Dave's Sketch Journal

I see corrugated royal blue walls erected around construction zones that block my vision for miles. I feel pounding pile drivers as we pass large cranes. I hear machine gun jackhammers, grinding gears, rattling windows. The lurching bus finds all the road's potholes.

There are mounds of slag and dross that cover the walkways. They are globs of dried concrete that trip the pedestrians. I see a father carrying his small daughter on his back. His hands are clasped behind him and his fingers interlocked around her.

We are entangled in knotted traffic that resembles a bad macramé accident. A car in front of our bus makes a 3-point turn amid a gaggle of mopeds and ants of people.

Shopkeepers, unfazed, squat in doorways reading Chinese magazines and newspapers.

A man on the bus dressed in blue socks, brown shoes, green pants, and a beige jacket exits carrying a purple shopping bag.

At many points along the road there are no crosswalks, no lights. Yet, people flood the four lane roads into small pockets of space, sucked into the void of passing busses, cars and mopeds. Like water running back into a scrape made in the mud, they overflow the streets until the next bus approaches and pushes them out of the way.

Our bus lunges forward again in a grind of gears and a milk carton spills, creating white riverlets on the bus floor. They cascade down the exit stairs

The automated voice announces the next bus stop, but it's not comprehensible for the TV blasting commercials touting multivitamins that will make my body healthy.

But I think I'll just avoid what's making it weak. I'm getting off at the next stop.

...dave
I'm not a complete idiot, some parts are missing. - Bumper sticker

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