Tuesday stuff...

i had an odd experience this morning on the bus. it was crowded when i got on, but there were seats in front. nowadays, my white hair gets me a seat anyplace and i don't have to feel guilty. but there were a couple of ongoing conversations among several people in the bus who didn't seem to know each other. most of us try to keep ourselves in our little spaces, and keep our ukana out of other people's way. that includes, of course, our voices and cell phone conversations. but today it was different. the person to my left, and another person two rows down and across the aisle, and then another person further down were having a discussion. loud. everybody heard every detail. they were talking about the price of gasoline and complaining about having to put $80 worth of gas in their car every two or three days--which was why they were riding the bus. at first i tried to tune them out, but that was tough. then (shifting into my anthropologist role) i asked myself what was really going on here. people were being mighty friendly and breaking all the unspoken rules about bus behavior! and these were not kids! not even teenagers! they looked like ordinary, going-to-work adults, middle aged or older, rather conservative. one lady was filipino, one guy was haole, and next to me was an older japanese woman who looked like she worked in an office. they were noisy! and friendly! by golly, they were behaving almost like a community! it occurred to me that the people on the bus, if they were allowed to ride together as a group for a longer length of time, would coalesce into a community of like-minded (around rising gas prices) individuals who saw themselves as sharing a common crisis, like survivors of a plane crash, for example. they would become compadres, all of them at the mercy of a system in which it became harder and harder to live an ordinary life. and no one who had not experienced their hardship could relate. my fingers were itching to take photos! i had to restrain myself.

so of course, as soon as i got off the bus i started taking photos of everybody and everything i passed on the way to my office, including a homeless man in a wheel chair with his cart of belongings nearby. and then beautiful flowers at the flower shop next to my building. after my first class, i walked down to the open market where all kinds of colorful things called to my camera lens. i saw some little painted wooden egg-like decorations. i wanted to buy a bunch, but had to rethink whether or not i could really shell out $6 each for the four eggs that i wanted. what would i do with them? but a really neat thing happened on my way back to my office. three young students were playing violins on the mall. it was so beautiful. i stood there for a few minutes listening. what a treat! it made up for all the times i felt depressed or sad during the week. it made me happy. so i get to end this post on a happy note.