Okay, my son and I were on the bus from hell but we really can't complain because it was free for us. The driver (Manny) deserves a pat on the back because he worked very hard for us and there were many things that were not under his control.
First, the buses turned out to be 28 seat jitney cabs. Good for a trip from a bedroom community into the city but not an interstate trip over 6 hours long. The seats were uncomfortable and not adjustable. There was little room for our backpacks. They were late, they would stop and would not go unless they were all leaving together thus it took over 6 hours to arrive to a city not even half way there that normally takes me 2.5 hours to drive to. We got a flat in Scranton and then blew another tire outside Baltimore which delayed us for a couple hours. Instead of arriving in DC at 9am, we got there after 2 pm. We had about 1.5-2 hours at the rally and then the metro transit to the meeting place where the buses were took over 1.5 hours d/t delays. We were told they would try to make it up to us by getting a coach bus for the return trip but no dice. I thought the ride home would never end. Plus the drivers seemed to want to stop every 2 hours?! each stop took forever. None of the drivers understood English very well. One driver in the group arrived an one rest stop, declared he had driven his 8 hours and was driving no more. I cannot recommend this company (never got the name of them) but all the buses had Paterson NJ to NY Taxi labeled on them. If anyone here works for SEIU or other union in the NYS area, please, don't hire them. Your members will vote for someone else on the board at next election. We only had about 4 SEIU members on our bus and they complained the loudest.
We picked the group we went with d/t me wanting my son to have a good experience at his first rally. This bus had a group of SDS college students in the SLP. He made friends, sat with them and now is really energized to be politically active. When we finally arrived in DC he told me he was going to hang out with them. Poor rejected me. Can you imagine a 17 year old wouldn't want to hang out with his mother? Well, luckily I made a new friend who also brought her teens (they were more interested in exploring the Smithsonian tho). So we hung out.
Here is a link to my pics. There are 45 of them:
http://picasaweb.google.com/rowsella315/OneNationRally10022010#So even though we had only about 1.5-2 hrs there and missed some really good speakers, marches and rallies... The spirit there was amazing. The people were so friendly and happy, lots of different kinds of people, -- I guess brotherhood was a good description. The speakers I did hear were inspirational, they really touched your heart. There were so many groups there. Every kind of worker one can think of except maybe stockbrokers. I met so many people. There were so many things to see and to talk about. My pictures tell the best story so please link and view them. I would have really loved to be there the whole day. I thank everyone that did go, I think we showed the country that we are not invisible, we are not silent we are loud and proud and are not taking the tea bagging Republican shit lying down- and we don't Hope for Change--- We DEMAND it!
I plan to go to more rallies locally and like this one. It is really important to show up and represent. If you can't go to these because of work or family obligations, consider contacting your local AFL-CIO or Peace Council and donate something towards the cost of buses so more people can go. If I have to say anything for the Tea-baggers, they do show up for stuff and we can't be complacent because we elected "our guy" and think that is enough.
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