Witness the world and its mother
There are three basic types of passengers and they’re easily recognised:-
Irregular: They’ll get on the bus (slowly, dubiously) and ask the bus driver which route he takes, does he go past so-and-so, how long will it take and, finally, how much will it cost. They’ll then spend an age digging the purse out of their bag/pocket, and another age searching for the right change. Amble down the aisle looking somewhat shell-shocked at the number of people crammed onto the bus, and totally at a loss when there’s nowhere to sit. Stand placidly at bus stops assuming the bus will actually stop - the fools.
Occasional: They’ll get on, sit down (if there’s a seat), and huff and tut for the entire journey, complaining loudly about the traffic. I always want to prod them and snarl, “Hey, mate, I do this every single day so stop yer whingeing!”
The seasoned traveller: Easily identified because of their resigned 'oh-my-god-here-we-go-again' expression, and because they’re weighed down with several bags containing a book or two, a couple of magazines, sandwiches, snacky foods (in case of emergency - i.e. a gridlock), bottles or cans of fluid (essential for survival in said gridlock), and a personal stereo to while away the hour or two of travelling. At bus stops, they assume nothing and wave their arms above their heads to attract the driver - some have even been known to step out into the path of bus to ensure it stops.
The mad bus driver who overtakes on single lane roads, zooms through red lights and cuts everybody up on islands, skidding to a sudden halt at bus stops or simply not stopping at all as people frantically attempt to wave him down. Constantly blaring horn and swearing at other motorists. Easily recognisable because you get off feeling positively grateful to still be alive.
The new bus driver. Not a clue where he’s going or where to stop. Turns left at Five Ways island and ends up driving down Hagley Road, which isn’t the route its supposed to take. Everyone on board has to direct him back on course.
The timid bus driver (easily identified because they look about 12, and nervous, very very nervous). Starts slowing down half a mile from bus stop, then overshoots so all the waiting passengers have to run to catch him up. Doesn’t pull out at junctions, doesn’t do above 20 miles an hour.
The sadistic bus driver. Waits until someone is coming down the isle before slamming on his brakes.
The yo-yo driver. These are the ones that discover the brake as if it’s a new invention. So they use it, prolifically, as they wait in traffic queues, along with that other ‘new invention’, the suspension. They rev the engine, pull forward an inch in the traffic queue, then slam on the brakes. Makes the bus rock backwards and forwards like a rocking horse, over and over again. And even better, the ‘kneeling’ buses can rock from side to side as well if the driver’s particularly bored, so you can go backwards and forwards and side to side at the same time. How amusing. Just what you need when you’re already clutching the seat feeling sick/hungover/faint.
The ‘more than my jobs worth’ driver. It doesn’t take much for the city centre to get clogged up and for all traffic to come to a complete standstill. Sometimes, just a broken down car or a minor accident in one of the underpasses is all it takes. You know when its happened when you find yourself standing at a bus stop for an hour and none of the traffic on the road in front of you has moved.
Finally, you spot your bus crawling round the corner at the end of the Colmore Row. It takes 25 minutes for it to cover the 25 metres to the stop. 300 people fight and scramble to get on board. You settle down in the seat you’ve pushed a pensioner out of the way for, grateful to be finally going home. The bus doesn’t move. 25 minutes later, the bus has covered 10 metres. You decide to get off. And that’s when you encounter the ‘jobs worth.’
This happened to me. I’d left work at 5.30, and by 6.30pm I was level with the building where I worked. I decided it would be quicker to walk, and went downstairs. There was a crowd standing around the driver.
“Are you all waiting to get off?” I asked innocently. “Yes,” they said, “But he won’t let us.” I approached the driver. “We want to get off,” I said, smiling. “I can’t let you off,” he said. “Why not?” I asked. The driver sighed heavily as if he was talking to a single celled organism, and said, “I can only let passengers off at a designated bus stop.”
There followed a few stiff words from myself along the lines of, “Don’t be ridiculous!” and “Let us off!” and finally, scrambling in my bag for my mobile phone, “I want the name of your supervising officer so I can report you!” I felt the crowd were behind me, as desperate to get off as I was.
“Look,” the driver sighed in that exasperating, patronising way, “I can’t let you off unless I pull up at the kerbside. It’s too dangerous. It’s for your own safety.” I looked outside the door. We were 12 inches away from the kerb, and the traffic outside wasn’t going anywhere. “Oh don’t be so bloody ridiculous!” I cried, “I’m sure we’re all mature enough to make it to the kerb on our own without getting ourselves killed.” The crowd laughed.
“Tell you what I’ll do,” he said, “I’ll pull up safely at the kerb, then I’ll let you off.” He turned the steering wheel dramatically to the left. Finally, I thought. The bus didn’t move because of the traffic, but it was ‘aimed’ in the right direction. Result! It took another 10 minutes for the bus, waiting for the traffic in front of him to move before he could, to ‘drive’ to the kerb. "Thanks a lot!" I snarled, as I finally alighted from the bus and began the long, long walk home (it took 95 minutes and, at the end of it, I thought my feet were crippled for life).
The racing bus driver. He who ignores everything around him (pedestrians, red lights, other drivers) and just Goes For It.
Late bus driver - goes hell for leather, turning corners at a 45 degree angle (while passenger valiantly hold onto their seats trying not to scream out loud)
Early bus driver - ambles along with all the time in the world. As he approaches the city (and his terminus) he ‘wastes time’ so he’s not too early by stopping at each bus stop for FIVE WHOLE MINUTES.
Surprisingly - the polite bus driver, who actually watches in your mirror until you’ve safely sat down in your seat (more noticeable with pensioners), as opposed to Putting His Foot down the minute you stagger down the aisle. Unfortunately, this type are few and far between.
The half-asleep bus driver. This happened just the other morning. We were crawling through the monstrously heavy traffic down a hill. An inch forward, a long wait, another inch forward (it doesn’t get more exciting that this!). You wouldn’t have thought anything could happen at minus 2 miles an hour, would you. But I did fleetingly think to myself, “Hmm, he’s a bit close to that bus in front,” but these are the kinds of things you get used to if you use public transport on a regular basis - sharp intakes of breath are the order of the day. Next thing, the bus I’m on hits the bus in front of it. Everyone goes, “Oooooooh.” The driver gets off and inspects the damage while we all wait to see if we’ll have to get off the bus and onto another (it happens). The driver gets back on, slams his cab door, and this little three year old kid says, “Did you have a little accident?” The whole bus laughs out loud - quite a nice start to the day actually.
• I always get them. If anyone gets on the bus who is ‘bigger than normal’ they come and sit next to me and squash their huge bodies against mine – you can feel the sheer bulk of their weight. My face is pressed like pink chewing gum against the glass every time the bus goes round a corner.
• Then there are the ‘fidgeters’, the ones that sit down next to you and do not keep still. Women fidget in their bags, nudging you constantly with their elbow, men read newspapers and knock their arms against yours every time they turn a page (waking you with a start from your semi-slumber). In my cartoon-like mind, I imagine beating them to a pulp screaming, "Will ... you ... please ... keep ... still!".
• Bus journeys are usually silent (on account of most of the passengers are still asleep or have lapsed into a coma). One morning, into the silence, a woman sitting on her own suddenly starts swearing out loud and rocking in her seat. I thought at first that the daily chore of getting to work had finally made her crack (I empathised). Then she made a phonecall (in a normal voice, so it was obviously her boss) and it became clear she had left at home something really important. Still cursing furiously, she got off the bus to go back and collect whatever it was she had forgotten, and she didn’t look the least bit pleased about it (her face was twisted with absolute fury). Even after she’d got off, we could still hear her swearing all the way across to the other side of the dual carriageway.
• Another morning, another burst of impromptu of entertainment. This time it was a Jamaican, obviously high on something, and using expletives I never knew existed. Throughout the entire journey he made crude comments about other passengers, mostly young ones (so, thankfully, that was me in the clear).
• The mother who got on and constantly moaned at her small child, berating him, smacking him and generally being a real bitch. The atmosphere on the top deck was thick with seething animosity towards her.
• Then there are the school kids. You’ll encounter many of these first thing in the morning. They’re SO loud, the sheer volume of their noise reverberating in the enclosed confines, sending some passengers insane and causing others, through the sheer inventiveness of their swearing, to vacant the bus completely.
• The boredom, the endless boredom, of crawling through heavy traffic for at least an hour every morning and every night. Getting through a book a week! (and heavily disappointed if the new book I start reading turns out to be a duff – then I’m forced to stare out of the window at all the other miserable human beings making their way to work).
• The gridlock where, sitting endlessly on the top deck having finished my doorstep of a book that morning, I would have gladly sold my soul for a newspaper, a magazine, anything to read.
• The struggle to get home in time to drive my partner to one of his rare nights out when the city centre is gridlocked … walked all the way down Broad Street, jumped on first bus that had broken through gridlock, jumped off when it turned somewhere I didn’t recognise, on another bus, off again, walk a mile home … and he says, “Oh, you shouldn’t have bothered.” (so much for gratitude!)
• I began feeling faint in the morning, every morning. It was awful; I'd feel the blood drain from my head, my gums tingled, my palms went sweaty, my heart would pound and the The Darkness would seep around the edges of my vision. I didn't know what caused this. I drank three mugs of coffee before I left for work, hoping it might keep me (and my fickle body) awake. I sucked on boiled sweets in case I was diabetic (later tests showed I wasn’t, by which time I was so heartily sick of boiled sweets I almost heaved on sight of one). This went on for months until I dreaded the sight of the bus coming up the road first thing in the morning, wondering if I’d feel faint today (usually at the same places, where there was heavy traffic and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get off the bus). On several occasions I had to ask the person sitting next to me to help me off because I wasn’t feeling well – then I had to wait, leaning against bus stops, until I felt well enough to get back on one.
One time I was excruciatingly embarrassed because this woman helped me off and I felt so ill I immediately had to sit down on the pavement. When I eventually managed to pull my spinning head up off my chest, I saw the whole side of the packed bus staring down at me. “I only work up the road,” I lied, struggling to my wobbly legs and staggering up the road to get away.
I once had to get off on Harborne High Street when the blood suddenly drained from my head. I went to the shop where my mom worked and told her how I kept feeling. She asked, “Do you breathe properly? Because sometimes I forget to breathe.” I wasn’t sure if I felt more concerned at that moment about my condition, or my mother!
By a process of elimination (gave up coffee, started eating breakfast and drinking orange juice before I left home), I finally discovered the cure … water. I was obviously dehydrated in the mornings (and coffee is a diuretic so it was actually make matters worse). Dehydration causes faintness! Who’d have thought? Now, I drink about three pints before I leave the house in the morning and, after an hour’s journey to get to work, its hit and miss whether I make it to the office toilet in time.
• Then there’s the toddler you encounter occasionally who sits in front of you, turned round in his seat, staring at you the whole time. You smile at first, then you try to ignore him, then you start giving him Really Stern Looks, then you pull your tongue out, at which point he believes you’re playing with him and makes loud noises, maybe blowing a few raspberries, drawing the attention of the whole bus onto you.
• I suddenly discovered I have an adverse reaction to sugar-free polo mints - they cause incredible ‘wind’. Unfortunately, I didn’t recognise it was the polo mints for quite a few days, during which (while my brain was trying to work it out), I suffered - and so did all my work colleagues. Whenever I moved, I let rip. Whenever I drew breath, I let rip. Coughing to cover the noise doesn’t help, it just makes it louder. I managed to look suitably innocent (as in, Who? Me? Lil ole me?) because I have no sense of smell (see 'Anosmia' in 'Other Stuff') and couldn’t actually smell it myself , but I didn’t always get away with this. I actually imagined the ‘waft’ following me around like a dirty grey cloud. The worse bit was having wind on a crowded rush-hour bus … I actually texted my sister at one point; “If you break wind on a bus, does everyone know where its coming from?” (because, having no sense of smell, I didn’t know). She texted back, “Just look innocent,” which I did anyway because I never knew if it was a ‘blank’ one or a ‘smelly’ one. Fortunately, the symptom ceased once I realised it was the polo’s (much to everyone’s relief).
• There is nothing worse in life than the sheer, bone-crushingly boring tedium of waiting at bus stops. Your feet ache (intended, as they are, to look attractive under office desks, not to be stood on for an hour or more). Pensioners start to get cranky and moan profusely, forcibly pushing themselves to the front of the queue, youngsters start to scream (and continue to do so once on the bus – Japanese torture was never so bad), and people, because there are so many of them, start to stand closer and closer, invading your personal space. I don’t like my personal space being invaded and, once pressed up against other potential passengers with no place to go, my imagination runs wild. In Technicolor cartoon fashion, I imagine myself dramatically Kung Fooing them all out of the way. Bit of interesting gossip at the back, and my imaginary ear grows to gigantic proportions and heads off towards the gossip. A beggar asking for change (when I’ve had to work my butt off all day for said change) is rugby tackled to the floor. A leering man has his arm pushed way up his back. Get the picture? Well, it keeps me amused.
• There was a woman who, frantically running down the edge of the road to catch the bus, tripped right in front of said bus and fell face down with her arms and legs stretched out like a starfish on the tarmac. The whole bus gasped (some sniggered - it’s a British slapstick comedy thing!). The woman got up again, stepped forward, then fell again. The sniggering became audible, overpowering the gasps and the cries of “Oh, poor woman!” Right next to her at the bus stop was a young man calmly smoking a cigarette. He didn’t move a single muscle to help, and eventually our bus driver had to get out and help her (primarily, I suspect, to get her out of the way).
• On the old type buses (where you can still open windows), the person at the front top deck might feel a bit warm with all the sunshine blazing down on them from all sides (the front seat on the top deck is, incidentally, The Best Seat). So they might open the window in front of them. They, of course, feel only a gentle breeze from this opening. Its only five seats back that you feel the full gale force and your hair blows out behind you like you’re on a speedboat.
• On the new type buses, they have a total of four windows that open because they’re ‘air conditioned’. The air conditioning blows cold in winter (at the end of your journey you can no longer feel your feet or your hands) and hot in summer (so its like boarding a mobile greenhouse and you sit there, melting, losing a pound an hour, with passengers complain about the ‘stench of sweat’ - like I’d know what that was like! (See Other Bits/Anosmia)).
• Massive huge man with balding palate sitting at the front trying very hard (but failing) to conceal the cover of the book he was reading - “Cross Dressing.”
• The young man who swaggers down the aisle, plonks himself unceremoniously next to you, and spreads his legs. Now, whilst this might look ‘macho’ in a pub, it leaves little room for me. I sit there for a while, trying to keep my legs tightly closed so they don’t touch his, but my leg muscles aren't used to this kind of exercise and start to shake, eliciting strange looks from the wide apart bloke next to me.
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