After looking into what exactly ethnography was after English class I wasn't really sure where I was going to conduct my hour long observation. Lenoir? No, that wouldn't be original now would it? I knew that if I was going to be stuck someplace for an hour it had to be (1) fun and (2) interesting. So where did I go? Yes, boys and girls I spent an hour long on Chapel Hill's finest transportation system. The bus was the next best thing that I could conjure, where people come together. Think about it. You ride it to class, dinner,or home. Sometimes you ride it alone, with friends, or perhaps you run into friends, or even meet new ones. All day, everyday people ride the bus, but what we fail to notice are the ways we all interact with each other- especially men and women.
At first, I got on the NU and deicided to follow that route, however, what I did not take into conisderation was the hour. It was 9 p.m and for those of you who dont usually take the bus at night, there's a reason. Most people don't really take the bus at night... now the p2p...that's a different story. So, after 20 mins of being on the NU I realized that I was on the wrong bus and if I really wanted to find the goods it would be on the p2p and that's exactly what I did. I introduced myself to the bus driver
( who must have thought I was crazy for doing this) and asked for permission to take pictures of him and people on the bus ( their permission also, of course).
As time went by I noticed more people were boarding the bus and most were girls. It was interesting to see where the girls sat. Since it was late at night most girls rode the bus in pairs or more. Whereas the guys boarded the bus in smaller numbers in most cases. There were 2 exceptions - two girls- who oddly enough got on the bus alone but walked off with people they randomly bumped into on the bus. What a coincidence!!
What made this more interesting was the placement of seating for both genders and the way they interacted with each other if there was ANY. The girls would sit next to each other with ease, whereas the boys tend to sit a couple seats from each other. Once the bus started to get a bit more packed guys would sit relatively close to each other so long as there was a girl between them or if they were sitting across from each other. It was kind of like an understood code between them... very stranger. As we were coming to end of my hour I noticed that it was easier for guy and girls to interact on the bus who were complete strangers as opposed to same sex interaction. Now, it could be because this is the p2p and 70% of the kids who get on are "under the influence", but it was 10:15 and everyone looked pretty sober to me.
An hour felt like too short of a time to make a cohesive conclusion simply because people came and went and weren't on the bus for a substantial amount of time. Honestly, I really learned a lot and it forced me to question why I have come to these conclusions. I met new people and I really enjoyed trying something out the box like this. *Ahem, even though people looked at me a little weird when asked if I could take their picture!** Yayyy!


NOTE: All the pictures in this post were the pics I took on the bus. I couldn't convince too many people to take their pic but I did get some.