By: Niveja Assalaarachchi, News Writer and Mason Mattu, Humour Editor

PLEASE listen to me. NEVER TAKE THE R5!!! I have had the most miserable experience on it recently, and I can only hope nobody faces the same horrors as I did. It was a normal Monday morning, until it wasn’t. More about that in a second. 

I made it up to the bus stop, saw the R5 coming, and couldn’t believe my eyes. In comes a run-down, rusting, barely functioning excuse of a vehicle (even more run-down, rusting, and barely functioning than usual!). I peered into the bus — the seat coverings were torn off, and worse of all, there were mice running around. I get that TransLink has no money, but are they really that broke?

Anyway, I got onto the bus. As per usual, I thought I’d get some readings done, but as a sleep-deprived king, keeping my eyes open was too difficult. As I drifted to sleep, the raggedy bus, full of fellow students, each lost in their own world, somehow kept pushing to campus. 

When I woke up, the bus was just past the lower bus loop. I thought, “Well, shit! My class is in West Mall Centre; it’s going to take me ages to get to lecture!” I consoled myself knowing that the upper bus loop existed. Plus, it couldn’t hurt to walk more (new school year, new me, right? I lied; it will definitely hurt me). The bus slowly approached the upper bus stop.

I began thinking about pulling the stop cord on the bus. I mean, you feel important when you push it. The only time I’ll stop a million-dollar vehicle! Nevertheless, I decided against pulling it because it was the last stop — and I’m always hard carrying people. It was their turn. Being the gentleman I am, I also let every single person off the bus before me so I could gain clout.

But to my horror, the bus closed the doors as I was about to get out. How rude?? The bus’ engine started rattling again . . . we were back on the road. No matter how many times I tried to yell at the bus driver or pound on the doors, I couldn’t leave. Suddenly, the LED screen that tells passengers what the next stop is started malfunctioning (again, more than usual!!!). The more the bus kept moving, the more restless I became. What if we were going to shred the bus? What if we were going to the bus recycling depot?? PLEASE, not the Return-It depot for buses, that place stinks. My nose will die. My body will be crunchy and smelly after being recycled with the bus.  I mean, that’s why the bus driver didn’t listen right, he clearly didn’t give a damn, he probably felt that this bus deserved to be scrapped. I was freaking out. I didn’t want to die on a bus — I had so much to live for! I started to think I should write a will on the back of my hand . . . but who even carries pens anymore? Welp! 

I was shaking and screaming — my daily “give a shit” energy began to reach its capacity. When I looked out the window, I could see a small road we were going on, surrounded by trees for miles — where the hell were we? Treehugger headquarters? Suddenly, I saw it — it was the lower bus loop again. I couldn’t believe we hadn’t really gone that far, even though that journey to hell felt like ages! The bus driver looked at me as my body was pressed up against the emergency exit window. He yelled at me to get lost. 

I don’t think I’ll ever understand what happened to me on that day. Maybe my lack of sleep keeps making me lose the plot — or maybe there’s some big conspiracy. Nevertheless, I learned a vital lesson that day, never take the R — (this message has self-destructed. The person who wrote this message is totally alive. Kevin from TransLink’s office was not here and in no way silenced or recycled the aforementioned student).