A Korean city-bus journey is infamous. Every trip is unique, and there must be a thousand untold tales worthy of any travelogue. I have lived and have worked in Pusan for seven months and have used its No. 96 bus service almost every day. Occasionally I have enjoyed the luxury of its smaller stable mate (the No. 506 bus). This latter bus has greater creature comforts, usually negated by carrying the same load of passengers as its larger companion. In these reminiscences of my travels, this article may be merely an illustration of the English idiom, "carrying coals to Newcastle." However, I need to excise my trauma!
Many of you reading this article will have experienced the Pusan Bus Service. The term, "packed to the gills" expresses of the lesser discomforts, particularly when its buses are being used to mobilize the daily dose of educational fodder. In the West I took the "school" bus for granted. I never realized what it would be like without that special form of daily public transportation in a city of more than a thousand schools. Physically I have changed: my arms are longer and straighter, muscles tauter, and digestion less stable. Every part of my anatomy is exercised by a journey on a No. 96 bus. Every soft part is probed, indented, or stepped on by fellow travelers. The smaller the adjacent body, the more pain it can inflict on contact. However, supreme in the pushing and shoving stakes must be the "halmoni." To be between one of these and the exit door of the bus, when she has just woken up to the fact that it has just halted at her stop and the door is about to close, is an experience never to be forgotten.
There is rarely a seat available on these buses. They are mostly occupied by slumbering teenagers, at the time I use this bus, who enjoy one or more round-trips of blissful unconsciousness before falling out of the bus at the entrance to their schools or institutes. So it becomes another bout of strap or bar hanging or clutching. Occasionally I find that the steel piping that serves as the main passenger support on these buses is bent or otherwise contorted. I used to wonder how on earth someone could have possibly vandalized a horizontal bar that is six feet off the ground and fixed to the ceiling or side of a bus. Now I know: it is the result of survival by hanging on at all costs. When a No. 96 bus is executing one if its 4G-force slalom turns, the weight of suspended passengers on this locally held piece of metal corresponds to its failure to resist bending. Also, during one of these turns, pity the person standing next to the large blue or red plastic bowl full of sea-water and live fish, in transit to a better road-side pitch.
Mothers with babies strapped to their backs are a hazard perhaps specific to Korea. When such a bundle of humanity gets on the bus, if I am seated (a rare occurrence, but it does happen), I am still "Westernized" enough to get up and offer them my seat. Usually this is to the amazement of nearby seated Koreans, who have no such scruples. On one such occasion, I even had a large fit Korean youth push past the mother and infant to take the vacated seat! Often the woman declines and appears to be offended that I considered her to be so feeble as to want to put her and her potential mini-projectile out of harm's way. The upper most thought in my mind, however, is the effect of the G forces on her infant: it usually regurgitates its last meal. So I have learned to give these bundles a wide berth. I am not usually so fortunate with the soju sodden Korean male who travels on the bus late at night. All I can hope is that he finds easy access to an open window, and has the wits to lean out of it occasionally. Then I count myself fortunate that I am on the bus and not on the sidewalk outside.
Mechanically the buses are a disaster: shot suspensions, steering, clutches, and transmissions. Their brakes, however, are always in top working order. They are very simply operated: on or off. When applied, all that is needed to complete a commercial package reminiscent of a large tin of sardines is some tomato sauce! On this service any bus that can move becomes a people�s carrier; broken or torn parts merely add to the challenge of the ride. It must be a triumph of maintenance to keep as many on the road as the engineers seem to be able to do. I would suggest to the operating bus company that some of their enormous profits, obtained from the long suffering customers, are put back into the business as a fleet of new buses -- not just the one or two that trickle into the existing system. A better bus just may encourage better driving! Certainly there would be less pollution.
This brings me onto the man in control: the bus driver. In their defense I should point out that these bus drivers are not usually bad, criminal, or insane. Their driving style and attitude are merely a symptom of the appalling attitude all Korean drivers have for their road traffic laws, which are administered by too few police. Also excess testosterone or a protective maternal upbringing may induce the bus drivers� macho personae.
What other gems is brought to mind? Here are a few feats of driving skill that I remember. A conversation, between two drivers with their barely separated laden projectiles traveling in tandem. A driver misjudging his turn and doing a "hand brake turn" to correct the same. A driver reading his newspaper while his bus speedometer was registering 35 mph; a driver steering with his knees as he had one hand on the gear lever and the other out of the window. The most memorable occasion of all, however, was of a driver holding onto the vertical passenger pole in order to keep himself seated, while he turned his bus (whose suspension was nil) into a left turn.
These reminiscences are ended here with two cherished memories that should become classics: they will certainly bore any future dinner parties that I may attend. The first occasion was a "duel" between two No. 96 buses. One was obviously late and the other early. They were weaving between traffic lanes and tossing us poor passengers about unmercifully. We were the lead buses when we hit a red stop light at a pedestrian crossing. As our driver was more concerned with the position of the trailing bus than where he was going, only superb reflexes on his brake pedal-foot stopped us before we had completely covered the crossing with the bus. The trailing bus, however, decided to "go for it" and overtook on the inside. Unfortunately for its driver, a column of uniformed police officers was using the crossing at the time and the leaders contacted the front end of his bus. The memory that I cherish is not that of the several dazed or squashed Pusan police officers, but the look of sheer joy on the face of our driver as he tooted and pulled away from his colleague and the carnage he had caused.
My other memorable moment came after a typical journey of arm stretching, gut wrenching exercises. Throughout the journey, the bus driver had sounded his horn continuously as he had tried aurally to blast the opposition from his path (without any success whatsoever). As we came up to the major intersection, the bus slowed down; rather considerately I thought at the time. We passengers noticed that nearby pedestrians were looking and pointing at the rear of our bus. Then we saw a plume of blue smoke rising from the rear engine compartment, adding to the considerable Pusan pollution. Our manic driver had achieved the ultimate accolade: he had blown up his engine. We coasted round the intersection under police escort and parked. I never got a refund for the rest of my journey. My compensation was the driver's crestfallen expression as he announced the premature termination of our travels! So my last thoughts on the No. 96 Bus? That I'm still alive and able to write this article.