As anyone who has used public transport knows, it’s a bit of a horror show. Hence it’s refreshing to see a journalist, a senior writer for the New Zealand Herald, no less, in agreement.
Did you hear? Auckland has invented train travel.
Last month, the new City Rail Link officially displaced Ikea flat pack furniture as the infrastructure most likely to be discussed at a Ponsonby dinner party.
The trip between the new midtown and Karangahape Road stations takes three minutes in real time and about five weeks and counting in social media videos, live news blogs and talkback radio reckons.
Auckland is a kid at Christmas in love with its shiny new City Rail Link. Sadly, like the three AAA batteries required to power a modern Barbie Dreamhouse or a KPop Demon Hunters lightstick, that love will fade and die – because the only people genuinely enamoured with public transport are the people who don’t have to use it every day.”
No doubt these same people believe in earnest that they are doing us plebs a major favour. When challenged on why they don’t use public transport themselves, the reply is always something on the lines of ‘I’m special.’
[…] That one time you rode the bus? That single sparkling day you had to leave your car at the garage for an oil change and flagged down the 27H and finished the new Ann Patchett somewhere between the village shops and The French Cafe and it was so stress-free and convenient and why doesn’t everybody do this?
Yeah, nah.
Recently, I spent 35 minutes avoiding eye contact with a man zooming up and down the aisle with outstretched arms yelling “I can fly... we can ALL fly…”
Which, to be fair, makes him a better comedian than any New Zealand comedian.
Some days, the worst thing you see on the bus is a grown man’s Garfield bag taking up an entire seat. Other days, you wish you could unsee the messages being typed by a pimply young man in a wrinkled suit who is maxing his afternoon commute with a Sugar Daddy side hustle.
This, by the way, is known as a ‘good bus trip’.
Some mornings the bus smells like last night’s dinner clinging to a coat or a cheap perfume that hasn’t had time to mellow. Other times it smells like the solvents in the bag someone is huffing on the back seat. Once, I sat behind two passengers who ate potato chips and argued over who had shoplifted the best flavour.
Particularly bad is the smell of dead mutton bird. And don’t get me started on KFC.
[…] There are definitive rules about how to behave on public transport. There are also absolute givens that are not written down but possibly should be.
In Japan, for example, it is considered rude to speak loudly or use your cellphone in this moving shared space. In Auckland, at least seven passengers will be scrolling YouTube, conducting a WhatsApp video call, or watching an international football match. None will be wearing headphones.”
Japan takes politeness to the extremes.
Auckland Transport’s conditions of carriage “encourage” passengers to offer their seats to older people, pregnant women and anyone with a disability or mobility difficulties. Obviously, if you are under 30, this does not apply to you because… actually, I don’t know why. Is it because you are a self-entitled brat?
Passengers are not allowed to board the bus with radioactive materials or poison. Fair enough. How about two buckets of KFC, a hacking cough and unspeakable racism?
Like supermarkets, public transport has its own share of ‘personalities’.
We have for example the ‘shower phobic’.
In my 20s, there was a guy with greasy hair who smelt like he hadn’t showered since Hitler invaded Poland. What’s worse is that no matter how empty the bus was he would also make a beeline for the nearest girl sitting by herself. This brings me to the next personality.
The ‘It’s always better to sit next to someone’.
Imagine being in a bus when there’s literally only a few people on it. You have the whole seat to yourself and then someone gets on it. There are empty seats everywhere and they, for some unknown reason, choose to sit next to you. Worse, is when they spread their legs, and this brings me to…
The ‘Manspreader’.
These of course are guys with testicles the size of small grapes who try and compensate by acting as if their balls are the size of grapefruits, making it impossible from them to have their thighs together. Having tiny testicles often means having a tiny penis, meaning they love to exert their dominance, making it impossible to regain territory without starting World War III.
Then there’s the ‘bag buddy’.
These are passengers who believe that their bags are their best friends and deserve space on the seat of their own, no matter how full the bus is. You could be on two crutches in you 90s and they will not move their bag, no matter what.
Lastly, we have the ‘Asian student’.
These are students who spent the previous night studying for a five-hour exam and as a result are constantly falling asleep next to you, landing their head on your shoulder.
One final thing. In my own experience, trains are much better to use than buses, but only if they are actually working.
