On the buses

30 July 2024

It is a truth universally acknowledged that while waiting for a bus, several will come in a row – but always on the opposite side of the road. However, despite the vagaries of bus scheduling and the fact buses tend to be at the bottom rung in the public transport hierarchy, I quite like catching the bus. Each trip you are treated to a microcosm of the city’s multicultural, multi-ethnic communities. Transport companies truly practise equal opportunity when it comes to employment. You see it as the turbaned Sikh comes on as the driver of African descent leaves, or the woman cheerily wishes everyone good afternoon while the man she replaces obviously can’t wait for his shift to finish. And as the drivers change, snatches of overheard conversation confirm Australianness in broad accents or discussion of the latest footy scores. The passengers are as varied. In the morning, students in immaculate uniforms are subdued, while in the evening they chatter loudly with ties loose and shirts hanging out. The elderly sit with those vertical trolley bags of shopping, parents nurse young children, teenagers surreptitiously hold hands. Girls in hijabs chat with friends in shorts and T-shirts. A young man skips through his playlist trying to find something to listen to, but having forgotten his headphones the rest of the passengers learn more about his execrable taste in music than desirable. A group of young people chat but as every second word of this loud conversation is a swear word the rest of passengers shift uncomfortably wondering if violence is in the offing, only to be surprised that when disembarking each of them loudly thank the driver – a courtesy that, it seems to me, has become less and less observed.

If the scenery outside becomes too repetitive or people-watching is not your style, there may be other things in the bus to hold your attention. The other day I was amused to read that a door had been tagged as a ‘defected unit’. What did that mean? Had it once belonged on a Russian bus and had made a bid for freedom, or had it been detected wanting to defect from the bus it was on? The stories one could weave around that one wrong word were endless.

Yes, it can be dreary waiting for buses that are late or cancelled, especially if there’s no shelter and the weather is unkind. Sometimes the bus is

AUSTRALIA

On the buses

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