Grrrrrrrr. I was so mad (angry) yesterday....on the bus...coming home from the lovely birthday celebration that i had with my daughter and her boyfriend.
Sitting there minding my own business...but the driver was taking so long to leave the terminal because there was an elderly gentleman on the bus, and he seemed to not have enough money for his fare...so she was talking loudly at him, ...saying, "o.k. now, another 24 cents..." then i heard her say," o.k. now, another 3 cents. " This interacting had taken about 5 minutes, so, frustrated, i got up and went to put some of my own coins in, saying "oh for Christ's sake, what's a few pennies!!!".. . . she replied "Don't worry about it, i'm talking to him in Punjabi, trying to help him out." [well, i'm sorry but it did not appear so to me] ..anyway, he finally paid his fare to her satisfaction and the bus got on its way. Then a man accross the isle from me made a comment, about people not paying their fare, and i said: "don't jump to conclusions, you don't know that he might not be able to understand, have a little compassion"...and he replied that "these people don't deserve our compassion"...then a woman sitting right next to me threw in her 'two cents worth' of opinion, saying something about "these people" don't deserve to be treated nicely, or something to that effect. And then the whole conversation started turning nasty, about "this race" ( he was east indian), with him sitting right there and another woman, also east indian sitting next to him.
So finally i said to the man accross from me "don't even go there with me", and he tried to defend his position but i said i did not want to talk to him, then the lady sitting next to me piped up again with more racist comments, so i said: "stop talking to me like that, i don't want to hear it" and turned my head away, but she just kept talking, so i turned back to her and told her to be quiet, she said she was talking to the man (accross the isle), so i replied, directing my comment to both of them: "You are entitled to your opinion but i don't want to hear it, so be quiet". But they continued on, so i said: "You need to stop talking like this right now - there are laws in this country against this kind of hate mongering, ...you are entitled to to your own opinion and you can say what you like in the privacy of your own home, BUT - YOU - ARE- NOT - ALLOWED - TO - TALK - LIKE - THIS - IN - A - PUBLIC - PLACE, - SO JUST STOP IT RIGHT NOW! " The woman just looked at me in total amazement, then a young woman sitting close by said: "She's right you know, you are not allowed to talk like that in public." So they both shut up, and a kind of weird silence filled the bus.
I sat there, i think my face must have been flaming red, i was so furious, i could feel my heart pumping so fast. But i felt proud of myself for speaking up...usually i would just sit silent, feeling angry and disgusted, and probably gone home and stewed for days...but this time i said what i was thinking, and bugger the consequences! Now i feel so good. heh heh!
