Ordeal On The Buses

London was a seething mass of tourism. The streets and attractions were filled with foreign visitors all streaming in an unstoppable if rather slow wave of loud, gawping pedestrians. Having put up with this for a while, I thought it was time to go home.

The tube seemed too hot. On the other hand, buses are cramped miserable slices of Hades at its worst. Naturally, I thought it was a good idea to get on board one.

Bus travel is slow, painful (if you have to stand all the way, like I did) and full of sullen miserable sods who hate you. A friend said being on a bus was better than the (much faster) tube because 'it was like an adventure'. Whether she meant A Clockwork Orange or Heart of Darkness I'm not sure. Add this to the dark and rather cramped space in a bendy bus (AKA, the 'accordion of death') and it's FUN FUN FUN all the way.

The highlight of the trip was a savage row between two women who were jammed up close to me. One fumed that the other's son was behaving badly while the other swore blind that firstly her foe was talking crap and secondly it was a moot point, as her child couldn't even talk in the first place. (Whether that meant he was still a toddler or a very backward 12-year-old, I couldn't really tell, owing to the claustrophobic press of flesh I found myself in.)

It reminded me that kids on public transport are a menace. Or at least their parents are. Earlier that day, some oaf rammed his child's buggy into my foot. Later on, some twit let her toddler slowly wobble down the stairs at Russell Square on his own, nearly making the rest of us all miss a train.

Getting back to the row, though, what stood out was that they were both clearly speaking English as a second language but were putting in a lot of effort effort to abuse the other one with as much care as can be. You could even hear them putting effort into pronouncing the syllables as well as they could while at the same time getting very, very pissed off.

Perhaps this is the answer to the age-old dilemma of integration versus diversity? Just stick 'em on a cramped, odious bus for an hour and let the hate and bile come flooding out via the world's Lingua Anglais. 'Cos nothing sums up London, and indeed the UK, better than irritable, bitter commuters who really just want the rest of their species to FUCK RIGHT OFF.

As I got off, a Pakistani man said sorry for letting a support strap hit my head as I got off. He sounded very sincere and upset about it. I hoped he heard me say back that it was OK while I leapt off the bus with some relief. It seemed a rather strange moment, like it should not have happened, and that we should have simply grunted at each other as one shoved his way past the other instead.

A Day On The Rails...

There was an argument at the station. A man had been stopped by the ticket inspectors at the top of the stairs. They were arguing like it was a matter of life or death. Eventually the man stormed off without paying, swearing at one inspector who told him to go make an official complaint, then swore back at him in turn. Neither man won.

I got on the train. It went past a huge cemetary where a funeral was taking place. Apart from the hearse and the old fashioned black and chrome Bentley for the family, there were cars - and lots of them. They were parked behind each other in a long, continuous line leading up to the avenue where the funeral was no doubt taking place. That was the roundabout tribute to this person - never mind the garish floral tributes, it was the twenty or so cars, all carrying those who wanted to say goodbye.

Later, on the tube train, I saw a dishevelled looking woman reading a newspaper. She looked rather lank and grubby, her long greasy hair hanging over her face as she looked down on the paper. She had a battered black leather jacket under which poked out the bottom of a women's white top with green stripes - the kind you might get out of Bon Marche. Her legs were pipe thin and clad in narrow jeans. This was all topped off with a pair of dirty white cowboy boots that ended with long pointed toes. It was quite a sight.

Then she looked up and turned out to be a man with a thick bikers' moustache. I quickly looked away.

When I got back, the ticket inspectors had doubled in number and there were two policemen too. They were taking no chances. Fare dodgers seem to think a free ride is worth pulling a knife out for these days. Or maybe it was just a performance put on for the commuters - or a mixture of both.