You've Never Flown Until You've Flown Greyhound

by Callum Cox (Finland)

A leap into the unknown USA

I sit in a Greyhound bus station in Miami. Filling my nostrils is the sweet, cheesy aroma of Cheetohs. Earlier on it had been a stale, somewhat urinary stench that had been hanging heavily in the air, as paramedics revived the guy who'd passed out in the loo. Aaaah Greyhound, how I've missed thee. My bus is here so I must take my seat. I have an eighteen hour theatre ahead of me and I don’t want to miss a minute. From the outset, it’s clear we have a quintessentially cantankerous driver. It’s written on his face and pours from his pores. His very essence is cranky. His nose permanently out of joint. He wants a quiet journey. One passenger is either oblivious to this or doesn’t care. As we start to move off she cries, "My coat! My coat!" Apparently she's left it in her son's car in the car park. The driver's face tightens and you can see the internal debate. Amazingly he relents, stopping and opening the door for her. She returns with five coats. The next scene takes place after our first pit stop. Upon re-boarding, Coat Lady finds someone sitting in "her" seat. This is not strictly true. Beforehand, Coat Lady had had two seats all to herself and because she wants to preserve this status quo she’s making a fuss. This is all explained to the seat thief by Coat Lady’s daughter. Not to be outdone, Seat Thief installs her own daughterly diplomat who points out that if Coat Lady wants to stretch out, then she should've paid for two seats (a good point well made in my view, but, not being anyone’s daughter, I stay out of it). Both mothers are part of larger family groups: Coat Lady's group is Hispanic and Seat Thief's clan is Russian. They are at an impasse. That's when the Russians start speaking to each other in Russian very loudly and very obviously about the Hispanic family. This is reciprocated from the other side en Español. It amounts to a very strange arms race in a very strange cold turf war. It threatens to turn hot, but heads seem to cool as we get back on the road. I think we have the driver to thank for the de-escalation. He is our Reagan and Gorbachev combined. The man is full of surprises. The final drama unfolds at a much later stop. We’re queueing in a station to again re-board and in strides a US border security officer. I’ve not seen this before at a bus station that doesn’t border another country. Instantly she makes a bee-line for a group of three Mexican gentlemen, asking to see zeir paperz. I turn to the couple next to me and say, "I guess it doesn't pay to have the wrong complexion." Despite speaking oh-so quietly, the next thing I know the officer's standing right beside me. My stomach lurches. “I’d like to ask you some questions.” I naturally oblige, my behind-her-back-cockiness having vanished and now replaced with complete timidity-in-the-face-of-authority. My travel documents are present and correct, so she cuts me loose. Then, as she passes the queue to exit, one chap says, “Hello," to her. I guess he wanted to appear casual, but she hears his accent and her interest is piqued. “Where are you from?” He says he's Israeli. “Can I see your passport?” He doesn’t have it. “Do you have your visa documents?” No. She sits him down on the other side of the station and begins a rather intense conversation with him. In my real life I’m a teacher and I’ve conducted conversations like that. Mine, however, have never ended with the subject of interrogation being lead away in handcuffs and leg irons! Leg irons! Just ten minutes before he had been a free man. I guess the moral is if you’re going to say anything with an accent within earshot of a US border security officer, better have it be a snide comment about racial profiling with all the proper papers in your pocket rather than a polite greeting with your pockets empty. Viva Greyhound!