Wet Feet, Buses, and Mothers

Went to school by bus again. Now that it's been such a common thing to me, I'd say one day if I get super rich I'd still force my kids to ride a bus.

Was very lazy to wear flip flops and bring extra girly shoes (screw Monday and formal dress code) so I just wore my girly shoes from home although it was raining. Stupid decision uhuh. Had to endure 2 hours of classes with wet feet. In baju kurung. In girly shoes. While doing a presentation.

The ride home was crazy with so many people. Many people equals to many weird smells. And many people means extra long minutes to reach home. What could have been a thirty minute ride stretched to a one and half an hour ride. Long rides mean sleepiness. 

And one funny thing about buses is that it contains dead souls. Or dead eyes of living people. Or living people who seemingly have dead souls and dead eyes. 

A mother of four had to stand up and ended up sitting on the floor (the floor had a raised level, if that makes sense to you). She was carrying her baby, younger than my nephew. And no one cared.

Worst part is...I hesitated. And I let her sit there for quite a long time.

Just because of my hesitant nature.

What if she declines? What if other people laugh at me when she declines? What if people think I'm stupid to give up a seat? What if she actually hates getting help from people? What if. I know. The what ifs all sound stupid, but being nice was never an easy thing to me.

Yet, pretending that I don't see this woman is even harder than I though. I may sit there and be happy that I'm less tired, but my heart will never be easy.

Several stops later, I made my first move.

And she declined. I was so ashamed.

But then I try to put myself into her situation. Of course I may decline. I won't want someone to sympathise on me. 

I tried for the second time. Third. She gave in. I was like yasssss.

Then standing up, I look at all the healthy men who didn't give a damn when they saw this lady sitting on the floor. No one wants to give up their comfort. Everyone has religion, everyone screams about their ideologies, everyone believes in kindness, but no one wants to give up the comfort of a bus seat (which is not that comfy, if you ask me..)

Okay let's get this clear. I'm not trying to say I'm better than all those people who pretended that they didn't see the woman. I'm not. I've done more bad things than good things last year. And I don't want the woman to think I'm so nice to give her the seat. I'm not. 

But I thought of all the days how I've heard stories of people being impacted by small things done by strangers, and I greedily want to become that stranger. Most importantly, I want this woman, or at least her eldest son (who seems to be the only one who understood the situation) to pass it on. It's easier to try to understand and love someone that I completely don't know about. For the first time in my life, I stood up and thought (and half-prayed, I guess) how I would want to see these kids not needing to ride a bus again when they get older. Buy a car or something. Live an easier life, although I don't know them at all. 

What I'm trying to say right now is that...I don't know. No amount of kindness that I do can ever neutralise the bad things I've done. But this bus lesson taught me that a lot of people have harder lives than mine. Most of the time I'm just bitching for nothing actually.