London to the North

The most disturbing journey ever.

I got on a coach from my home in London but up to the North of England because my holiday ended yesterday and I was due to go back to work today.

I boarded the coach at London Victoria coach station at 2:45 pm. I got a good seat.. No one sitting next to me – which is always a plus because then you don’t have to have that forced conversation that some people try to have when you are in a confined space for x amount of time – took my jacket off and got comfortable.

A few minutes before we were set to leave a woman got on the coach with 3 children. 2 older ones and a younger little girl. I saw them in the station because the little girl was running around, screaming and being silly. I didn’t expect them to get on the coach but they did. We set off on time – 3:00 pm on the hour. About 10 minutes later all hell broke loose. The kids that had gotten on with their mother were sat at the back of the coach near to the toilet. The screaming and crying was unbearable. I think at the same time all of those children decided that they wanted to use the toilet. The little girl wanted to go first, but one of the older ones wasn’t letting her, telling her that she had to wait until both of them went because she was too small and couldn’t go on her own. She began to cry. She held her breath for about 10 seconds to deceive everyone on the coach into thinking that she had stopped and then let a rip. She was screaming and hollering louder than I’ve ever heard. In addition to this her mother was shouting at her siblings telling them to take her to the toilet, but by this time there was no consoling her. She continued screaming for about 20 minutes before her screams became quieter and everyone thought she was fine and it had stopped. Out of what seemed like nowhere, the screams started up again. This time you could hear her mother telling her to shut up and behave which made her just scream even louder.

Fast forward around 2 hours and we pull up into Milton Keynes coach station. The little girl is still screaming and making noise. Another family get on the coach. Two older women, two gentlemen and four children. They were LOUD. Like.. They were sitting across from each other and shouting to have a conversation. It was absolutely ridiculous. One of the children sat next to me and proceeded to have a conversation with one of the other children sitting a few seats away so he wasn’t really shouting too much but making a lot of noise nonetheless. The driver turned the engine on and set off after some kerfuffle. When the engine came on, the air conditioning did also and as if on cue their voices got louder, and as theirs got louder so did the voices of the mother with the three children that were on previously. The initial screaming child was now crying because she wanted to get off and go home. I was tired and had developed a headache about 25 minutes into the journey. I had no ear plugs to block out the sound or any headphones to listen to music or watch anything on my phone. I was being tortured and it wasn’t fair.

After a while the little girl stopped screaming. I don’t know when she stopped. I only noticed the first girl stopped when the second one (that got on at Milton Keynes) started. First she cried because she’s a child and I think she was testing how many decibels she could reach within a confined space. Then she was crying because she wanted to get off and touch the sheep that we drove past. Yes, it was cute initially, but after an hour of screaming about sheep it sort of begins to grate on you. She stopped for a little while. The little boy sat next to me – probably about 7 years old – was playing casino and roulette games on a mobile phone. He’d been playing on it for a while before the little girl trotted over and tried to grab the phone. He ignored her, moving away and continued playing. Again, all hell broke loose and the screaming began again.

I don’t know what I did to deserve what I got yesterday.
I was so thankful when the first little girl and her family got off at Leeds coach station. It was still loud, and as they got off the little girl started crying again.
It was such torture. When it was finally time for me to get off I felt like my brain had been fried and then squeezed and all my energy drained. I was tired, hungry and had a splitting headache.
I think I need to start planning trips enough time in advance so that I don’t have to take the coach anymore. 5 and a half hours of pretty much continuous screaming and crying?

No thank you. I need a vehicle of my own and it can’t come quick enough!

 

I want apple crumble. Great.

~ by originalapplejunkie on April 28, 2014.