It's such a shame that they are either your cheap friend or your worst enemy.
As a newbie to the country, I found buses terrifying. I didn't know where I was going or when to get off the bus.
A friend of mine and a native Londoner told me about an app that has saved my life. It is one of my most used and and first suggestion to any new person to London. City Mapper.
All you need to do with is app is let it know where you are, type in where you are going, and then it will give you all the options of how to get to that place. Whether it be bus, tube or overground.
Armed with this app, I decided to give the buses a chance. After all, it would give me more of a chance to see London. And I saw it alright. I just don't know if it's a good thing.
One of the first times I caught a bus by myself, I sat on the upper deck (as that was still a novelty) and was shortly joined by an older gentleman from Ireland. I had been warned that nobody on the tube will talk to you so I assumed that the buses would be the same. WRONG!
This man decided that he wanted to tell me his life story about where he lives and his job, all the while drinking whisky that was in a brown paper brown (cliche I know.)
Then there was a time on a night out when there was a lady on the bus singing (badly) at the top of her lungs to different 80s disco classics.
It seems to me like the tube is a silent world where you do not speak, and the buses is where all the crazy people come out to play. Its just a little creepy after the sun goes down.
And just remember Please move down the bus
Absolutely love CityMappers! Hahah I think you're right about buses and tubes, I've never realised that until you wrote it but people do love to natter on buses but tubes are just a no go. Although on new years I did have a chat with a woman who was casually smoking on the tube so there was that...glad you're enjoying London!
ReplyDeleteYeah it's funny the things you notice when you go somewhere different. Everything day on public transport is a new adventure
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