Sometimes daily life is rather the same. I don't think people living in Nairobi or Hiroshima who grew up in Rome or
Reykjavík think of the foreignness of the place where they buy their groceries or brush their teeth unless something extra weird happens. When you first arrive however all the minutia and all the mysteries are giant as billboards next to sidewalks. You're constantly rubbernecking to let your eyes get big and your mind go blank so you can take it all in.
Montrealers don't really notice themselves. Sure, they spend time on their looks, or more importantly their look, and talking they do, but I think these things come naturally. They sort of have this, "I'm interested in what I'm doing but I'm bored" way about them. They don't seem to get as worked up as their French cousins. Maybe they'd like to go on strike or smash up a McDonald's once in a while but they probably are holding a coffee or reading a book that they'd like to finish and by then it will be time they worked themselves up for a good raou they'd be late for their buss and they probably have plans with friends later.
I took the Metro (subway) to a neighborhood I hadn't been to yet and walked around. The plan was to walk but I had my laptop in my bag and it started to rain. When I got to the bus stop the bus schedule said that the last bus had come and gone and the next bus wouldn't be arriving for several hours. Standing there under the bus-stop shelter I was daydreaming and staring off when I heard a sound. Looking up, there was a bus stopped with the door open and the driver was waiting for me to get on. I thought, "what a nice guy!"
The bus was busy: there were a Muslim family and the wife was fully covered except here face, a Jewish mom with her littler daughter and a boy who talked in an excited high-pitched banter fairly constantly until he would occasionally fall over and flop and roll around on the floor. Standing coyly in the middle was a teenage couple. They were French-African and hip. He had his pants down hip-hop style and his shirt was open. Across from me was a rocker girl who seemed drunk, and while her head bobbed, as she nodded off now and then, I was noticing her Debbie Harry tee and her chipped blue nail polish. Her nail polish was as thick as the enamel on my grandma's old stove.
The driver driver seemed to be on a mission. The street was not busy but he would accelerate as fast as possible from every stop and intersection. The Jewish kid had tumbled into nearly everyone and was like an little French Tom Thumb Pinata wearing a yamaka. The drunk girl had nearly crashed to the floor twice and the Muslim woman genuinely looked worried.
By the time we had rounded Mount Royal on Rue Parc the driver had effectively indoctrinated everyone into his fast take off routine. This is when he pulled a fast one. As he approached Rue Doctor Pinfield he hit the breaks as if there were an infant riding a Catholic Saint laying in the road. It was really his finest moment. The African kid crushed his girlfriend. The Jewish boy rolled away from his moms outstretched arm like sailor gone overboard but with more acrobatics. Poor rocker-girl wedged herself nicely between her seat and the seat of a artsy but un-groomed man holding a french horn. I myself landed beside the 49ish year old woman to my right who had a blue dragon tattoo and an I-just-woke-up-face.
I had felt so lucky that this bus had come along when I really needed it, but at what price. Looking at all the passengers faces I couldn't help myself. I'm a prankster at heart after all--I laughed out loud--twice. This bus ride was possibly the most entertaining thing one could do for $2. What driver of any public vehicle has ever threaded the great distance between complaint letter and pat on the back with such broad stitches. I hated and loved him.
The best part was not that the bus driver had this "I'm interested in what I'm doing but I'm bored" look on his face the whole time. It was that when I got to my stop he stops the giant bus and as I walked to the door to leave the door closed. Shit. I realized that I might actually be dead. A really bumpy bus to purgatory full of wacky Montrealers would be fairly accurate for my karma. Further, it seemed fitting that when you die do you might not know it so everything would be really surreal and bouncy. I had been thinking earlier in the day about the Jewish faith because I wanted a bagel for lunch from Mile End and when I was looking for the library at HEC I had interrupted three Muslim men during their afternoon prayers. That afternoon I had read an email about MBA recruitment in Africa and the french horn just seemed like decoration. And rocker girl? Well she was obviously a manifestation of my partying past and my there was a Debbie Harry connection with a guy I used to date!
I went to the front and asked the driver, "may I get off here or shall I stay on?" I find that in times of desperation it pays to be really really polite.
With a blank face and a shrug of his shoulders he opened the door and I stepped down into the warm evening absolutely relieved that I was both alive and completely entertained by my ability to die, go to purgatory, relive my entire days daydreams and plead with the grim reaper for my return to the living all in the time it took to walk three paces to the front of the buss.
Next time I'm judging some bored looking Montrealers or staring at people on the bus I think I'm just going to relax, let my mind go blank and take it all in.
