The Bus Ride

Today, I took the bus, the public bus, to get home from school.

But today’s ride was not a normal one. Not the normal ride where I just sat and got irritated by the sound of loudspeakers from those super-powerful handphones, irritated by ‘voice-over’ some makciks were doing and annoyed by looking at young people (I mean school children and teenagers) kicking their friends in the bus, throwing bottles and paper pieces to each other, laughed out loud, doing some ‘shuffling’ moves (my brother introduced me the moves just months earlier) and most important of all, watching the little dearies standing near the door and jumped in and out of the bus (…to give way to people to get off in style…) each time the bus stopped.

Today’s ride got me thinking. Not that I didn’t think before. But I thought deeply today. Rather deeply than doing the deep thinking for lesson planning. Haha. So, what happened that it got me thinking?

One very old uncle got on the bus, very old and he didn’t look well. And I looked around. The bus half filled by obviously younger people; the primary and secondary students who were busy looking at their phones (the school should have more spot checks, I suggest), and partly filled by older passengers but definitely younger-than-that-uncle. So that uncle walked on further but he stopped few seats before me. I looked around and I saw that this uncle was not even acknowledged! Like he was not even there. So I got up and offered him my seat. He said ‘no, no, lu duduk, its ok, its ok’. So I sat back and stole the show. Eyes were on me. The eyes were probably saying ‘ala, tunjuk baik la tu’… So, my dear old uncle stood steadfastly holding to the tiang and at the next stop, one guy got off and the uncle won a seat.

Talk about fate. The next two stops saw a pregnant lady who got on the bus together with number of people, and the bus was full but not packed. And this soon-to-become-mommy didn’t have a seat. Ouch. Again. So, I got up and offered and she refused and smiled. Eh? Eyes were on me again. I stole the show twice! Can anyone do better?

You must be thinking, what was wrong with me that all these people were refusing my offer. At that moment, I didn’t know why. At this very moment, I still do not know why.

So, that got me thinking. I want to live in a more loving and love-able community. I want us, especially the younger people to show their love. To show that we care more about the elders than our blasting handphones. To know that it is ok to surrender the seat to someone more deserving despite paying the same fare (students pay less, they should sit less~). So I decide, that, we, us, the people need some educating to be done in order for us to be more loving and caring. Love and care can be shown through small actions, small steps that anybody can take or initiate.

Thus, I am going to pitch a campaign. A campaign to promote love and care, and more awareness among our people (especially the young students) and this campaign should start right away. I just hit lucky 23 (Beckham’s Jersey No, so I guessed kire lucky la) last Sunday, so probably something had just got into me and yeah, I will start my own blog which will feature my 2 cents (hope they can worth more in future), my ideas (things that come out when I think) and most importantly, my campaign. My campaign to promote a more loving and caring society through small but practical and do-able acts and steps.

What do you think?