Conversations on the 43 Bus

CONVERSATIONS ON THE 43 BUS

There is new hazard now encountered on my North London bus journeys. “Hazard” is, in fact, too strong a word. I need a noun for an event which is neither dangerous nor alarming, but rather- disconcerting. A “disconcert”, perhaps. Pronounced not as if it were a kind of musical occasion but with the accent on the final syllable.

The bus disconcerts are occasioned by (so far) young men in their 20s, casually dressed. They look like final year or graduate Uni students. So far, pretty normal bus clientele. But (here the disconcert) suddenly they start talking to you. Theirs is not the discourse of an under-breath mutterer whose breaking into audible speech you dread; not are they Ancient Mariner sorts who “fix [you] with a glittering eye” and try to pull you into a challenging dialogue (that might come later, if you allow it). No: the technique they use, almost immediately on sitting down near you, or you sitting down near them, is to address some wholly disarming pleasantry to you.  So far I have had: “That’s a very nice leather bag, Sir” and “Hello Sir- did you enjoy the snow this morning?”.

When someone whom I think to be a complete stranger attempts to make small-talk on public transport, my initial reaction is one of panic (this doesn’t apply if the stranger is commenting on some more or less transitory misfortune common to everyone present, like an inordinate delay or another passenger’s boorish behavior). The panic takes the form of: Should I know this person?- is s/he a friend of one of my children? is it one of my children? (Yes that gaffe has happened recently, in the street…)

The next phase is one of awkwardness. How do I handle this conversation? For the young men evidently want to go on chatting. The “nice bag” guy asked where I got it. I said “Venice”. He (a North American) asked “Where’s that?”. I said “Italy”. He said (to my sinking heart) “My friend here”- indicating a hitherto silent young man sitting a couple of places away from him and right opposite me- “is Italian”. The latter smiled: “I know Venice of course. I am from Milano”. A new avenue of chat beckoned.

It was then that I noticed the badge on the second man’s lapel. It was dark blue. The only words I could make out were “Jesus Christ”, in larger letters than the other text.

At this point I gave up a silent prayer of thanks (to JC?) for the existence of smartphones, and suddenly had an urgent need to consult my texts/emails/websites.

They got off the bus at Highgate station, heading for more polite conversations – and conversions?

The snow-gambit man on the second journey was cut from the same cloth. He was eager to discuss how often it snowed in London (he said he was from a part of the US where it snowed a lot). Again, after a perfunctory but civil rely my smartphone absorbed me.

This man too had the badge. Research online later that the young men were Mormon missionaries. The badge’s full template goes:

The Church of

Jesus Christ

Of Latter-Day Saints

I have always had an image of Mormon missionaries as men in cheap dark suits (as Jehovah’s Witnesses are women in dubious hats). These young men were more stylish than that. They wouldn’t be out of place at an Indy gig. Wholesome in a modern metropolitan way.

Nonetheless: there is something creepy about people who are encouraged(?) or trained (?) to interact, almost by rote, with strangers. Spot a topic, either to with your “mark” (eg leather bag) or with the weather (good British subject) and set up a potential, but superficial, intimacy.

I do not know whether theses exchanges are just practice (on the bus, on the way to the work of conversion) or whether they are in earnest: probes to discover whether the chance traveller is open to a more glittering eye treatment. Either way, I am grateful for the phone’s glittering screen.

February 2015