The buses I travel on are usually full of people. The air tends to become very stale and it becomes difficult to breathe.

Quite often, when I ask the driver if he could turn the air conditioner on, the answer I get is: “It is not working” or “What do you want air conditioner on in winter for?” or “Open a window” – which I do, or try to do – as often they are locked or closed.

I’d say that only about 50 per cent of the time do they turn on the air conditioner if asked. There are times when I’ve exited the bus soon after entering – to escape the foul air! The air also gets quite hot.

Another thing I noticed with the buses is, if two arrive at the same time, the first one will stop, but the second will quite often not even slow down (never mind stopping) – and ‘sail’ past, the driver not seemingly worrying if there were any passengers waiting for his particular bus or not, i.e. ‘maybe they’ll not notice’ – is what he (it’s usually a he) seems to be thinking!

I noticed this twice on the Chalet bus stop in Sliema; a number 13 bus sailing past a 212 which had stopped (going towards St Julian’s).

I noticed the same thing happening on quite a few occasions in the past as well. So those are my two main gripes.

I actually complained to Malta Public Transport – the girl wanted to know the number of the bus that had ‘sailed past’. Which would have been impossible to get, even if I had a pen and piece of paper handy.