Ever read a “Journey by bus” essay in school? In the textbook, the journey is always enjoyable and “a memory worth cherishing for the rest of the life”. But if you are a commuter in Chittagong, or any other metropolitan cities for that matter, memories of public bus journey could instead HAUNT you for the rest of your life.

Imagine yourself a passenger of route 10 in the port city. Your suffering starts when you arrive at the station.

You see many route 10 buses. When you are about to board one, the conductor would say it would take route 12. So you go to the next. It would go through the right route, but only halfway. It has a “reserved trip,” you are told.  

What they are doing is violation of traffic rules, but what can you do? So you live with it. If you draw the attention of the nearby traffic police, he would give you a gaze as if you were an alien.

After waiting for long under the scorching sun, you find one willing to go to your destination. But don't rush. If you do, you run the risk of tearing your garments or even injuring yourself. Most buses are in a morbid condition, with spikes coming out from here and there.

The bus is full and yet it does not move an inch.

 “Empty bus, empty bus”, hollers the conductor and asks the standing passengers in the narrow aisle to press inside. The bus would start only when it is crammed up to the entrance. 

You feel you are on a coal burner and you are sweat-drenched.

More trouble pops up as the bus moves along.

A bitter odour takes over. You discover its source without much difficulty: standing passengers holding the iron rod above to prevent fall, their armpits wide open inches from your nose.

As a way out from your misery, you yell at the driver to speed up. The driver, nonchalant as usual, keeps his composure. If you shout a lot, he returns: “Go catch a private auto-rickshaw instead. Nawab!”

Embarrassed, you fall silent and close your eyes, contemplating how it would have been if there were flower gardens along the road instead of garbage cans.

But you suddenly hear a hue and cry over one taka. A fellow passenger and the conductor are exchanging abuses over the fare. It's an everyday scene and you return to your daydreaming.

You swallow all these irregularities, chaos, sufferings and whimsical attitudes in gut-wrenching silence. Still, all the while you dream someday the public bus journey would be as pleasurable as those in the textbook.

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