End

My lovely readers,

I’m writing this from the bus because it will be my last post and I thought it suited the occasion. 

The only interesting thing that’s happened today is that I almost missed the bus, but thankfully the driver saw me and waited. Now you know how you see people running to the bus? Well that’s not me, I actually walked.

The bus driver was sweet about it too. When I walked on the bus I apologized for being slow and he replied by saying, “it’s alright, at least you didn’t look like a lunatic running after me.” I laughed and agreed then took my seat.

Don’t you just love it when people are funny and super nice?  

Anyway everyone, it’s been four/five weeks of me talking transit. I’m about to get off the bus and  I won’t be taking it for the next two weeks (maybe longer) so it seems I’m ending thing at the perfect time. 

Walking Drivers

Hello there readers! Are y’all ready to begin talking transit?

Some people are considered to be very rude, especially transit riders.

Yesterday on the bus, it was a normal Wednesday evening and some teenagers thought they were being so funny and “cool.” They’d pull the wire to request a stop but they’d never get off. It went like that for a while and the bus driver couldn’t just not stop because he didn’t know if someone would actually get off or not.

From where I was sitting you could tell he was getting very angry and he continuously sighing with an annoyed tone. Eventually he couldn’t handle it anymore. When he stopped the bus and no one got off he just got up and left.

At first I thought he wasn’t coming back. He walked down the street then a couple minutes later came back to the bus. He seemed calmer but you could tell he was still a little agitated.

He didn’t say anything to anyone, he just got in his seat and began driving like nothing happened. The teens didn’t pull the wire again until they were really getting off and everything went back to normal. 

It was a weird experience, but then again, so are most of my trips on the bus! 

She flew!

Hey readers, are you ready to talk transit?

 Now, I don’t have anything new to talk about but for now, I’m going to bring up an old experience.

Old people tend to take the bus a lot. For the past few months I’d say 65% of people I’ve seen on the bus were rather old (by old I mean, at least, 60+). Usually I don’t notice them much. They’ll walk on, sit down, get off… Nothing exciting.  But a couple weeks ago, something happened that got me worrying.

It was a Wednesday, I was on my way home and everything seemed to go normal. Then three old ladies walked on the bus, walking as slow as they possibly could. Each one of them had a walker to help them out, these were the walker that have a little seat on them so if you’re using it, you can sit down. When the ladies finally paid for the bus, they took up the front few seats, only one of them didn’t sit on a seat. She sit in the aisle of the bus, sitting on the seat of her walker and looked comfortable. Little did she know, she was going to fall off.

When the bus got to the next stop, the woman flew off her seat and onto the ground. It all seemed to go in slow motion. No one got up to help her, and her friends just started yelling at her to get up. To this day, I regret not getting up to help her. The bus driver and another woman on the bus helped her up and sat her down on an actual seat and not her walker. The sad part was, the whole time her friends didn’t seem to care for her, they just yelled at her for being dumb.

After a couple minutes, she insisted she was alright and asked everyone to go back to what they were doing. She stayed quiet for the rest of the ride until she got off, and when asked one last time if she was alright, she replied with, “thank you very much, but I’m okay.”

I respect that lady. She was able to take a hard fall and not cry. Now if it were me, I’d probably start bawling my eyes out before I even touched the ground.  What about you readers? How would you have reacted if you flew off your seat and onto the bus floor?

I’d love to hear from you! Until next time when I, talk transit! 

Photographer

 Hello everyone! Julie here, are you ready to talk transit?

Today I’m not going to be talking about a moment on the bus from this week. The reason is that I only took the bus once this week, so I don’t really have much to talk about, but I will bring up a past story!

A few months ago, when I first began to ride the bus, I had a pretty weird encounter with this man. I was waiting for the bus and he walked up to the stop like any normal man, the only difference is that he was staring right at me. Now, this man didn’t do anything physically harmful to me, which I’m blessed for, but he did give me a little scare. Our conversation went a little like this:

“Hey there, you look like a smart girl, do you think you could change the weather?”  Now when he said that I began laughing because if he was trying to pick me up, it sure wasn’t working. I did reply though, I casually explained that I appreciate the comment but I wasn’t smart enough to change weather, but I wish I could. “What a shame,” he said. And I really thought the conversation was over, but I was wrong. He continued talking, asking me where I was like, which was very creepy, and what I did for a living, again very creepy. I did all I could to change the subject from me, to him. So when he did finally start telling me about himself, I began to wish I was mean enough to just walk away but I wasn’t.

The things I know about this stranger are things I wish I didn’t here. He told me about his past; how he was always so competitive in school and how he wishes he could go back and make actual friends. And he eventually got to what he did now. “I’m a photographer actually,” he stated, “Not professionally, but it’s more of a hobby.” This is when my brain began to scream, “He’s a creeper Julie, just back away slowly…” But, of course I didn’t. The good news was that I finally saw the bus I was waiting for, so I stepped closer to the edge. What I didn’t expect was him to step closer to it to. “You know, I’m actually looking for more models.” I smiled as well as I could, gave him my luck, and walked on the bus. I made sure to sit close to other people so he couldn’t sit near me, and put my headphones in so I wouldn’t be disturbed by anyone, anymore.

I guess that’s the one day I’ll never forget about when I began taking public transportation. It’s the first story I’d tell people when they ask me how my experience has been and it always will be. If there is one story that can keep me talking transit, it’s this one!  

Absolutely Livid

Hello, my name is Julie EL-Chaer and I’m here to talk about the wild ride many call “public transportation.” So let’s start talking transit!

Originally this first post was going to be about my experience using the bus, but something happened yesterday that I strongly feel should be discussed. Yesterday, when I finished class, I was waiting for the bus (as I do every Wednesday) and the rudest thing happened. Not only was the bus late to come to the stop I was at, but it decided to continue going and not stop to pick me up.

Now, when the bus drove by me I was confused at first. Giving the driver the “where are you going” look, but all he did in return was shake his head. I went through as the possibilities of it driving by. The bus, from what I saw through the window, didn’t look too busy and it was only me at the stop, so it couldn’t be because there was no room.

I’ve had a lot bad experiences on the bus, but this one takes the cake. I don’t think I’ve ever been so livid because of public transportation before, and that includes the first time I took the bus, when it was 10 minutes late and I was almost late to school.

Now, not every week am I going to rant about how horrible the bus it, I just wanted to get this little thing off my chest. Stick around, because every Thursday I’ll have a whole new experience while we talk transit!