Lady…..Want my Seat ??

I am going on my first month now of traveling on the bus and metro to and from work.
The bus is amazing, if I’m not asleep. Where I get on the bus it is close to the start of the line so I usually manage to get a seat. I usually sit on the back bench near the window, less chance of being sat upon. People who join me on the ride to Angrignon Metro are varied and well…varied. One lady I see almost on a daily basis gets on the bus with a double stroller (both seats occupied) a shoulder baby carrier (also occupied) a back sack, and another type of bag I suppose to carry baby stuff. Despite the fact that it is rush hour no one on board seems perturbed at the space she seems to be taking up.

When we get to the Metro there are at least six people giving out two free news papers, most people seems to take one or both.

The Metro is another experience, trains run about three minutes apart and every station is announced prior to arrival and again announced as we ease into the station. I usually announce along with the recording (in my head of course.)

By the time I get to my station (Guy Concordia) we are usually packed cheek to jowl, but because I get on at the start of the voyage again there is normally a place to sit. I sit in the lead car as this is ideal for exiting when we stop, and close to an exit door.

Often there is a drum player greeting travelers and shilling for spare change and at the second escalator an other man wearing a sign wishing that we all be blessed by God, and any spare money we could give me would help as he is a blind Vietnam War vet.

Then I take the 165 bus which winds it’s way up Mount Royal past, the Cote des Neiges Cemetery, the Montreal General Hospital and the Jewish General Hospital.

I debark at Barclay cross the street then off to try and sell big screen televisions.

The trip home is like the trip there only backwards.