UTA

 I've started to take the public buses to get around places, and realized that I haven't taken public transportation (for some reason airplanes never seem to count in my mind) for about 7 months now. in fact, as I was thinking about it at a bus stop yesterday, the last time I really took public transportation was when I was in Europe. it just made me laugh at some of the differences between my recent experiences and my last experiences.

 The first big difference, and this is not from London, but from Italy when I was taking a lot of buses places, is the lack of language barrier. yesterday i was waiting at a bus stop for almost an hour, and there was another bus that came by. I knew the number I was waiting for, but I had the option of asking the other bus where it was going, and understanding the answer. I didn't have to think about how to form the question, what words I knew that would get my point across, or worry about understanding what I was being told, if I actually did get my own point across. asking questions about what buses I need

 to take, and just understanding what was going on around me was exciting. haha, it is what I was looking forward to being excited about when I finally came back to the States. I've finally felt it, and it only took 7 months.

the other big difference, and this may only be a difference because (again) I understand what is going on around me, but the other big difference is the interesting people who ride the bus. in Italy, and Europe, all types of people rode buses and all sorts of public transportation. here, those who ride the buses are those who don't own a car because they can't afford one or because they don't want to blindly follow society. idk, it just seems like the people on the bus, if they are talking to others, are much more interesting than those who ride buses in Europe. maybe that makes me interesting to!

The other thing that is different for my experience now is how and why I am riding the bus. now I am taking the bus to get to specific places at specific times. so if a bus is late, or I miss a bus, it's a lot more stressful. and I am riding alone, so I have no one to talk to while I ride and make the ride seem shorter, or less boring. when I was in Italy, we did have time constraints sometimes, but most of the time we didn't fully understand how to read the schedules, so we were winging it the whole time. that meant that we wouldn't even know if we missed a bus or not, and would enjoy the waiting almost as much as the riding part. and there was always a group of 3 or more of us going anywhere, so when we had to wait, it wasn't as boring. those were my thoughts as I waited for the next bus yesterday after missing the first one. I was not thrilled with it all, but it wasn't the worst thing in the world. I guess I'll just start taking my bike everywhere, so that if I do miss a bus, I don't have to stand at a bus stop waiting for the next one to come, but can be proactive about getting wherever it is I'm going. It'll be fun, and hopefully get me into better shape so I can ride my bike everywhere I need and want to.