- Last year’s second term -

2009’s second semester was a little complicated in academical terms for me. I failed 3 out of 6 subjects, which again proved me that I do horrible at university when the a academical load is too high for me. I do however hope to better this year and I guess I can say that thanks to last term’s experiences I learned to revalue sleep (as ridiculous as it may sound) and I reconsidered my study methods.

Like usual I didn’t practice any sport nor did any specific outdoor activity (I’m a highly sedentary person). Concerning my family members, last semester my father had to undergo back surgery because of a problem he’s been having for years now. Thankfully everything went well and now he’s doing pretty good.

Another thing that didn’t exactly happened during the class period was that I finally took driving lessons and presented the driving exam (and passed!). This actually was a big deal for me because in the past I had practically convinced myself that I was never going to be able to drive because it scared me to much (it still kind of does but a lot less than before), so I guess it was nice to prove myself that I actually could do it.

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* ~ TranSantiago ~ *

I personally have a very good opinion of Transantiago. I think this new system is a lot better than the older one.

One of the things that bothered me the most about the previous system was that, since drivers were not paid a salary they depended completely on the money they made from the ticket sale. Considering this, having a great deal of students on their bus was most certainly a very unprofitable business. Therefore we students were incredibly discrimated by them. They wouldn’t hand over you the ticket they were suposed to give you after one paid, they were rude, and a lot of times they wouldn’t even stop at the bus stop.

Nowadays they have a salary, meaning that it is of no importance to them if the bus is filled with students because they get paid the same anyways. This has made travels a lot less stressful for both students and drivers.

Another improvement consists in the creation of the Bip card system, this allows users to pay without having to carry change all around (which is more hygienic), plus, the fact that drivers are no longer the ones in charge to colect the bus fee allows them to be concerned only with traffic wich makes travels a lot safer too.

When the new system was put on march I had a lot of troubles. The bus frecuency was extremely low and the demand tremendous. Therefore one could easily wait one hour before a bus with enough room passed. My travel time increased by 40 minutes approximately. Luckly the frecuency problem was solved after a few weeks and soon after that a new route - wich benefits me a lot- was created. This new route follows the exact same path that I would travel if I were to go to classes by car. And the bus stop is only two blocks away from my house. So now it takes me about an hour to get to the faculty (a lot less if there are no traffic jams) and I only have to take one bus!

I consider that one of the problems that remain today is not so much bus frecuency as the coordination of said buses. Sometimes 3 buses will pass in a row and then no bus will get to the bus stop for over half an hour. Bus communication should be improved.

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