As I have mentioned in a previous post, I used to catch bus to and from school when I went to primary school at the Springs Convent. Here are some of my memories.
I was about five years old at the time.
In those days we used bus tickets that normally came in books of ten. Each ticket had a small section that the driver would tear off and, for good measure, would punch a hole in the ticket itself.
My mother wisely decided not to let me have the whole book of tickets. Instead, she would give two tickets to me each day. As a safety precaution, Sister Manus, our saintly bus monitor, had her own book of tickets, in case I lost mine for the return journey home.
I was a nervous child, and I sometimes chewed objects unconsciously. I remember getting on the bus one afternoon realising, to my horror, that I had folded my ticket into a tight pipe and had proceeded to ’smoke’ it like a cigarette. I handed the driver a soggy bundle. Unbelievably, he unrwapped it slowly and managed to tear off his bit. When he tried to punch a hole in my portion, it was too soggy. That upset him, and he started to yell at me. I was, and still am, quite sensitive to criticism, so I began to cry. The next minute, I was surrounded by a habit and veil as Sister Manus stepped into the bus to resolve the situation.
I normally travelled in the bus with Sangoma, my older brother. One afternoon, I was on my own on the bus, and I rang the bell to get off. I was only after alighting that I realised that I was at the wrong stop. I tried to get back onto the bus, but the door had already closed, and it pulled off without me. I panicked and screamed at the top of my voice and ran after the bus. My dear mother was waiting for me at the correct stop, which was not that far away. When I did not get off, she looked down the road and saw this hysterical kid in the distance. She had my sister, Mona Lisa, in a pram, and I think she was also expecting Dalia Lama at the time. That didn’t stop her. It was such a relief for me to see my mother and the pram hurtling towards me at full speed. When we met, she picked me up in her arms while I just sobbed with relief.
The bus we took home from the convent also stopped at the Springs West state school to pick up kids. Instead of the gentle Sister Manus, they had this huge Amazon woman as their bus monitor. She used to get on the bus and yell at their kids. “Move along the bus” she would yell, “Any nonsense and you are off the bus”. I could see that the Springs West kids were terrified of her. I thought I was immune because I was from the convent. One day, I was sitting on the back seat with a group of other convent kids, and my urge to be a showman came to the fore. At the Springs West bus stop, bull woman got on as usual. “Move to the back of the bus” she bellowed, and I imitated her, much to the delight of my travelling companions. “No nonsense from anyone”, and I yelled the same. The Springs West kids looked at me in shock, while the convent kids shrieked with laughter. I was in my element. I had an appreciative audience, and I was not about to stop. I put on the best gravelly voice that I could and began to yell out my own commands. All of a sudden I noticed that the convent kids were not laughing. The bus had fallen silent, and bull woman was heading straight for me. The next minute I was dragged down the aisle and out of the bus. She threw me roughly onto the ground, and my globite school case burst open, strewing the contents onto the grass. I gathered my things together and climbed back onto the bus, utterly humiliated. The funny thing was, even at that young age, I felt that I had got what was coming to me, and deserved it. I was quite surprised when my parents did not have the same understanding. The next day, my dad took off work early, and they came and fetched me from school and, to me horror, drove me to Springs West school. We walked through the kids playing in the playground, and they stopped and stared. I did not enjoy that attention at all. We sat in the principal’s office, and he called bull woman in. She told what had happened, including how cheeky I had been. They asked me if she was telling the truth, and I said yes. My parents then apologised to the principal and bull woman, and she shook my hand and ruffled my hair.
That incident taught me a valuable lesson – to respect all those in authority, even if they do not have jurisdiction over me.
