Was a bit grumpy this morning on the way in to find somebody barge in and board the bus before everybody else while waiting for the number 3 to take me from Guildford to the Surrey Research Park. I can only assume this chap was a crap doctor because he had no patients (patience – geddit?! D’oh..).
But what got me grumpier was that the bus driver decided to drop everybody else around the back of the Research Park rather than just by the entrance or just opposite the STC which just about every other driver does. No, this one wanted to make everybody walk back up that bloody hill. I’ve always said that most Arriva drivers serve themselves rather than that of the passengers who use their services. If we’d known that this chap was going to do this, we could have waited until the bus did the complete loop of Occam Road and got off at the opposite side of Gill Avenue. However, it’d be nice if the University of Surrey could erect a proper bus stop (alighting only) opposite the STC.
As I’m on the bus for the next few days until the bike is repaired and serviced, I’m using the Arriva Bus Mobile Ticket system on my Sony Ericsson (not available for Android or iPhone – yet). It works rather well, but registration was a complete nightmare and needed manual intervention from the Mobile Ticket support team in order to get it running.
The advantages are obvious:
Cashless, thus no need to waste time paying in cash when boarding the bus – flash the phone at the driver and you’re done!
No need to forget/lose paper tickets – just make sure you don’t lose or forget your phone!
The downside is that it takes some time for the application to load, and that the navigation menus are a bit of a pain to negotiate. Therefore if you’re running for the bus or forget you’re ticket is on the phone, it can take up to a minute or two for the application to load and the ticket to become available. I’ve also found that some menu prompts (although to be fair – are attributable to the Sony Ericsson OS) aren’t visible due to the colour scheme used by the application. This morning there was an upgrade available, so the time it took to get the ticket loaded was much longer than usual, but went through just fine.
Overall I like this system – it’s much more convenient than paper tickets and you don’t have to carry cash (all transactions come off your registered debit or credit card). All drivers I’ve encountered have accepted it, and so far apart from the registration issue, is well worth doing. Roll on the iPhone/iPod app (hoping that tickets can be purchased over a wireless connection in the case of an iPod Touch).
Jennifer and I have just returned from two weeks in Kenya. We had a wonderful time, although I spent the eve of my 34th birthday with most of my world disappearing out my bottom or through my mouth – so much so I had to to be taken to a remote village hospital (in Voi, near Tsavo East National Park) to get a couple of injections to stop the vomiting and some strong antibiotics to stop the diarrhoea. Also had blood in the urine. The doctor thought it might be malaria (although it was only a couple of days since we got to Kenya, I was already taking Malarone, and it didn’t look as though I’ve been bitten as yet). He also thought it might be food poisoning. Either way after the injections I was absolutely delirious and had no idea where I was. It took two men to get me from hospital to the taxi and from the taxi back to the hotel room as I had absolutely no idea who I was, where I was or what I was doing. After a trouble night’s sleep I felt better enough to get back on safari (although had to miss the 6.15 morning safari) and head back to Mombasa.
The rest of the holiday went well enough and I was back at full appetite, blood-less urine within 24 hours. The drugs seem to have done the job. Although today I’m off to the doctors with the drugs and pamphlets given to me by the Keyan doctor to get myself fully checked out.
In the mean time, here’s the Masai version of the Hokey Cokey:
.. it’s still Europe! One can get a bit tired of seeing the same places (although to be fair – so far I don’t believe any of the trippers have been to the same towns or cities as previous couples, but the countries visited have almost always been the same each season) and the same activities. There’s only so much wine tasting, go-cart racing, cooking, painting, etc. that one can watch without it getting overly repetitive. But it’s the PEOPLE that really make the show interesting. But a change of scenery and activities can help enormously, however. Thankfully the current series (4) has been a bit more diverse than the rest. Long may it continue for series 5 and 6.
I’d really like to see the team (and Brendan) go a bit further and explore the US and Canada. Or Australia. Or New Zealand. One could take the format and really take it to some extraordinary places. But I realise there are budgets and other limitations. There also needs to be a Celebrity Coach Trip as well. Having Scootch in this series doesn’t count.
But what I’m REALLY hoping for is that the format will make it across to the US – in which US folk get to come to Europe and do the same thing. It’d be important to get US travellers who rarely travel outside the US. But equally, the show would need experienced travellers to berate and get on the nerves of those that haven’t. But a US produced version of Coach Trip is most definitely something I’d watch.
While my bike is out of action (although now borrowing a colleague’s bike as from today):
I’ve been using Arriva Buses to get me to and from work. And boy is it an eye opener. I usually leave 6:50am to catch the 7am 34 to Guildford. This is a pretty good route and gets me to work in plenty of time (turning up around 8:15). The only real downside is the stop at Bellfields where school kids get on. There are a couple of girls who are constantly screeching and making as much noise as possible and when they’re not doing that, they’re playing music on their mobile phones at full blast. Two businessmen scolded them for this and they just answered back until they were told off again. As soon as the businessmen got off the bus, they cranked up the phones until I told them it was too loud (I had the iPod on with headphones and could hear them loud and clear). They answered back, saying that they were just having a bit of fun before school. I left it at that. I had no wish to get into a shouting match with them. All I know is that they then get on a number 4 or 5 bus and head to Park Barn. They repeat this action almost every single morning. I wonder how Arriva bus drivers keep their sanity.
This morning I took the 28 as I had to prepare for the bike swap and thus left a little later than usual. A group of kids from Merrist Wood College get on at Sainsburys (Knaphill) with me. I’ve seen them before having used to take the 28 during previous bike outages. But they seem to be getting much worse – they’re taking to insulting fellow passengers who have done nothing to them. One girl got off near Pirbright and was immediately criticised by these teenagers about her weight. A man was getting on at Brookwood station and had insults about his hat. And this continued, including insulting the bus driver, pedestrians and so on until they got off at Worplesdon. It got worse as school kids soon embarked and started making racist comments towards a Sikh passenger (who had, perhaps, been lucky enough to be wearing earphones and didn’t hear) – they little game of giving their fellow passengers different names. Don’t know which school these kids were from – they had black blazers and red embroided coat of arms.
Even back in my day (God, I sound like I’m 70 years old) we didn’t take to insulting people. Makes me wonder what kind of parents these kids have to encourage their anti-social behaviour against people who have done nothing to them to warrant such verbal abuse. It’s getting worse, as we’re seeing drunk teenagers boarding the 91 bus and making far more aggressive gestures to passengers. The bus driver tries their best to reason with them, but they just get stroppy and fling more insults until they eventually get bored and leave.
So what’s gone wrong? I have no idea. But I will most glad when Memset upgrade their bike fleet and we get a bike that’s not going to keep breaking down every month – I really dislike using public transport at the moment and will be glad to get away from it.
I’m currently addicted to the Channel 4/12 Yard Productions Coach Trip, a reality TV show that combines a Big Brother style game show format with travelogue.
Here’s an example of what makes this show fun to watch:
I’d really like to see 12 Yard go that extra mile (boom boom!) and take the show to the US – from New York to Los Angeles – since the previous four series have remained firmly in Europe and a little bit of Africa and Asia. Perhaps for series 5, eh?
In the mean time, all four series are available on 4oD, YouTube or SeeSaw.
