Daily Life Blog Post ... Transportation take 1!

This is the third of many (hopefully) editions featuring aspects of daily life here in Guatemala... in writing these, I hope to share funny things, ironic things, and things I admire and I want to share them not as a form of judgment... in ANY way... but in a form of telling a story... with that being said...  here's information about buses!

There are many names for busses around here. 

Sometimes they are referred to by tourists as Chicken Busses.   Although this is taken rather offensively by many Guatemalans, the name itself is scarily accurate.  Not a day goes by when I don’t wonder what is in the basket beside me that that the woman is gingerly carrying on her head because it seems to move on its own, and not a week goes by when I don’t, to my surprise, see a living animal in those baskets, most often a chicken.  Along with the living animal motif, I looked up the other day and saw a dog sticking its head out one of the windows on the bus.  He looked quite content sitting there on the seat…

Locals refer to them most often as “Camionetas”.  I try to stick to that name, now that I know it (it took a while).  Ironically, my host parents also refer to their car as the “Camioneta”.  Deep down inside, I wonder if they are referred to by the same name because both my host dad and the drivers of the Camionetas are incredibly safe and talented drivers who manage to also instill a deep fear for your life as you are careening down the road.

Then, there’s the simple name, “El bus”.  Although the name is boring, don’t let it deceive you.  Busses are anything from boring.  Check them out!

These Camionetas may look like school busses that were seized by hippies in the 60s and 70s but they are definitely run differently.  Almost every bus has two employees on board: the Ayudante and the Peloto.  The Peloto’s job is to drive the bus and stop every 100 yards in the city to pick up more people.  Outside the city, his job is to drive as fast as the bus can go to the next location in order to keep themselves on the imaginary bus schedule that doesn’t actually exist.  Meanwhile, the Ayudante (literally, helper) has the task of yelling the destination of the bus as loudly as possible.  He is also responsible for fitting the standard 80-90 people onboard through the front and back doors while yelling, “move atras” or “dos cada lugar” over and over.  Once everyone is on the bus, he holds onto the handles of the door in order to keep the person there (quite often me because I’m not aggressive enough to get further on the bus) from falling out mid-ride.  When it is possible to move (aka I’m on the 2^nd step from the door), the ayudante walks through the massive amount of people and collects bus fare.  It is quite a complex job.
 

Possibly my favorite part about busses is the irony that they all have.  My bus today had a sign that said, “No Firearms. Ordered by the laws of Ohio”.  I like the message, but I’m not sure if any gang members or crazy people, or the standard Guatemalan man who either has a machete or gun really care what the Ohio law says.  My other favorite thing is the busses that still have the rules from their former lives pasted inside the bus.  I copied them one particularly slow bus day and am going to share them with you, along with my ironic commentary.

School bus rules: “Don’t lose your riding privileges!”

                FOLLOW THESE RULES!

1)      Observe the same conduct as in the classroom

a.       Classrooms here are rather out of control… or they’re copying straight off the board.  Neither of these are conducts that you would want on the bus.

2)      Be courteous and use no prohibited language

a.       I haven’t really heard any prohibited language, but if courteous means move from your seat in the front so the abuela entering the bus doesn’t have to walk all the way to the back or stand up in the aisle, this rule never followed.

3)      Do not eat or drink on the bus

a.       They sell food on the bus when you stop in focal points in the city!  It’s hard to not eat or drink. 

4)      Keep the bus clean

a.       Considering all the people who go on the bus, it’s really clean.  However, there are the times when the drunk is on the bus, or people are being dirty and therefore making the bus look as dirty and trash-filled as the rest of the country.

5)      Cooperate with the driver

a.       That’s not hard… just pay him!

6)      Do not smoke

a.       They actually seem to follow this rule!

7)      Do not be destructive

a.       How do you define destructive?

8)      Stay in your seat

a.       This isn’t too hard unless the abuelita gets onboard and my conscious tells me it’s time to move.  The driver and ayudante seem to have a harder time with it.  More than once, we have been driving and I look up to see the two of them switching places.  That’s a really interesting sight to see.

9)      Keep your head, hands, feet inside the bus

a.       That pertains to small children too, right?  Because there is never any lack of small children poking their heads outside.

10 Bus driver is authorized to assign seats

a.       Good luck.