Week 11 8/19/09 Toad’s Wild Ride
Well, this is it – the final week of training. Already it has been a hard week because we are tired of going to school and attempting to learn a language. We thought that we would just get to sit back this week and let the training people pour information into our minds.
Unfortunately, they wanted us to research the topics and do the training ourselves. And yes, I do understand that this is a much better way to learn something.
Tonight I have to pack up everything so they can take it to the Peace Corp office on Thursday. We need to divide it into three groups – what you need for this weekend, what you will take with you (on the bus) to your site on Monday or Tuesday, and what you can leave behind for Peace Corps to bring on the site presentation (which in my case is the second week of September so I don’t have long to wait for it). I’m still of two minds about getting a bicycle – am I really capable of riding one (fortunately, the area is very flat where I live) or should I just walk everywhere – or will I fall off the darn thing and break my neck. We’ll see. They are very nice bikes.
So time to tell of another adventure – which does involve buses but not getting anything stolen. Bambi needed to go into San Lorenzo to get money out of the ATM. This is about an hour’s ride from Guarambare where we had class yesterday. I said that I would go with her. Now, you have heard me speak of how terrible I am on getting the bus to stop for me. Buses pass me by all the time (which is really weird because once I get on the bus, I always get a seat, no matter how crowded it is – Bambi calls it the old and infirmed reason). Believe it or not, we got a bus to San Lorenzo within 5 minutes of waiting at the bus stop. Best yet, the bus stops right in front of the supermercado Salemma. This is truly our day for buses because this morning we arrived at CHP 45 minutes early because all the buses were on time and not even crowded. So we did a little shopping in San Lorenzo and feeling so good about the buses, went out to catch the #50 or the #32 back home. That’s when our bus luck ran out. We waited about 15 minutes and saw bus after very crowded bus passing us by (not our buses). Finally, the #50 came. And it definitely had the Kilometer
23 sign in the window. Unfortunately, it was the wrong #50 bus. I was watching out the window when we passed by our turn. Immediately, I yelled to Bambi, “Wrong bus – time to get off!” So we did. We have often walked from Kilometer 23 to our house. It is only about 4 kilometers. However, we were kind of tired and it was late so we decided to take the next bus that happened along. The next bus was extremely crowded, so much so, in fact, that we were not able to get on the front. The designated “pusher” yelled for us to come to the back of the bus. Now you must remember that I had a shopping bag in one hand and a very full backpack on my back. The step was very high (because this is a very uneven dirt road) so I needed Bambi to push me up onto the bus. This bus had a turnstile so I couldn’t go any further than that because it turned toward me not towards the interior of the bus. So each time someone wanted to get off, Bambi and I needed to get off the bus and then back on. And we weren’t the only ones standing in the stairwell. The designated “pusher” would give me a shove to help me get back up the step. The shove also came with sound effects “ooofph” or “updah.” By this time Bambi and I are dissolved in laughter because the sound effects are so funny. It’s almost as if we are on Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. Everyone in the back of the bus watching us is also laughing because it is funny and since we’re laughing, they can now laugh too. By this time at least 20 people have left the bus.
Once we tried running up to the front of the bus but no one in the front is moving toward the back so we had to race back to the rear of the bus to get back on (Fortunately, our pusher yelled to the bus driver to stop and not leave us as we are racing back and forth).
Finally, after another 3 or 4 stops, the pusher decides that it is time for us to go to the front. No one in the front has moved even an inch towards the back but we jump onto the steps, hold on for dear life, and the bus takes off. They do not shut the bus doors and I actually didn’t feel in any danger but it was an experience I don’t care to repeat with my rear (and my backpack) hanging outside the bus as we travel down the road. We did finally manage to get inside the bus, through the front turnstile, and with my usual luck someone gave me their seat. It was only later that we discovered that Diana was on this same bus. I think she was just keeping a low profile so that no one would know that the crazy old American lady lives with her.