Dear Bus Drivers of Stockholm...

Bus drivers in Stockholm are great. Every day I catch the bus, and I solemnly swear that I have never seen a bus driver not wait for someone running to make the bus. While in Sydney the doors will literally close in your face, here the bus drivers will open the doors again for late people once, twice, and sometimes even thrice (even after we've started pulling away from the curb!). And while a Sydney bus driver will give you the 'Sorry I wish I could open the doors for you, but we're on a time schedule and I just can't do it' shoulder shrug, Stockholm drivers smile and wink. It feels like they're saying 'Hey, I know you've had a long day / rushed morning. Sometimes that happens to me too and that's ok'. In Sweden, bus drivers can be nice AND always be on time. Sadly, Sydney can do neither.

And while I'm at it, buses in general in Stockholm are great. Anyone back home could tell you that I actively hate buses. I only ever seem to have to catch them when I'm going somewhere I don't know, and if I want to avoid getting off at the wrong spot and walking for an extra half an hour, I instead have to spend half an hour on google maps familiarising myself with the area so I can recognise where to get off. I find the whole thing really stressful, and almost always opt for catching trains and walking.

But in Stockholm every bus stop has a name- be it the train station that's across the road, the name of the street, or a Swedish word you don't understand the meaning of. And not only does each stop have a name, but every bus has a screen that flashes up the name of the next stop, so you always know when to get off. The extra great thing about naming each stop is that you can look at the bus timetable and know exactly which bus goes where, instead of looking at a map with coloured lines and complicated coding systems for 15 minutes trying to figure out how you can possibly get where you want to go.

Get your act together, Sydney. Stockholm is judging you (silently, of course. It's not very Swedish to cause a noisy confrontation).

'YOU could ride a bus with friendly drivers too if you lived in Stockholm'

(P.S. I swear I actually wear different clothes and not just my Swedish cow jumper all the time...)