3.36 PM as I wait in the sun at one of Greensboro’s bus stops. Which I feel is not really a bus stop so much as it is... a street lamp with a sign no seating and no shelter from the 91 degree heat in the middle of August. With a bus scheduled to arrive at 3.45 PM I was honestly not expecting anything special. I’m no stranger to public transport because I actually find that public transport can be a very easy way to get to work or school in the summer especially when the price of petrol reaches a $4.15 peak as it did this past summer. I took this time to read through some of the reading placed online. Segregation is often taught in school and it seems if you dont know what’s going on you’ve probably been living under a rock.
Finally at 4.05 PM my bus arrives and I can join the masses enroute to the bus depot. Its crowded, I choose to stand as I am not one to really enjoy having my personal space. However inevitably I was told to sit down and found myself in the midst of society. 
People of all walks of life. On one side I was having a pleasant conversation about why people who are quite wealthy have begun taking the bus to avoid paying the high prices of petrol. While on the other side of me I was being lectured on how crack cocaine was safer when it was a powder and not the new kind which comes in stones apparently and how every cop in greensboro was taking bribes. Such interesting people you can meet on public transport. However the ever looming sign was just how many non colored people you dont see on public transport. At the front of the bus sits a sign in memory of Rosa Parks, and this is on every bus. But in all on a bus with 27 riders 6 were white. Most were black, many seemed to be quite content and were having a merry time.
However having read the reading I couldn't help but see how segregation was really just still around today, an unspoken part of our society. For example the people on the bus seemed to segregate themselves, many of the white people crowded together while many of the african americans took up seats nearby each other and didnt really talk to anyone. The Bus is a prime example of misconception, the stereotype of public transport in the States is dirty, unclean and something only the poor do. But in fact public transport seems quite clean, its cool in temperature and all around is a comfortable ride and surprisingly quick. The reading was I felt to be a bit of another statement of just how segregated we really keep ourselves however I also feel that by constantly pointing it out we continue to lay the ground work to continue such behavior, almost as though if you hear something long enough you begin to think that it actually is normal its almost phycological.
1 comment:
Hey Kevin
In this post about your bus ride I like how you set the scene with the time and how you expalin that it was really hot that day. I find it interesting that you have taken pulbic transport before and kinda knew what to expect unlike I did. Its nice that you had conversations on the bus even though the topics might have been odd. I agree with you about segregation and how we are the ones that keep it that way. Apart from what you wrote your sketches are nice visuals of what you wrote about.
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