-In the first place, public transportation can take you to just about any place in the country, including the smallest villages. The vast majority of people in Honduras use the public transportation system as opposed to driving their own cars. According to the survey I did of my town last year, only 6% of people here reported owning their own car. (It does seem, however, like most people in my town at least aspire to having their own car, but as it stands, it’s prohibitively expensive to buy one and much more so to pay for gas and maintenance.) The positive consequence of this dependence on public transportation is that Honduras’ carbon emissions are immensely and responsibly low. Not to mention, Honduras isn’t involved in the messy politics of the Middle East like America (though I won’t go into their recent history with Venezuela).
-Public transportation is cheap. It costs me L28 (just under $1.50) to get to Santa Barbara from my town, about two hours down the winding and steep mountain road.
-On my town’s bus, as is probably the case in the rest of rural Honduras, people often use the chance to catch up with friends and neighbors and sit quietly and politely chatting (and gossiping) for the entire ride. For the most part, it’s a refreshingly friendly experience. True, things get a little less friendly once you get onto buses between bigger cities, but it’s almost never hostile.
-Passengers are usually surprisingly helpful to strangers. More than once, my bus has stopped to let passengers hop off to help push stalled cars on the side of the road. When would a public bus ever stop to help another vehicle in the States? Also, people will help other passengers move heavy bags or hold kids in their laps if there’s no more room to sit. People will give up their seat to elderly people and women with children. If the bus is struggling to make it up a steep stretch of road, passengers seem happy to get off and help push or pull! In the States, people would most likely get angry and probably consider calling their lawyer.
-There’s no need to wait at a “bus stop.” In fact, that concept doesn’t really exist: You can flag a bus down anywhere along the road and get picked up. The same works for getting off. Just yell out “baja” (the equivalent of the impersonal “someone is getting off here”) and they’ll stop and let you off, helping you with bags if you need it. Of course, the dark side of this is that you can be in trouble if you’re trying to get anywhere in a hurry.
-If you’re hungry or thirsty at any point during your travel you won’t have to wait long for someone to offer to sell you tasty greasy/sugary food or drink. Same goes with needing pills for anything from mental slowness and forgetfulness to back pain, new toothbrushes or a chip for your cell phone, or God. It’s practically foolish to pack considering all the things you can purchase while on the bus.Ultimately, people take riding buses here as part of daily life and are much less worried about regulations and cold efficiency as we are in the States.
Cheapness is mainly what’s important. That and upholding a sense of empathetic communal support (ie ‘we’re all on this bus together’ type of thing). So I’d say it’s only fair to consider all the negative stuff I mentioned in my last blog post with all this good stuff when talking about riding buses in Honduras. But when it comes down to it, I still miss the freedom of having my own car.
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