I do also have to tell a story about a bus in china (but there is a taxi envolved)...
Ok, so we're going through the himalayas, from the yunnan province to the szechuan province on a bus. There is at least a 3km drop to one side of us. The bus needs to stop and reverse twice because a wheel has gone over the edge. This was before I got worried.

We stop for a meal etc, and as we get back on, I realise that the buses suspension is a makeshift jobby, done with bamboo. The driver's mate decides it will be really funny to chuck a spanner at the driver while he turns a corner. Bus loses two wheels over the edge, we all have to get out and help push it back onto the road. Locals are saying the equivalent of "dude, there's a 3km drop there".

Driver's head is bleeding. His mate can't drive. One of the Guilaos (foreign devils/white ghosts) asks in mandarin if he can drive instead. The (extremely racist) locals decide that Guilao can drive better.

Bleeding driver flashes a government symbol that shuts the rest of the bus up. I spent the rest of the ride saying to myself "ok, when the bus rolls down the cliff, I'll put this arm here, that leg there, should I relax my knees and elbows, or will that make me smash into the walls?"

Driver's mate then decides to interrupt my train of thought by throwing a book he is reading at the driver, who then decides to stop driving.

3 hours later, another driver turns up in a cab and drives us the next 20 minutes until the end of the journey. Should have walked (the entire fucking way). God bless the driver's mate (who we went out drinking with later, just to ensure he at least had a nasty hangover the next day)

I will never apologise about my length.
( gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Thu 27 May 2004, 16:05, Reply)