Thursday, October 29, 2009

Need for Speed (Above Ground 2)

Bogota's streets are litterally filled with busses in all sizes, ages and colours. The ratio busses cars is about 10 to 1 and they all drive like crazy. There aren't many busstops in the city so everyone flags down the bus they want to take wherever they're standing. Because of the heavy traffic and the speed, the busdriver will often fail to notice passengers that want to jump on the bus, so sometimes you have to get half accross the road, jumping up and down while waving your arms to get the drivers attention. The price is invariably 1200 pesos during the day and 1250 pesos at night, no matter if you travel from terminal to terminal (which takes up to 2 hours) or just one square. To know where the busses going you have to find the right neigbourhood on the signs in the front window which look a little like this:
GERMANIA
10 Cle y 7 K Candelaria
Galerias Cali
K 26

So to find the right bus you'll have to read all the signs quickly, hoping that your bus is not just overtaking all the other busses on the third lane, or if he is, that the driver notices you anyway after which he will dangerously swerve in front of the other busses to allow you to get in (if you still feel like it after watching the driver do that).
Because of the many accidents and deaths, now all the bus companies have to show statistics at the counter which say how many accidents/wounded/deaths they had last month and accumulative.
The alternative is taking a taxi, which is a lot more expensive and probably not a bit safer either as these drivers are just as loco...

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