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What would it be like if such a simple thing could bring you an incredible sense of relaxation and help you start your day right?
Honestly, I don’t really know what that feels like, because I live on the outskirts of a busy city, Cluj-Napoca, and when I say outskirts, I mean Florești. Or at least I didn’t know until recently.
I work in the city and I have to cross all of Florești plus the center of Cluj to get to work. On a normal day it takes me about an hour, an hour and 15 minutes. Which I consider acceptable, given the distance.
In the summer months, it’s somewhere around 45–50 minutes, and the way back is roughly the same.
That was until Thursday, when I did a 12 km trip in 2 hours. On top of that, I was in a hurry to get to the office, since I had something pretty urgent to finish.
My delay was caused by a pretty serious accident; I just hope there were no victims, only me being unable to get to the office.
On Friday I decided to take a different approach. I was convinced to try taking the bus. Usually I don’t like this kind of “adventures” where I have to switch multiple buses. I still have some pain in my leg, but luckily it wasn’t a long walking distance, so I was easily convinced.
I’ve kept a bit of reluctance toward public transport, because in my “younger days” I had to rely on it; it wasn’t exactly pleasant. It was usually extremely crowded, no air conditioning; there were also those old diesel buses. The combination of heat plus exhaust fumes was absolutely awful.
A few months ago I tried taking the bus again. It was the end of winter. The bus was 40 minutes late and I was left with the impression that nothing had changed—same old buses, and even when they are new, they still feel like they lack proper conditions.
I tried giving it another chance, but this time I was surprised. Why? Well, it wasn’t how I remembered it, luckily. But I already started off wrong, like I do on a Friday morning when the weekend is near. For more details, you can see here why I say Friday is a bad day for me.
And it wasn’t just that; I looked at the schedule wrong and ended up waiting at the stop, but that wasn’t the transport’s fault—I was just being dumb and checked the wrong timetable. Anyway, while I was waiting, I was thinking about how the bus would be.
It’s 40 degrees.
Does it even have ventilation, or is the ventilation just the outside air? How crowded will it be? Will I arrive on time?
I tried to find an excuse to go back home for the car, but I didn’t give in; I had to remind myself I’m a pure-blood DAC, I’m not scared of taking the bus.
Just kidding—after I saw I still had to wait another 15 minutes in the sun, I almost started taking small steps back home.
Looking back, the idea of an adult being scared of a bit of heat is kind of ridiculous; it feels like as I’ve gotten older I’ve become more fragile. Anyway, my recent experiences kind of prove that this isn’t just a theory, but a certainty.
Putting aside my avalanche of thoughts against taking the bus, it finally arrives and, to my surprise, it’s a new, modern bus, with air conditioning, clean. I started feeling more optimistic. I sat down because my leg still hurts and I didn’t want to be a complainer all day or faint again.
I started looking out the window. I was fascinated by how easy it is to get distracted and how you can actually see a city changing. Since I wasn’t focused on driving, I could observe it.
The way this city has gone from a sad, empty place during summer periods to a functional, fairly lively city. Infrastructure problems will always exist as it grows; we can only hope for better.
After a few stops I shifted my attention from the outside to the inside of the bus. What caught my eye was that I no longer had anything to fear at all. We were riding with holy protection over 9000+.
In the middle of the bus, although it was new, there was a religious icon stuck on the wall. Nothing wrong with that—it was just interesting; there was no “come to our church, give us money” message, just an icon on the wall.
The most interesting thing for me was people’s expressions. I saw people absorbed in their phones, people reading, sad people, happy people. It makes you wonder: what are people dealing with? Why are they happy? Why aren’t they looking out the window too? Am I the only one who just stares like this? Am I disturbing anyone?
These questions will probably get an answer another time. Until then, slowly but surely, we move toward the destination. Not even that slowly, because despite people complaining about them, dedicated lanes are a real gold mine for public transport.
As I was getting closer to my destination, I started realizing that even though my day had all the signs in the world that it would go badly, it actually went well. I arrived at work relaxed, without being stressed about having 5 accidents, without constantly changing routes just to avoid being late. I didn’t even realize how exhausting that is, when instead you could just sit and relax.
I did more than 50 minutes during rush hour. I was surprised by this.
On the way back I usually do an hour and 30 minutes. This time I did it in 40 minutes.
During those 40 minutes I also had some included entertainment. I witnessed an event where a grown man tried to prove to everyone that he was the ultimate alpha; he only proved he was an idiot, starting to argue with the driver and insult him. All this in front of his wife, who was telling him to stop acting like an animal. No success, but that’s part of society; nothing we can do.
It was a good day, and the bus ride was relaxing—much more relaxing than driving. I’ll repeat this experience; I don’t want to stress myself unnecessarily every time.
