I have written before of my bewilderment while watching fellow bus and tram-goers rushing to alight at a stop as though the vehicle was on fire only to commence shuffling like geriatric tree sloths once off the vehicle. It seems that the slightest indication of a queue forming will cause frantic behavior no matter that there is no urgency at all.
Last night as the tram arrived at the Happy Valley terminal I heard someone yelling for a fellow passenger to stop pushing him. I peered from where I was standing in the back of the tram to see what looked to be an actual tree sloth- a pale, slightly stooped individual with fuzzy ears and droopy eyelids. The tree sloth was much more animated than I expected and shook his small bag of fruit at a middle aged woman behind him. "Give me some respect; I am almost ninety years old," exclaimed the folivore at the interloper of his personal space, "you stop pushing me in the back!"
The woman ceded the tiniest sliver of space between their two bodies and they continued down the aisle until he was almost at the front of the tram where she apparently couldn't help herself and closed the distance. I was still leaning against the back of the tram so I was unable to hear the exchange but there was more grocery bag waving. Then the aggrieved old man finally disembarked and shuffled along (at a much more rapid rate than the other passengers might I note). I was curious to know what kind of a person would crowd an octogenarian but the woman didn't look anything unusual. In fact, she looked like every other typical passenger as she plodded along without the slightest look of embarrassment on her face.
I wonder what Edmund Leach would have made out of all of this.
Last night as the tram arrived at the Happy Valley terminal I heard someone yelling for a fellow passenger to stop pushing him. I peered from where I was standing in the back of the tram to see what looked to be an actual tree sloth- a pale, slightly stooped individual with fuzzy ears and droopy eyelids. The tree sloth was much more animated than I expected and shook his small bag of fruit at a middle aged woman behind him. "Give me some respect; I am almost ninety years old," exclaimed the folivore at the interloper of his personal space, "you stop pushing me in the back!"
The woman ceded the tiniest sliver of space between their two bodies and they continued down the aisle until he was almost at the front of the tram where she apparently couldn't help herself and closed the distance. I was still leaning against the back of the tram so I was unable to hear the exchange but there was more grocery bag waving. Then the aggrieved old man finally disembarked and shuffled along (at a much more rapid rate than the other passengers might I note). I was curious to know what kind of a person would crowd an octogenarian but the woman didn't look anything unusual. In fact, she looked like every other typical passenger as she plodded along without the slightest look of embarrassment on her face.
I wonder what Edmund Leach would have made out of all of this.
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