Polemic

So, today Thryn and I had what was probably our first rather unpleasant interaction with an Australian that we’ve had since coming here. We were at the bus stop, waiting for the 513 bus to get back to Kingsley (we should have been waiting for the 527, but that’s another part of the story) and I see a woman out of the corner of my eye walking behind me. She looks to be about 40 years old and has dark, thick hair that is down to her shoulders, and darker skin that kind of sags off of her cheeks. She walks around behind Thryn as well, and almost in passing, start talking to her. By the time I turn to face them, she has circled around to stand in front of her, and Thryn is asking her to repeat herself. “What?” she says. “What? Like you don’t know what I’m talking about,” the woman replies, “Don’t act stupid with me, I know what you’re up too, don’t play dumb with me.” She has a low, heavy voice that dripped with disgust. There seems to be nothing to do, so Thryn and I both set our faces like cement, staring without expression at the traffic that is zipping by. “Stupid badgers” the woman says, finally turning to leave, tossing back a few more phrases along the same lines as she goes.
The bus finally comes, and I’m desperately hoping that she will not be joining us on it. At first I am hopeful, because she seems to be making no move to board. But after we are already seated, she shuffles on and shows her card to the driver. As she shuffles her way up the aisle past me, she seems to purposely bump into my shoulders, dropping another “Stupid badgers” to keep us company on the bus ride. Thryn and I have only our frozen faces for defense, but inside I feel mortified, both at somehow having earned this woman’s disdain for no reason that I could ascertain and at what the other passengers must think of us and of this interaction.
It took us until the bus reached the end of the line at Gowrie station to realize that we were lost. I mustered up my courage, and marched up to the grate that kept the driver safe from his passengers. “We’re looking for South St,” I said, trying to sort out where we had gone wrong. But just as we started to talk with the driver, the woman was behind us again, on her way off the bus. “Don’t even listen to them, they don’t even know where they’re going,” she called out to the driver. “Get out of here,” she told us, “go do your business somewhere else. Stupid prostitutes,” she muttered, finally walking away towards the station. I worried suddenly that the bus driver might believe these half-coherent allegations she was making, perhaps kick us off the bus and refuse to help us. But it was painfully obvious that what she said was untrue, both Thryn and I were bundled all the way up to our chins; the way we were dressing could hardly be called provocative. Apparently the driver concurred, because everyone else seemed to just ignore her as well.
But then, a wonderful thing that happened. The bus driver was asking us questions, trying to figure out where we wanted to get to. He didn’t know where South Street was, but then the lady in the seat across the aisle called out some advice. An older man who seemed to know the area well also had some directions to offer. A crowd of people that I was acutely aware that we were inconveniencing had gathered; by blocking the aisle with our queries we made is so that no one could get either on or off. But the other passengers didn’t seem at all surprised or annoyed, and instead did their best to assist the driver with giving us directions. We couldn’t understand what was said in all that jumble, but the bus driver told us, “Just sit back down for awhile, ladies, we’ll get you where you need to go.” As we neared our stop, the woman across the aisle told us, “Just get off here and in about two blocks go right and you’ll be on South Street. You can’t miss it.” We got off the bus with copious thanks to those that had helped us and continued to make our way back home, having, in one night, been acquainted with both the best and the worst of Australian people.