On the road-lost wallets, luggage and New Zealand

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January 17, 2009

So far the trip is amazing and love is in the air.

Everyone on board is definitely excited about going to witness history but the reasons for traveling by bus vary from person to person. We’ve had our first “casualty.”

Mr Johnson’s lady friend got on board and sat in her seat and said “no way”. She hopped in her Mercedes and drove away. The seats are smaller then usual and the overhead compartment can only fit a blanket or shoes. unfortunately everyone on board brought along at least two carry ons and huge pieces of luggage.Ace decided to bring 8 bags. The bus is packed head to toe.

As I’m writing this I’m sitting next to Ace with a laptop, blanket and camera on my lap with two bags under my feet. Talk about comfortable! Ladies have purses, bags, extra clothes, computers, books, cookies and everything else.

But on the upside, Our hosts are keeping things in perspective. MacArthur of MacArthur Tours is playing night driver, comedian, historian and host.

He grabs the mike every hours and asks historical questions, tells joke or asks passengers to tell there stories.

There’s a brotha who flew from New Zealand to Oakland to be on the bus. He said he was originally from Oakland, teaches history at the university but recently decided it was time to move back home and be with more Black folks.

He says New Zealand had about 100 Black folks but 4 million sheep.

Another passenger said she’d worked as a nurse for 22 years but became disgruntled wit the current “third world” health care practices in America. She’s hoping to get a job working with the Change America campaign.

On our first stop the nurse misplaced her wallet, stressed out, called creditors and told everyone on bus, who pitched in and donated funds to replace her losses.

30 minutes later, after checking all her belongings, she found her wallet-in her own lunch box. She was humble enough to come forward and tell all what happened and no love lost. Shirley and Helen, two of the Everett and Jones sisters, are buzzing around, offering snacks, raffling Obama books and merchandise.

There’s lots of media and folks with laptops so I’ve been sharing our wireless internet card. There are two young ladies from the Globe Newspaper writing and taking short videos. I showed them how to upload video via email. Another lady was given a webcam by CBS and they called and went live over the webcam. Moments later the calls started rolling in from friends and family-they’d seen us on the news! We’re famous already!