Above, the rider camped at Red Chilly in Mbuya. He stayed in Kampala for
a few days and continued his journey to Rwanda. Below, he met Keneth
Kaunda when he was in Zambia. PHOTOS BY ISMAIL KEZAALA AND COURTESY
PHOTO
In Summary
The bicycle adventurer. Canadian Dave Conroy gave up
his job as a computer consultant and set off on the adventure of his
life, cycling to different countries in the world. He has already been
to 10
African countries on what he calls a “one of its kind” bicycle.
Dave Conroy’s life story is as incredibly
amazing as it is unbelievable. For four years, the 35-year-old Canadian,
currently in Uganda, has ridden his bicycle around North America and
Africa and is still on the move. He quit a well paying computer job,
sold off his life possessions and set out on a mission to discover the
world- on two wheels. How long it takes him, he has no idea. Whether he
will pull it off or not, he is not sure.
A bicycle, his everythingFrom
first impression, Conroy comes off as a perfect time manager. The
appointment at Mbuya based Red Chilli Hideaway is set for 4pm. A phone
call at the guest house’s gate to announce our arrival receives an
instant, “I will join you in a second.” Hardly had we identified a seat
for the interview, than a well built medium height man dashes out,
dressed in a tight fitting red t-shirt and pair of black multi-pocketed
cargo pants. Walking towards us, his pair of weighty, mountain-climber
like shoes stamp the green compound.
When the photojournalist asks to have photographs
taken first and then leave us to proceed with the interview, his face
lights up with a contagious smile. He reaches for his bicycle, holding
it with enviable warmness and murmurs, “this is my wardrobe, kitchen,
girlfriend, office, bedroom, best friend and worst enemy at the same
time.”
The sports bicycle, he claims, is the only one of
its kind in the world. It was specially assembled for him in Britain six
months before he hit the road. He will not reveal how much it cost him,
but heaps praise on the machine whose rim bears 13 stickers of flags of
the countries he has visited so far.
On average, the bicycle’s weight, with all the six bags he travels with combined, comes to 75 kilogrammes.
“It
has some amazing features. I charge my electrical devices like the
music system and phone using pedal power. The faster I pedal, the more
energy it generates, so I only use petrol and diesel for the cooking
stove,” he says, holding its tyres that have most recently ridden all
the way from South Africa.
When we finally zero down on a comfy place
for the three hour long interview, the sight of a tent draws more
questions than sheer admiration.
This is his bedroom, anywhere and
anytime wherever darkness dawns on him. The water proof, one metre long
structure has a cozy yellow interior and air mattress.
“I need a good
night’s rest otherwise I won’t ride the next day so it has got to be
that cosy,” he shares, nodding his head. With a fairly good rapport
established, we are now set to dig into his life.
Life of a computer nerd
Born
in Canada, the last born of three children of two working class parents
admits obsession with computers, calling himself, “a computer nerd.” By
the age of eight, he would sit behind a computer for an average of 12
hours a day. Not playing games. And neither surfing the internet. In any
case, this was in the 1980s when social media platforms like Facebook
or even its founder, Mark Zuckerberg were not yet born.
Whilst other children played about, little Dave
busied himself trying to learn how computers worked. Scratching his head
to understand complex computer aspects like programming and networking.
“My parents were okay with it because they knew where I was,” he quips.
Nature however, was not okay with it. The computer without play
lifestyle took a stall on him. “My life went crazy, I was not sociable,
and I spent a lot of time on the screen, seeing things and yearning to
learn everything about them. I could not sleep, I was not happy with
life,” he says.
He started to worry about how to be successful,
rich and what he was going to do with his life at 70. For a teenager,
life was taking him on a rollercoaster of illusion and out of the world
fantasies. Perhaps, he suggests, this had to do with his childhood
environment. His sister was on special needs education following a
pre-mature birth. Today, she is his role model. “The doctor said she
would never sit upright. Today she has two children, a degree and is
happily married. She inspires me because she didn’t let someone’s
opinion determine her life.”
Describing himself as an introvert, architect of
ideas, who loves adventure and doing things outside the conventional,
almost structured western way of life, this single man, who shoves off
the marriage question, set out to do something different with his life.
First, he quit high school. A few weeks to graduation. The reason?
“I
wanted to see what would happen. But on a serious note, school was too
slow for me. It was not giving me the challenge I wanted in life.” That
was only a step into a zillion miles of an anew life that would leave
tongues wagging. Next on the agenda was to resign from a well paying
computer related job that earned him consultancy stints beyond Canada.
Daring to follow his dreams
Then came the
bombshell. He sold off all his possessions. From the mansion to whatever
came with it, be it kitchen ware, clothes or furniture. Everything had
to go. He only remained with two boxes of books and letters from
friends.
“He has gone crazy. May be he wants to kill
himself,” he quotes reactions to his eye-brow raising actions from
family and friends. “I knew what I was doing. I told them you can
express your concern, you are allowed to but just sit back and watch,
wait and see and wish me well,” he told them.
It is this that amazon.com, in a review of his
self published 240 page book entitled, “Tired of I.T. How I learnt to
stop worrying and love the bicycle,” calls Dave’s quest to, “reprogram
his mind and find inner peace.”
Conroy saw that inner peace in only one thing- the
bicycle. It is at this point that the idea to discover the world and
its peoples was born. For six months, he did extensive research on the
internet and read self help books. About tourism, bicycles, cookery,
accidents and first aid and everything he needed for a ride around the
globe. The initial plan was to achieve the dream in nine months which
later stretched to a year, two years, three years and now four years. He
has since stopped counting.
The start of an incredible adventureHe
chose July 2009 as the start of his journey. On the D-day, he didn’t
sleep, thanks to intense anxiety. Much as he loved bicycles, he had
taken two decades without riding one. He awoke, hurried to a restaurant
for breakfast and grabbed his bicycle for a ride from Vancouver to the
Gulf Islands in Canada. That was in 10 hours for a distance of
160-180km. His speed has since gone on a down ward spiral to 140km in
2010, 120km in 2011, 100km in 2012 and 80km in 2013.
Deep in the woods’ wilderness, he suffered his
first set backs. First came mosquitoes and other strange insects that
stung him, ripping skin and causing unstoppable bleeding. Then surviving
death by a whisker when a suspected poacher shot at him twice,
mistaking him for an animal. Luckily both bullets missed him.
That however, did not deter his ambition to cross
to the United States, where he spent 30 days cycling across different
regions of the vast North American nation. Another package of challenges
awaited him in the wild with four legged creatures ranging from wild
cats to beasts he had never seen attacking him. He pulls out a small
knife, pushes its sharp end to his lower lip and says, “this lip is
paralysed for the rest of my life. I got fellow riders in the US and we
hang our bikes in trees. Mine fell and hurt me.”
