Hero bus driver

I was coming to see my parents in Richmond Hill and was on the last leg of my journey on the bus. At one of the bus stops near my destination, an old, blind Iranian man who didn't speak English was trying to get on and repeatedly said "number 5, number 5". An older lady getting on at the same time told him "no" relatively coldly and held him from coming on because it was not the #5. Others including myself didn't do anything, we were a bit confused because initially it looked like the old lady was with him, then when she got on and he didn't, we realised he was lost.

By this time, the bus driver had noticed and left the bus, walked up to the man to see what was wrong. He quickly realised the man was lost, took out a map and found the right way. It was somewhere around -20C outside and the bus driver didn't have a coat on. He took the blind man's arm, walked him about 50 meters to one light, crossing a large intersection south and then west to take him to his correct stop. This took around 10 minutes, and many of us on the back of the bus watched in awe. None of us had had enough in us to do what the driver did, the driver was an incredible man.

When the bus driver returned, completely frozen, and worried that he had kept people waiting, the passengers in the back who had been witness to the whole thing all started clapping. It was very touching and I couldn't hold my tears back any longer. I couldn't stop crying. Both the heroic act was making me cry and also the lost old blind man. It hurt even more that he was an immigrant, didn't speak the language, and didn't have enough money at his age to take a taxi in his condition. Leaving one's country, learning a new language, adapting, finding work, and a new network are all difficult, but for someone in that man's situation, nearly impossible. However, due to the political, economical, and social, climate of Iran, he and many others don't have a choice.

A lady in the back of the bus said she was going to write a letter to the company saying what a lovely thing the bus driver had done. I also walked up to the front of the bus when I was getting off to thank the bus driver and also to get his name to write a similar letter. He told me his name was Joe Santos and he also said that one of the men that just got off said he was going to write a complaint letter because he should have kept the bus on schedule! Wow. Are we really that terrible now? It had made me feel good that there are heroic people still out there and I was also angry at how we also have the exact opposite.

It was so emotional because I hadn't seen something so heart-warming in a long time. We become cynical as we grow older because we see so much coldness. We begin to think coldly of the people around us, and its so nice to be reminded that there is also generosity and warmth too. I promised myself I wouldn't forget that.

These acts of kindness also take a lot of courage, confidence, and bravery because people are often concerned about what others are going to think and they want to avoid the smallest chance of embarrassment. I was so proud of the bus driver that I couldn't stop crying until I got home and even then couldn't tell the story to my family without crying all over again.

I know I didn't react quickly enough to help that man, I was angry at myself for that too. It's definitely easier to stay in your own world and ignore what happens around you but if we all did that, that blind man might have stood in that corner in that freezing weather for a long time.

We can all learn from Joe Santos and if more and more of us take up his ways, we will have a world full of heros, a warmer world.