Column: Thanking your bus driver should go viral

I was on board with giving thanks to bus drivers long before cell phones and social media became a thing.

A pair of TikTok videos recently shared by a Greater Victoria transit user has supposedly garnered millions of views. One shows riders thanking their driver as they exit the bus. Beneath the video, the poster writes “Canada is too wholesome.”

Another video shows a bus with the sign above its front windshield flashing the words, “Sorry” and “Not In Service.” The poster remarks “Canada is the only country I’ve been to where the buses apologize for not being in service.”

I’m not on TikTok so I haven’t read any of the comments to these videos, but I understand they’re abundant, with some people expressing surprise and some wondering why this doesn’t happen everywhere?

I too thought thanking your bus driver was a common courtesy. Certainly, it’s one practised by my family and a great many others I’ve shared bus rides within the Lower Mainland.

Why wouldn’t you thank someone for providing a service, especially one that involves safely transporting many people daily along busy city streets? In my mind, it’s no different than thanking your cab driver? Or your restaurant server (and kitchen staff if given the opportunity). The same thing applies to doctors, nurses and care aids. Firefighters, police and paramedics? Of course. Cashiers and other helpful folks in retail, your barber or hairdresser, the movie theatre employee getting your tickets and treats, the mechanic who gets your vehicle going again – the list goes on and on.

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A great many more people are deserving of our thanks daily who go without, like government staff (local and other) who care for and maintain all the infrastructure we depend on.

All of my experience with public transit has been in Vancouver and whew, I’d never want to drive a bus or any big vehicle there (and I used to drive cube vans across Kamloops’ narrow Red Bridge). So I’m more than happy to thank my bus driver.

Sorry, if I come across as defensive. Growing up in Vancouver, my grandmother was big on manners and quick to comment when her grandchildren were dropping the ball on their Ps and Qs.

In my mind, it’s important to give thanks, though maybe not video worthy. But I guess living in a time when so many of our daily interactions are conducted online, where hostility and skepticism are abundant and kindness is sometimes misconstrued, a little in-person display of gratitude is something to celebrate and share, with the hope that not just the video but the action itself goes viral.

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