Today I start a series of cool posts - I'm being sarcastic - about the infrastructure of our beloved São Paulo, and the human material found here. (Moment of silence for contemplation of doom.) I Decided to make this series recently, after going through several sui generis situations going from home to work and vice versa. And I'm talking only about 2014. Last year had a lot too, and some of them I have outlined here on the blog. So, there's a lot to be ashamed of.
2014 promised to be better. Soccer World Cup, people trying to learn some new things to receive tourists, things settling ... Only not! (Shamelessly paraphrase Otário Anonymous.) I started the year working hard, having to take the bus and subway to get to the job... I live in São Paulo... These are the ingredients for the hell on earth!
Many people ask me why I prefer to take the bus instead of the subway . Well , I have observed that people in buses , in general, are more educated with each other than the people of the sub. The second group seems to be more stressed and always late, and less happy than the first. Although the first group is noticeably poorer people. You see, it's not the money that guarantee happiness! Well , in my first week of work in 2014, I decided to make a Paulistana (person born and raised in São Paulo) and save time using the subway. This idea lasted two days... Getting squeezed on a train underground without access to daylight, having to deal with the lack of education of the people around did not please me . See an old lady being pushed off the wagon , because an idiot with some serious cognitive problem needed to go down on that station did not appeal to me . I gave up this life in two days, because I don't have the money to buy a bazooka - a dream of consumption from some time now. Not to mention that all the time I saved on the transportation, ended up being spent on the walks to get to the subway stations.
Bus became the solution. Very good to be in a airy vehicle with less sullen people around me, usually nicer than the ones at the subway. The possibility of going down if something bothered me ... And, incredibly, the possibility to make the journey sitting. Besides catching two buses I can go virtually from door to door, without too much walking. Everything perfect! Or maybe not?
The first event that started to bother me regarding the buses was the changing of the place where the second bus that I take home is located . Now we get into the Ana Rosa Terminal, without any signaling and without a proper space. That accumulation of people from three lines , and the lack of coordination to ride queues drives me crazy . Everything was following its course, exits from the bus going every fifteen minutes, which made me less upset to stay standing there with that bunch of people desperate to get home . After all, I was in the same situation . One day I got in line . Asked girl in front of me if it was the line for the X bus, and she confirmed . I was behind her. Time to crawl , a lady pushed me , and said he was in line in front of me. WTF?!? All the time this lady was in a snack bar, near the queue, eating, never in line, indicating she was going to take that bus. I called her a rude , for pushing me , and she said that I was poorly educated, for stealing her place in the queue . This was my moment of wanting a bazooka again. Jesus , I just wanted a bazooka! But I had to take a deep breath. I wanted to go home.
Isolated case. I ignored it, and went happily sitting home. A few days later the bus delayed his departure. People kept entering. Apparently the subway had a problem, and people were looking for alternatives. Okay, what to do. Isolated event, subway can present problems ... Everyday??? Because suddenlythat's what started to occur. There were always a crash somewhere and that overloaded the bus system. And going back home became slightly more stressfull, as well as reaching the job.
Alright, let's surpass that. What else can go wrong? Oh yeah, spirits of pigs - a very common breed in São Paulo - can burn some buses, forcing utilities to relocate part of fleets of other lines to suply the defalcated. Suddenly the bus that left every fifteen minutes started to have a half-hour gap. Seriously, a bazooka would make me immensely happy. A helicopter with a driver, and a house with helipad too.
Well, let's get over it, because I still travel sitting in the bus, and I walk far less than I would with the subway. Even when I get sopped for forty-five minutes in a very hot day in traffic in front of the gate of hell - also known as São Paulo Hospital - smelling my house, with a quarter mile between us. I forgave the system when, in the rain, the windows had to be all closed, and I started having an allergic attack because of a deodorant called Avanço, very popular among poorer people. I do not understand what it is that this people think the deodorant can do some good in a sweaty dirty body after 8 hours of work. It doesn't work like that people. As my friend Jefferson says, it is the armpit sport smell. And that brings me to an asthma attack! And makes me unhappy as well! And when I'm miserable I like to eat chocolate, drink coke and fire with bazookas! There was none of those thing on the closed bus, in the rain, smelling armpit sport!
All right. I got home, I took anti-allergic, I went to rest ... And I tried to forget the horror of that day. Then the next day, I took an oxcart. Because that driver may only have bought the driver's license, and should be the type that takes drips at breakfast! After much shaking, I got to sit. But that does not mean the trip was more comfortable for me. I felt every pebble in the street, and every time the bus braked I saw the front seat from up close. Total stress. I thanked God when I got off the bus alive. Five people have fallen along the way. And yes, we complained. That day a bus made the news after climbing a corolla car and killing the two occupants... I started to get nervous. But I went back in one piece to my home at the end of the day. It was only the next day I got another donkey driving. But then I was prepared: coffee candy to stay awake and prevent my nose to end up rubbing the bus floor...
And then, here's my life now: I spend an hour and a half or so in the packed adventure on the bus, with the heat, the rain, the donkey driver, total stress, pain and willingness to use a bazooka, to get to work, and I face it all back on, plus the armpitsport smell and the vision of the gate of hell for forty-five minutes. One day, on the spot, I remarked to a lady about all this, and said that Haddad (our Mayor) had worsened things a little with the change of a few lines, because now we have to catch two buses for short trips. And we talk about young people sitting in the seats reserved and not come out when it is necessary ... I spoke of my indignation. And she asked me: Do you think you live in Switzerland?
JulyN.
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