line? what line??

On Saturday, a teammate and I ventured to Beijing. It's always an adventure to leave, and this time didn't let us down.

We decided to take the campus bus into town since it was quick and cheap. (We live in the "suburbs" of Beijing..about an hour out. There are 2 campuses of our university--here and the main one in Beijing. They have a free shuttle for students and teachers several times a day between the two. Freshmen and sophs have classes here, the rest in Beijing. Some have classes on both campuses. Got it?!) The bus was to leave at 9am. We arrived at 8.30 am, knowing there would be a long line of students waiting to get out of boring Liangxiang and have a fun day in the big town.

We were right. Quick count of 40 people in front of us. The bus holds about 50. Yikes. It was gonna be close.

As we stood in the cold, we noticed students cutting in line with their friends. This happens in the States, yes. But people will usually speak up about it, right? Not the Chinese. They don't even see the injustice. My friend and I started to get a little irritated, knowing we were on the edge of actually getting on.

The bus finally arrived and the bus driver stood at the door taking the 5Y (.75) payment for the weekend bus. (weekdays are free) Then, to our astonishment, annoyance, bewilderment, we saw students running from afar cutting in front of everyone!!!! We couldn't believe it! At least 5 kids did this--just ran right up to the bus driver, paid, and got on. REALLY!? The driver didn't even flinch.

By now, my friend and I were starting to boil..and voice a little. Really, just grunting and saying "what?!"

The bus was getting full. But we were next. Would we make the cut? Nope....no more seats. We were beyond frustrated. 10-15 students cut in front of us. We would've made it if they understood the purpose of a line.

A student of my friend's came up to us and started chatting. (Not about the lines--it made no difference to her.) Thankfully she did, because she helped us calm down. :) So we got on a city bus that took a bit longer and our adventure started. (And it was an adventure. A 12-hour day with at least 6 of those hours traveling or trying to find the right bus, subway, direction.)

They are trying. Lines are a new phenomenon in this country. Michael said 4 years ago when he was here, lines didn't exist. Anywhere. You pushed and shoved your way to the front. But your Father-likeness in you gets to ya...do you really want to elbow a grandma just to get in front?

A student text me later asking if we had made it onto the bus. I said no, semi-blaming the cutters. She wrote back saying teachers have privileges and we should get on first, AND it's free for us. We knew this was true for the weekdays, but were told the weekends was a free-for-all. Now we know.