Same morning routine as before. Until we got to the bus stop.
When we walked up we saw that there was already a long line. In speaking with the ladies who were at the front, we learned that while the bus to Ruby had started running by 6:30 AM on previous days, it had not yet started this morning. The folks from the transportation company were there, and were trying to find out where even the 7 AM bus was.
I saw that quite a few people in line had their packed duffles, meaning that they were probably going home or off site to do laundry. At the beginning of the Jamboree we had been given special wristbands that were meant to give us priority access onto the bus so that we could get to work in a timely fashion. I told my teammates to make sure they had their wristbands ready.
What happened next was a perfect storm of lack of information across different teams.
The transportation person essentially commandeered a bus that was meant to drive a different route for the Ruby bound line, as there were multiple buses for the other route, and she still didn’t know where our bus was. I stood at the door to the bus to let the other people know that my team had priority access with our wristbands.
Well, the first person to come up was not having this at all. He argued with me that he needed to get to work, and that he had been waiting. I tried to explain that we had been given the wristbands to make sure we got to work, and I was just making sure my team got on the bus. He continued arguing and was trying to physically push me out of the way (in reality he was pretty much pushing me backward into the bus).
The transportation manager had gone off somewhere else, and the bus driver did not know anything about the wristbands. No one was backing me up, and this man who was a good foot taller than me was continuing to aggressively push me.
At this point, I threw up my hands, said “fuck this”, and walked away. There wasn’t anything else I could do, and I was outnumbered. I walked out of sight, trying not to cry from the anger I felt. One of my teammates came after me asking if I needed some water. I told him I was ok, I just had to walk away. He joined the rest of the team, and my friend came to see if I was ok. She had left her gear on the bus, which had left, but stayed with me.
We waited until the bus had left, and walked back into line. As we were waiting, a transportation employee finally came over and told the people with bags that those who had jobs to get to had priority to get on the bus. At this point it was a bit too little, too late: there were two buses lined up to take people. We ended up on the third bus, though that one sat for a bit waiting for more people.
We sat down and the people in the row behind us were apparently leaving for home. I overheard one of them discussing the incident. She was specifically referring to me. So I turned around to face her through the seats, and wished a good morning in a very clear voice. She wished me a good morning as well, as I was turning back around. It seems at that point she realized who I was. The topic of the conversation changed quickly.
I spent the ride just trying to keep my composure. It’s been a long two weeks, and my mental energy is quite drained. That kind of clash just caused everything to spill over, but I didn’t want to break down crying in front of everyone.
Once we arrived, I took some time away from everyone else to release some of the dammed up emotions and compose myself. I spoke to my team lead about what happened. He even offered me the day off, but I didn’t take him up on the offer. What would I do by myself all day?
The rest of the work day was pretty uneventful. We had almost half the guests of the previous day, the buses flowed smoothly, and the visitors came at a steady pace. A little before noon we started taking some things down, mainly the canopies. We got most of them taken down and their tarps inside right before the sky opened up.
In true southern fashion we had a proper thunderstorm that poured buckets for about 10 minutes, then disappeared as soon as it had appeared. During the storm though, the wind blew so hard that I had to physically lean against the tent flaps to push them, so that we could tie the opening closed against the storm.
We finished the rest of the day without anything unusual. We hopped on a bus to Echo, and headed for the Chat-and-Chew. I had made a sauna reservation and invited the team from 6-7, so after sitting for a while I went over to my tent to pick up my sauna gear.
The sauna experience turned into a bit of a flop. Only two other people from my team showed up. Additionally there was some sort of a mix up because another person with the same name as me had made a reservation, and was from a team with a similar name as ours, so we got double booked. No big deal though, they also only had three people, so we had plenty of room.
After sauna we had dinner. After dinner we checked out what was available for trading and I got a couple of fun patches. Then I got a message from someone I had been discussing a bag trade with, and was able to meet up. My tentmate was extremely generous and gave me her USA contingent backpack so that I could trade it for a Finland contingent one. I had wanted one of the Finnish bags since I saw it, but I also liked the functionality of the USA bag so much that I didn’t really want to give it up. Thanks to some wonderful people, I was able to find someone willing to do the swap, and also keep a USA bag.
Then our choices were a pub quiz at the Rainbow Tent, or Forrest Gump in the cinema. We went for the quiz, but the tent was swamped. We heard they had expected maybe six teams, and there were closer to 60. The crowd was too big and tight, so we opted out. The movie had already started, so we passed on that too. We ended up sitting in the Chat-and-Chew a bit longer.
Before heading to bed, we stopped in at the Trading Post, as we heard they had gotten new stock. Unfortunately said stock wasn’t anything interesting, but this also meant money savings. We called it a night, and went our separate ways to our tents.
Xennial Wanderer 