A Bus ride in Sri Lanka is one of the most exciting experience you can make in this lovely country – and for sure it is one of those moments you will never forget.
Every single bus welcomes you as an individual design of colorful, almost mawkish piece of art. Some are decorated with glittery stripes of tinsel, others a personal shrine of buddhism. Again others are like a pleasant cosy grandmas' living room and then there are those nobody cares for – plain, sterile and dirty. Most of them have a small old television set, hanging right sided behind the driver seat. A bus ride can be quite long in Sri Lanka. 'Let me entertain you' – the television set seems to cry into the too often tiered and exhausted looking faces of the bus riders. For them daily routine. One add after the other streams over the screen, sending their tempting promises towards defenseless passengers. Sometimes they play music – out of broken, out of tune speakers. Local rhythms, local melodies and compositions – unknown and unusual for the western ear. No one seems to listen. No one seems to hear. The seats are narrow, out of old sticky ripped leather. Two seater on the one site, four seater on the other. Narrow. A space next to the window the jackpot.
Enter the bus. Stacked and packed with people and goods. All on their own way and journey. Move closer, more people have to take the ride. Squeezed. A big lump of human sweat and flesh. One pulsating, breathing organism. The ride begins. The street is rough. The traffic unpredictable. Stop and go. Stop and go. Outside impacts, registered in the brain, transmitted into bodily reaction. Stop - weight on the front. Go - weight on the back. Stop - front. Go – back. Stop – front. Go – back. The pack moves. The body becomes one with the movement of the bus. Follow the rhythm of stop and go. Stop and go. Stop and go. Hypnotic motions. Breath. Sweat. Keep the balance. If one falls, the other follow. The western mind thinks.
The moment is gone.
Look around. Young men are hanging onto the bus. Their hands with cramping strength around a sweat slippery metal rod. Their feeds on tiptoes touching the entry step of the bus. They wear tongs. The horn is remarkable. Its loud and long and deep. Enters the ears, finds its way along the nerves, right into the spine. A vibrating sudden sensation. Unexpected every time. Loud. Long. Depp.
***
As traveler moving is one of the most time consuming aspects of the journey.
And one of the most precious ones. Traveling by bus, train, plane, boat, bike or -
the most common way of traveling - by walk, it doesn't matter.
It's motion. It's change.
The restlessness of the mind and breast gets transformed into a physical movement.
The world passes by on a window.
You see the change, you stay the same.