Geneva has a very sophisticated always on time network of trams which I am very grateful for since I cannot drive. Well, I like to think that I can, I simply don´t have a license and in Geneva you don´t really need to drive. Finding a parking spot in Geneva is very hard, can I park here, oh no, blue lines, I need a macaron thingie, can I park there, yes, but only from Monday to Tuesday between 04:00 and 4:30 in the morning and so on.
So, like most of the people I know here, I am taking the tram which is quite OK. It´s not like in L.A. where only the poor people take the tram, it´s absolutely accepted here and also a very interesting place to do some people watching. You have the bankers in their cute little outfits hunched over their blackberries, the adorable Russian girls from Lukoil in their amazingly tight costumes, people from the UN in colorful gowns, well, depending on country of origin, spoiled american au-pairs which end every sentence with "totally" or "awesome" and so on.
There is only one thing I really hate about trams. It´s the level of noise in there. I am not really an aggressive person, but those kiddies with their cell phones playing french rap on speakerphone are driving me towards insanity. I am not a big fan of rap neither am I into the French language so you can imagine what it think of Leh Rubb. One day I will forget my Ipod at home and that is the day when one of these cell phones is flying out of the window.
The other source of noise I hate on the trams are the musicians. Actually I wouldn´t call them musicians, I would call them people with instruments. Most of them prefer the #15 tram going towards Cornavin train station, getting on at the Plain Palais stop. It seems they figured out that the could make the most money on that line. There are so many of them in different configurations, it´s amazing. There are the guitar boys, the old guy with the violin, the countless accordion players, The cello trio, the saxophone women who always butchers "Que Sera, Sera" and of course my personal favorite, Synthesizer Lady.
That women is amazing. She has one of these huge ugly keyboards on top of a stroller with an optional baby in there. Sometimes it´s there, sometimes it´s not. If it´s the same baby I don´t know. Anyway, keyboard on top of stroller and amplifier from hell on the bottom of the stroller. She is always very friendly, saying bonjour and bon journee but that doesn´t help the fact that her singing is awful. I mean really bad. Imagine an old Fado, that Portuguese I want to slash my wrists, but I will sing about it for hours so you want to slash your throat music, singer who had too many ciggies and too much whiskey in her life so her voice sounds like a rusty file plus the inability to stay in tune or in rhythm. It´s unbearable, every time she steps on the tram I am switching my music to the loudest cheap Techno I can find, it´s so bad.
Tourists might find music in public transportation romantic, I don´t and if I want hear that kind of music, I go to Paris.
Never go on public transport without an Ipod, earplugs or suicide pills!!
3 comments:
I hardly ever come across the street musicians on trams, but I guess I don't take the 15 that often.
I am constantly amused at the teens playing American music that's a good 10 years old. "What's that, No Doubt Tragic Kingdom? Weren't you in elementary school when that album came out??"
I am right there with you. I have cranked up my iPod to a *painful* volume just to block out the sound of that woman with the saxophone. I am sure she must be violating some clause of the Geneva convention with her "performances". :-P
I know, I know! Especially the Synthesizer Lady! She just keeps feeding the kids Dar Vida crackers to keep him quiet. I was just in Liverpool where they have buskers on the street that you actually want to stop and listen to, and I thought about the difference in quality between the street performers in the two cities.
And the fact that when you're on a tram, you're a totally captive audience. ARGH!
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