On the Buses in My Bangkok

My Limousine

Using public transport is a great way to know your local situation and to know you within it.  It all happens on the road, where you encounter the local populous, enter into conversations and observe your fellow passengers, as well as look out for yourself.  It is a real eye opener into life on the ground running, so to speak.  

Like life, it is all a mixed bag.  I had my bus ride from hell, when a bus conductor yelled at me, on her getting frustrated, with my persistence, in trying to pronounce a local destination properly.  A long term result was that I now know how to pronounce that name so as to be understood.  It is experiences like this, from which one learns a language.  

Apart from my horror stories, my catalogue of bus stories are full of learning, friendly encounters and, yes, love.  I observe and so learn about people and their lives.  They are tired; they keep going every day; they even struggle to get on and off, despite all odds.  I have had the friendly conversations in Thai or the occasional, inquisitive enquiry about where I am going.  I exchanged phone numbers once with a fellow passenger, a friendly and talkative female.  Then I once sang a song with a bus conductor and one even told me that she loved me.  I replied that I love her long time, but never saw her again.  

On the Bangkok buses, the bus conductors are the powerful figures.  They do more than sell bus tickets.  Their work is long and strenuous.  They are the ones who can make or break your journey, with either a smile or an occasional frown.      

Riding the buses opens my eyes to the richness, vibrancy and diversity of the life I share in My Bangkok.  It is an everyday context, within which I discover more about my identity and the identity of others, with whom I share my daily life.  Riding the buses in My Bangkok is a vital way of my healthily asserting myself into local life, of which I am a part.  It is all about so much more than riding buses to get places.  It is a vehicle for learning about who I am in my community, for knowing my place in it, for assuring me of my role in it.  No matter who I am, here I belong for now and here I have my invaluable role to play.  We belong together,  Together, we create that rich, vibrant and diverse world.    

It's all yours for the taking