And ARRIVA came

They have now officially been over a week in the service but unfortunately 

no real improvement has been noticed.  

They've come with a lot of promises, better services, politer bus drivers, more comfortable and air-conditioned buses, more frequent buses, more routes.  All beautiful things that made the Maltese look really forward to their arrival.  But what did they really get??

People, such as myself, who use the service every morning to go to work, are forced to wake up and go wait for the bus much earlier than they used too. Mind you, I am not talking about a couple of minutes earlier, I am talking as much as an hour earlier.  But than what happens?  Are the Maltese people at least rewarded for their early departure??  Of course they are not.  At least that's the case in my home town.  You go to wait for a bus at 6 in the morning.  The first thing you see is a mass of people all piled up on top of each other already waiting for the bus.  Some of them have actually already been waiting an hour for the bus, waiting for a bus that never came.  People grumble because let's face the truth, they are going to be late for work.  But nobody seems to care.  It may pass as not much of a problem once or twice but which employer welcomes you with open arms when you arrive later for work day after day?? 

So you're there, waiting, and you finally see a bus coming.  When it stops in front of the mass of angry people, they actually realize that it is not the right bus, it is not a bus going to Valletta which all the people are actually waiting for but a bus going to a remote place called Bahrija. One has to ask, who the hell goes to Bahrija at 6 o'clock in the morning??  If truth be told, who the hell goes to Bahrija at all.  So you stay there waiting some more, cursing and looking at your watch, hearing the church's clock chiming a quarter of an hour after an other.  You see another bus coming, but guess what, it's not the correct bus either.  This one is going to the beach.  Would be actually nice to go there, there's only a tiny bit of a problem, you are actually waiting for the bus to go to work.  Who in their right minds sets up routes to remote places in the early hours of the morning instead of sending buses to the capital city where everyone is actually going.

But that is not it.  When the bus actually comes it takes almost an hour to arrive in it's mid destination where some people have to stop to change buses.  It used to take buses half an hour to arrive at their destination, Valletta, but now it takes almost an hour to arrive mid way.  And one asks, why the hell is that?  It is true that the traffic has actually increased because of the inefficiency of the Arriva services, but the reality is that the length of time is not wasted because of the traffic.  Just yesterday, it took us 40 minutes to make it through Siggiewi, 40 BLOODY MINUTES.  And obviously the reason is that differently from before, when we had more than 6 buses available in the morning, where the people using the buses would be divided in these, and where both the buses and the drivers would be on the first stage before it is time for it to leave, NOW the buses come (sometimes actually on time) but it takes them minimum 15 minutes on the first stage to get all the people on board as obviously most need to pay for the fare.  By this time the bus is already full so from than on it is sort of a fight, a fight with yourself trying to make yourself as small as possible so that all the other people could actually make it on the bus.  Sardines have more spaces in their can.  

Needless to say, so far, this has never happened, and you are left feeling guilt for those other poor souls who have been left to wait, God only knows for how long, in the hope that another bus shows up.  But mind you, that is not the end of it.  When you have to change buses you have to pass from this same process once again.   This is definitely not what I call the best way to start they day.

Being the social scientist I am, it has been interesting for me looking at the way people reacted.  It has to be said some reactions are typically Maltese, which never seize to surprise me. You have to explain to me how such such an issue is also discussed and fought on a political basis.  People who grumble from the service are accused that they are Labour Party supports and that they are the people that grumble no matter what.  Whilst on the other hand, the people who don't grumble and who are actually in favour of Arriva because of the new buses etc, are accused of defending the Nationalist Party no matter what.

Well I don't know what else to say.  So far this has been the Arriva situation. It is true the buses are air-conditioned but you spend hours waiting outside for the bus, in the sun.  Most of the drivers I came in contact so far are definitely a bit better behaved, but than they are hardly of any help because they themselves have no idea of what is going on Arriva wise. The buses are neither more frequent nor do they come on time, especially if you live in a small town. The buses are definitely more comfortable, but it is difficult to see this if you are packed like sardines, where you have to fight your way in and out.