The people who travel on long-distance buses are all freaks

There are three types of people who take overnight coaches: the stupid, those trying to fulfil a stereotype, and the desperate.

This seems like a bold statement, I know, but let me explain. You see, I fall into one of these categories (stupid, certainly), lured in by Megabus’ £11 ticket to Amsterdam, and I always observe the same things.

It seems like a great deal. You’ll get on a coach in the evening, read a book, fall asleep, and wake up the next day in a European city of your dreams, having spent less than the price of two drinks in a central London bar. You’ll arrive rested, rejuvenated, and ready to explore. What will actually happen is that you’ll arrive (inevitably, at around 6am) at a foreign bus station which will invariably be miles from the centre of the city, in the roughest possible area imaginable. You’ll be freezing (no matter what time of the year it is), and will almost certainly be stiff and grumpy from the journey, and exhausted from having spent the night awake, enraged at your fellow passengers. Plus you’ll probably really need to pee, the toilet having been out of action for the second half of the journey, causing distress both to everyone’s bladders and nasal passages. I’ve never had a successful first day after this, and I’ve never failed to swear never do it again – a promise that lasts until I get excited about the next European destination. This, ladies and gentlemen, is why I am one of the stupid.

Maybe the bus journey in itself would be bearable were it not of the people on the bus. And yes, if you’re travelling on a long-distance coach, you are one of these awful people.

There’s something about bus stations that removes all sense of normal decency. Nowhere else would the level of aggression and selfishness be acceptable, and each person’s sense of boundaries changes so dramatically in response to this. In Victoria Coach Station two weeks ago, a man spat at me and another deliberately hit my shins with his umbrella while I was waiting patiently to get on a bus. Even I’ve been know to take off most of my clothes, have a wash with baby wipes, and put on new clothes, all while viciously defending my place in a queue to get on a Flixbus in a Paris bus station (I may have snarled at someone – I take my right to first dibs on a window seat seriously).

This isn’t something that I do in Sainsbury’s while I’m waiting to pay for my weekly shop, but it feels perfectly normal and acceptable in a bus station in the middle of the night. Yes I know, I am contributing to the horrible experience of bus travel.

But yet I am somewhat considerate: I have the decency to make sure that I am fresh and clean (at least as much as possible) before embarking on twelve hours packed like sardines with fifty other people, one whose personal space you will violate just by existing in the space next to them. But not everyone does this, be it because they don’t care to, or they can’t. And these are the desperate. The ones who need to make this journey and can only afford to do it by bus. They’re travelling to see loved ones, or to achieve their dreams. I can’t really blame the desperate for their unpreventable contribution to the hell that is international coach travel, but I can place some sort of blame on anyone who demonstrates an avoidable lack of personal hygiene and respect for their fellow passengers.

What about the poor students, I hear you cry? Where do they come in? Well, if they really can’t afford an extra couple of tenners for a much more pleasant budget flight, then by all means, stick them on a coach, and maybe send them a link to a money management guide. Usually though, they’re taking the coach out of some desire to be the image of what they think a student should be: creatives travelling on a shoestring, wearing thrift store bargains they picked up in Budapest, sporting silly haircuts, reading Kafka and listening to Kate Bush. They have a romantic idea that they are building character; their pretentious sullen faces as they sulkily wait at passport control at Calais tell you that they think they’re better than you. Their misguided arrogance is amusing for about five minutes, but no one wants to be stuck in a confined space with them for 24 hours.

In other countries and continents, bus travel seems to be more tolerable and less dominated by this kind of degenerates, but as soon as there’s an long-distance coach passing through London Victoria, the quality of the clientele plummets. So why bother? It’s literally not worth it when you could pay an extra £30 to be there in a tenth of the time. Do me a favour and fly, so that when I’m stupid enough to take the bus, I at least have a bit more space.