The Back of the Bus ft. Bus no. 16

I will start this off by giving a disclaimer that there are a lot of different buses here with different interior layouts and designs. Some buses are big and some are small. Some seating makes a lot more sense than it does in other buses. Expect this - you will encounter different buses, should you ever decide to visit Korea.

Now I know I just started this blog, and while I plan to write about my most recent bus adventures, I’d be doing a disservice to not only me, but you too – If I didn’t share the story I’m about to tell.

If there’s one word of advice I can give to you about the buses here in Korea (at least the public transport ones) – it’s to do anything BUT sit right at the back. I’m not talking about the seats near the back but rather the ones at the very back. The ones that sit slightly higher than all the others. The ones where there’s a row of at least four or five seats all lined up next to each other.

< [ Here are two pictures to help you envision the seats at the very back.]

Let me tell you some very ‘obvious’ reasons not to sit in those seats…

Number 1. If you sit in a back seat of the bus and the bus hypothetically crashes or abruptly stops to the point where people will jolt forward – you may expect to see yourself obtaining whiplash. You see…you are seated higher up than everyone else, so apart from the fact that there’s no seatbelts in the bus and that the bus drivers are usually going a lot faster than what I would generally presume to be a safe driving speed – there’s also nothing directly in front of you to stop you from launching forward into the abyss of ‘mistakes were made sitting here.’ If you think I’m sounding very dramatic – you’re not wrong. But neither am I. Although I have yet to see this happen to anyone, it’s as valid a reason as ‘why putting your feet up on your mother’s dashboard is a bad idea’. We all know our knees will impale our chests. We all know it’s never a good idea…but alas…we do it anyway, don’t we?

Anyway…moving on. Some buses are usually littered with poles to grab onto, and as tempted as you may be to swirl yourself around them, they’re not stripper poles.

Whilst these poles are a great way to help support you if you must stand, they make for a very unfortunate weapon, should you fly forward and knock into one of them head-on. Be wary of them.

Let’s move on to obvious reason Number 2. Going to and coming from the back of the bus is a hassle. It isn’t easy. The buses here have buttons you must press when your stop is approaching. Often, these buttons are spaced out around the bus along the walls. Unfortunately, you’re not always sitting close enough to one – which means you have to get up and make your way to the middle of the bus (where the exit door is) so that you can press one. You could also lean over someone to do so. If you’re lucky enough, there’ll be a button on the roof of the bus near the middle-back (you’re welcome). So…in saying all these things, you’ll be riddled with anxiety trying to figure out which button you’re going to press and who you’re going to have to awkwardly and somewhat rudely reach over. Not that people seem to mind. Doing so is pretty normal here.

Okay, let’s move on to the less obvious reason. The reason that really just depends on one simple factor. Rush hour. The reason that shattered my nerves and beat my dignity to a pulp. Let me just say that there’s truly nothing quite like a crammed bus.

Okay, let’s envision the scene together…

We get on a bus… bus number 16 to be exact. The driver is friendly enough and you proceed to scan your bus card on the little machine that sits near the door, ready to welcome you as a reminder to PAY UP. This ride ain’t free.

You’re looking for an open seat while simultaneously avoiding unwelcomed eye contact. You then realise you’ve made your way towards the back of the bus. You think ‘I really shouldn’t’ but you do it anyway. You sit down. You’re right at the back. As back as back can be. I’m there with you. We’re sharing a body at this point…

It’s all going well-ish?, so we think. It’s your first time on a bus going from work and it's around 5 o’ clock in the afternoon. You’re not very confident or comfortable but you’re trying to enjoy the view from the left side window you’re sat next to. You have space. No one wants to sit next to you because you’re a foreigner and foreigners can be scary (just jokes people.) BUT THEN, we reach the Bus Terminal stop – a stop where an influx of people either get off or get on during this time of day. In this unfortunate case – a lot of people get on. They come in like ants and they’re never-ending. We should probably start panicking. Our stop is approaching. Getting up now would be the smarter decision. But we’re frozen in fear of self-doubt and worry, not wanting to deal with it right this second. Fools we are.

The next thing we know, a bunch of rowdy (what I assume to be) middle school boys sit with us. They fill up the remaining back seats. Oh, but there’s MORE.

People don’t stop getting on. They keep coming to the point where they have to fill up the back aisle and stand in it, practically blocking all paths to freedom. Foock. Now we’re really trapped. We contemplate missing our stop in favour of not living out having dug our own graves. But I guess we might as well get on with it and bury ourselves…

Once the bus starts moving, you press the button out of panic. We think this is the right stop? The teenage punks realise you need to get off, but their knobby legs are too long and they’re blocking you in. One eventually gets up and walks a little downward. You follow him. You then have to awkwardly do the rango-tango shimmy-shuffle to try and get around each other because he’s now in front and you’re now behind, but really it should be the other way around. Your head is spinning at this point. All this whilst knowing there’s more people in front of you blocking the way to freedom.

But the next thing you know, the bus approaches what can only be assumed to be some sort of high bump in the road, at an obnoxious speed. KA-DONK. Welp.

We literally go flying. You surge up, I surge up, the teenage punk surges up.

At this point, we’re bonking around like damn pinballs in that 1995 Windows XP Pinball game being played by a child that doesn’t know what they’re doing. We’re all in the air at this point…I’m regretting my choice to even move to Korea in the first place because how do you recover from such humiliation? We (metaphorical you and me) almost squash and kill the boy when gravity decides we’ve had enough. But he survives, much to our relief.

We don’t turn back. We force our way passed all the standing bus passengers– they have no faces at this point because we’re too fear-struck to look at what expressions they may hold. We make it. We finally get off as the bus comes to a halt. We want to simultaneously cry, lurch, and simply squeal for making it out of there alive. Hallelujah~!

Only then, we realise…. it’s the wrong damn stop.

*End traumatic flashback*

So, if you hadn’t guessed it by now, I took you on a journey with me to re-live my first ever, VERY traumatic bus experience.

You see, I had changed schools at the beginning of this year and my new school required me to take a bus instead of walking (since it was over 4 kilometers away). Although I wasn’t totally unaware that a bus could become quite full, I had never anticipated anything like this happening. NEVER. EVER. AGAIN. Just kidding, I totally did it again. But did I encounter the same fate? Thankfully not.

But I survived and learned from such an experience, and I hope you can learn from it too. Just don’t even entertain the thought of sitting right at the back of the bus (here at least) – even if your journey is long and you want to sit down. It’s never worth it. You’re better off standing.

Until the next stop,

Bus Blog Driver Tay