Bavesh Blogs

During my seven years of secondary school, I spent about 2600 hours on a bus. That’s nearly 4 months just sitting down in order to get back and fro from school everyday.

But those 4 months of being a teenager were filled with truly unforgettable moments with some of the best friends I ever met, some of which I may never see again.

Off to a Good Start

The first time on my bus was actually before I even started year 7 (the first year of secondary school). 12 year old me rocked up with my dad and brother and we sat enjoying the view as I nervously wondered if I was going to be able to handle at least 2 hours of this everyday.

Unfortunately, nobody had told us the unofficial hierarchy of the school bus at that point. That the big ol’ sixth formers sit at the front window on the top deck. Always. As they were forced to resettle with the “lower year scum” I was supposed to be part of, I wondered if they’d hold a grudge against me.

Thankfully, they didn’t really (or they forgot) and a few months later was my first week of secondary school. Great!

Until I started getting so motion sick that I ended up explosively puking over the poor dude in front of me (i’m so so sorry) and out the top-deck window onto the road below (so sorry pedestrians, too)…

The Bestest Bus

A few of my favourite moments on the bus were,

1) When the whole window pane popped out its frame and fell onto the road below from the top deck of the bus, almost causing someone to fall out the bus, when two people were fighting leaning against the window.

Then the bus driver, getting angered by the screaming upstairs, marched up the stairs and demanded to know what was wrong as he failed to notice the glass pane in front of him was not just ultra-transparent but ultra non-existent. When he noticed he just said “find your own way to school” and left.

Thus began my hour long trek to school, following sixth formers because I had no idea how to get there by myself yet (at least by walking). On the bright side, I missed a Biology double.

2) When the tunnels were flooded so traffic came to a standstill and we weren’t allowed to get off the bus for four hours… Until our headteacher emailed all of us saying that we didn’t have to go to school as we had missed so much of it anyway.  

3) On the coach when the sunroof pane/roof hatch blew off due to the strong winds on a Geography field trip and the coach driver, as well as our poor Geography teachers, ran off trying to retrieve it in some old farmer’s fields. Upon restoring it and getting to the beach, it blew off yet again and almost hit a Fiat in the car park.

4) Being so late so often due to traffic that you could just explain to the teacher of the second class of the day that you’re part of the “bus gang” (of course you’d already missed first class).

This bus was truly extraordinary. They always used to give us the oldest and crankiest buses, so they inevitably broke down once a week or two. Sometimes they couldn’t even send a replacement bus so we walked the remainder.

Comradery, Sabotaging and Cabbaging

I spent more time with my school mates on the bus everyday than I could at school over lunch break. Seven years of putting up with all their sh-

If you put a bunch of male teenagers on a bus you can probably begin to guess the number of daily fights and bickering. Maybe you can even guess the number of times you woke up minutes before getting off to go home to your parents with some… unpleasant drawings tattooed on your face. What nobody tells you is how your closest “friends” may decide to take your school bag whilst your sleeping, turn it inside out (cabbaging) and hide your house keys, hiding it downstairs (where the girls’ school sat) and refusing to tell you until you missed your stop.

But even with all the cabbaging, I can never forget the big bro moments.

The moments where people from the year above taught us how to tie a tie or how to get through a particular evil teacher’s class.

The moments when your friends saved you a double seat at the front as you were running late from class.

The moments you spent listening to music through one earbud with your best friend because you were both too tired and sad to talk to each other.

The moments the bus driver gave out chocolates for the sixth formers to hand out to everyone on their last day. The moments that turn into memories.

I grew up on this bus 🙂