Honolulu, HI – My name is Grace. I grew up in Seattle and Korea and then went to college in Chicago, where I studied technology and fine arts. For a while, I worked in fashion doing graphic design, but the work was very taxing. So, last August, I moved to Honolulu to live with my aunt and uncle and found a job at the Humane Society. I really enjoy playing with the cats and dogs at the end of my work day.
When my aunt works from home, I get up at 6 a.m. to take the 6:45 a.m. bus to work. The bus ride is about 40 minutes. Sometimes, my aunt can give me a ride to work, which only takes 10-12 minutes.
I do have a driver’s license, but I’m a tentative driver and feel safer taking the bus. I used to take the bus everywhere in Chicago and Korea. In Chicago, the buses were incredibly convenient and ran everywhere. In Korea, the buses ran on time, and the bus stops had shelters where you could go inside and wait in air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter. The air was even purified. In Korea, where there were no shelters, there were large umbrellas for shade.
Here in Honolulu, I have waited 20 or 30 minutes for a bus and sometimes have just given up and walked. It gets very hot to wait in the sun in Hawaii. One time, I missed a bus because I couldn’t find the bus stop. I walked right past it and didn’t notice it because it was just a small sign on a pole.
I would really like to see Congress make funds available for good bus shelters and more visible bus stops, as well as more-frequent and -convenient bus service.
Going to work on the bus takes up a lot of my time. If it was more frequent and efficient, I would be able to spend less time traveling to and from work and be able to enjoy more of the things that I want to do and like to do. If the waiting periods weren’t as long, it would motivate me to travel on the bus to more places rather than just using it to go back and forth to work.