Bus-iness as usual

Dear dedicated reader,

Somewhere between watching a woman repeatedly throw up into a small plastic bag that she carried with her for that purpose and becoming a little too close to the migrating limbs of the narcoleptic man sitting next to me, I realize that there are few joys that delight more than taking the local bus.

Seriously: as we careened haplessly around a hairpin corner on a mountain road with no guard rail with a thousand foot drop on the other side, I happened to quell my terror long enough to spot a comfortable, close windowed, air conditioned tourist bus out of the corner of my eye. The look of utter boredom which was apparent on the faces of the passengers within said bus as they passively took in the countryside was enough to convince me that if I were to die on these mountain roads (a fate which I felt at this point in my observations of Nepalese driving was assured), I would much rather do so while listening to a sixty minute loop of the same Nepalese music with the wind blowing in my face than in some comfortably cushioned video coach.

But really, I should start at the beginning. Bolstered by Obama’s heartening win, Kate and I arrived at the New City Bus Station in high spirits. I can’t attribute these completely to politics: we’d been looking forward to leaving the unchecked chaos of Kathmandu since we arrived. Our destination was the small mountain town of Bandipur which had been recommended by friends and a random Frenchman with whom Kate had struck up an acquaintance before I arrived. We also wanted to break up the seven hour ride to the other major tourist city here in Nepal, Pokhara.

Upon our arrival, we did what any good westerners might do: we set off to ferret out where the tickets for the buses were sold. Immediately, we were set upon by some adolescent boys asking in their accented English, “Where do you want to go?” We’d become used to this routine from our exploration of Kathmandu’s Metro Bus Service (a series of small vans with boys who travel with them and shout out the names of where the van is going to any interested passerby), so we told them. Immediately they grabbed our arms and ushered us frantically to a window which said clearly in Devanagri the name of our destination.

“You pay 220 for one – okay?” The boy/man shouted at us with a frenetic energy I can only attribute to local urgency or cocaine. I looked at Kate.

“I think you should ask at the window,” she said.

I turned back to the window and yelled over the head of the boy/man to the guy sitting behind the grill in Hindi, “Hey bhai, how much to go to Dumre?”

He mumbled back a number that sounded the same, so we handed over a 1000 rupee note in the hopes of getting change. The boy/man immediately took off with us in tow and unceremoniously pushed us onto the bus.

“You sit here,” he said, indicating the seat directly behind the drivers.

I threw down my bag and Kate headed towards the back of the coach, as we had previously agreed on sitting apart during the journey in order to allow each other to fully get in ‘the zone’ (not to mention give a little space).

Boy/man then disappeared and left us wondering what the hell happened to our change…

I settled into the seat “assigned” to me. As the bus started and boy/man got behind the wheel, I learned early on that there are a few distinct advantages to having the seat directly behind the driver’s:

1. Front row seats for the magic show that is keeping a Nepalese bus on the road.
2. Intimate acquaintance with the top part of the bus’s engine as it is located (gasp) directly in front of you, shaking and rattling and overheating your legs which must rest on it out of necessity.
3. There’s no one sitting in front of you to throw up/spit/toss trash out their open window that will subsequently splash on you through your open window.
4. First pick of the various snacks peddled at the national high way bus stops including but not limited to: freshly cut cucumber, Indian cheetos, and small dried fish speared on wooden kabobs replete with eyes, scales and fins.

Actually, my favorite part of my particular vantage point was that I got to observe first hand that the driver of this multi-passenger vehicle and I actually have a lot in common. Just like me, the driver would occasionally get thirsty while driving, fumble with his water bottle and hold the steering wheel lightly with one hand or perhaps his knee; also like me, he’d occasionally get sick of the music playing and I’d watch his eyes leave the road so he could fumble around on the dashboard for a different tape, which he’d then have to insert into the bus sound system and press play. But don’t worry: only once or twice during these minor distractions did we actually face the possibility head on collision with an oncoming vehicle.

Another delight was watching the woman across from me breast feed her baby. Now, I am in all for public breastfeeding: I mean, if the baby needs to be fed, it needs to be fed and really its just a natural relationship between mother and child. However, usually, after the feeding is finished, you can count on the mother to remember to put her breast away. Unfortunately in this situation, mom was so distracted by having to throw up in her plastic bag every so often, she and baby simply fell asleep, both forgetting that her breast was still hanging around, literally. I wasn’t sure if, as one of the only other woman in the vicinity, I should say something? I mean, what would you have done?

With a sudden eventual jolt of the bus stopping at some discrete village location, she awoke and rearranged herself accordingly. Fortunately, this particular jolt also woke the narcoleptic man next to me whose head had migrated to my shoulder and elbow to my stomach, and he similarly rearranged. Not so fortunately, his new consciousness also made him realize that his bus stop was imminent, and on seeing an acquaintance of his out the bus window, he poked me in the eye with a rolled up newspaper while wildly gesturing to “Vikram” and hitting the back of the seat of the bus driver to get him to stop the bus. The bus driver having obliged, he got down and I was free, but by that time, our interminable bus ride became terminal as I saw a sign which indicated we were only five kilometers from Dumre.

I mean, honestly, who wouldn’t want to travel this way?

Best,
Cat