A Combi Adventure

When you're main form of transportation is of the public variety, your life can never be boring. Unfortuantely this past week, my life was a little too exciting.

Last Tuesday, after three days of rest and recooperation, I was feeling like a caged animal. There is only so much rest a sick person - or a healthy person - can have. So, I decided to go across town to my weekly Spanish lesson.

At three in the afternoon, I was caught up in the most-lunch rush hour as the Peruvians were making their way back to work after their extended lunch hour. For this reason, the combis were crowded. I counted 28 people (including the driver) on my combi. Unfortunately, Tuesday was an unusually warm spring day, and the windows on the combi were closed. I had just finished eating lunch (read: a piece of bread that I was able to stomach) and between the heat, the smells of my fellow passengers, and the maniac fast-slow-stop-go combi driving, I was starting to feel a little sick. Five minutes passed, and it seemed the driver was in even more of a hurry than before. My stomach started rolling, and I recognized it as the sign that I was about to revisit my lunch. I wasn't sure what to do. People in the combi were literally sitting on each other's laps, and there was no safe place to turn if I needed to be sick. So, I didn't the only thing I could think of. I called out to the driver, "Senor Conductor! Senor Conductor! Si no puede manejar con mas cuidado, voy a botar en toda la combi." (Roughly translated: Mr. Diver, Mr. Driver! If you can't drive with more care, I am going to throw up all over the combi.)

Immediately, the people on the combi started shifting away. The combi assitant, who rides in the back with the people to help open and close the door and take people's fares, started yelling, "Stop! Stop! Stop!" Almost immediately, the combi slowed to a corner and stopped. "Tu," (you), they said adressing me, "OUT!" Shocked, I looked around. "Yo?" (Me?), I asked innocently. "Out!" They said again. I gathered up my things and stepped out of the combi. That's when it occurred to me: They're kicking me off! Flabbergasted, I remember thinking Can they do this?.

Yep, they can.