Ride Home

I decided to do something a little different this post.

I put together a little photo essay about my commute to and from school, I've already gotten a little positive feedback so I figured I might as well put it up here. The tone is different from what I've written so far, I'm interested to hear what you all think.

The young woman’s face is swabbed with makeup. Sharp black lines frame her crinkled eyes and perfectly pink cheeks corner her smile, all teeth. Two friends lean against her back in similar looks of ecstasy, they couldn’t imagine having a better time anywhere else. All because of Aritaum beauty products, says the bus stop ad, we dream of you only.

I pull my hood closer and stare away from the women, fluorescently bright against the dusk. It is autumn now, just cold enough to bring on a shiver and make waiting for a cross-town bus interminable.

First one, then two, then half a dozen buses, their illuminated interiors full of reclining passengers like living rooms floating by. I wait outside, my hands shoved deep into sweatshirt pockets, thinking of my own living room, so remote now.

5614 comes out from behind the curve, its number painted in orange lights upon its prow. I am getting on at the first stop, so I have my pick of seats. The driver greets me with “오서 오세요.” Once the bus becomes fully laden and each new rider must elbow their way onboard, the greetings stop and it’s just a silent run to the next terminal.


At each stop, I look up from my window seat and flicker my glance across the students and salarymen who are coming home from work. Unless clinging to a boyfriend or girlfriend, they all file silently into open seats, leaving the spot beside me empty.

Sometimes their gazes lingers for just a second on my face, the moment’s hesitation that tells me how unusual it is to have a white person ride the bus. Once every so often, if every other spot is full of packages and tired riders, someone will sit beside me, pulling their thighs to the other side of the bench.


Outside, neon brightens the way, advertising karaoke rooms and barbecue restaurants to all who pass by. Every ride back from campus brings a new sign, a new smiling animal mascot who entreats me to descend from the bus and discover how he tastes. Other shops peek out from side streets, single bulbs illuminating shelves smothered with plastic pipes and scooter parts.
The girl beside me, her hair dyed a violent shade of brown, straightens her sweater and stares intently at her cellphone.

My professors say that long ago, everyone read on the bus, before you could plug your ears into music and watch television in the palm of your hand. American singers are piped into my head and I think of how strange their crooning sounds amidst the quivering anthems of pop starlets on the bus radio. Sing to me of the silence down on Bleecker Street, sing to me of summer flings before college, sing the same songs I listened to in my real hometown.

Now my apartment block swings into view, uniform beige and brown towers that house the legions of men and women who work in Seoul. I step off the bus and cast my eyes upward, to where a lit kitchen window can show my host mother starting dinner.


I walk through one last wall of neon, 고기사랑, 안경 1001, and 꽃. Then I am in the courtyard, and the pulsing roar of buses and mopeds is quieted for the night. A little boy, wrapped up in nothing but a taekwondo robe, comes home after class, walking beside me for a moment before disappearing into his apartment doorway.

Fourteen floors later, I am home. My homestay 이모 calls out a hello from the kitchen and asks me if I’ve eaten dinner. For a second, I am just glad to talk to someone else, to explain in halting Korean that everything is alright, for now.