Chicken Bus, Anyone?

I love embracing the moments here that I would never experience in my life back home in Wyoming. For example....public transportation, which in Guatemala they call Chicken buses for very specific reasons. People smashed together that have been soaked by the rain = chicken bus.

So I live in San Juan del Obispo right now...a little village outside of the city, like 10 or 15 minutes away. When I want to go into Antigua, which is like everyday almost, I ride the public buses. Now these buses are the typical huge school buses we are used to in the states. Something unique about them though is that the owners of the buses ( I am assuming) get to decorate their buses how they please and drive them as they please. haha. One of my favorite decorations is a decal sticker above the bus door as you exit that says ´te quiero´ or i love you, with these creepy letters that look like some gooey liquid dripping. kinda spooky. lol.

Specifically, we all know the ´loco´ crazy bus. The driver always drives about 100 mph and stops on the dime. You can imagine what we look like bouncing around in the bus, hitting bumps and stopping very rapidly.

About 2 weeks ago, the road closed part way between Antigua and San Juan and so we started taking a really long detour. This detour probably took like at least 10 minutes longer depending on the day and the roads shall we say were a little bit sketchy. One night, one of the my fellow YAVS and I got on the bus a little later than usual because we had gone to a free salsa class. So around 6pm the bus starts getting very very full of people going back home for the night. On top of this did I say it was raining? Kristi and I are like running to the bus with our raincoats on. We get on the bus and it is already super duper full and we are super duper wet. Finally, I find a seat and sit with half of my body on the seat which is already occupied by 2 other people. Kristi is in the seat behind me on the edge of a seat as well. We start off for San Juan and more people keep getting on the bus and I keep getting people more wet with my soaked raincoat. They keep jamming people in the bus in any and every direction they fit. Kristi and I just embrace the moment and enjoy ourselves...which means we are like laughing but trying not to draw more attention to ourselves than we already draw by simply being ´extranjeras´ or foreingers.

To say the least, Guatemalans are not worried about their personal bubble or personal space. You have somewhere to be and a job to get done and you do it any which way you can. Just get the job done. And that´s what they do....Soaked people jammed into a bus like chickens. :) You just have to experience it! It is one of the best cultural experiences! One of my newest phrases for my time in Guatemala is ´Embrace the moment´ and embrace the awkwardness and discomfort´.

I hope you got an idea of a bus ride in Antigua ;)