While my friend and I were in Santiago, Chile, we were waiting for a city bus and learned from the trials of a mass transportation systems.  Our bus came and our bus went, leaving us waving our hands frantically in the dusty air.

Since this was the first time that we had actually tried to hail a bus on our own, we thought we must be doing something wrong.  When our blue city bus came into sight, we made sure to signal exactly as we had been taught and to stand where we definitely could be seen.  No luck.  We were still left standing with our hands in the air.

On the third time there was a Chilean waiting for the same bus, so we were sure that he would be able to get the driver to stop.  Wrong again!  When we saw a couple of police officers standing nearby, we realized that we must be trying to get on at an illegal bus stop.  After walking the extra three blocks to a true bus stop, we caught the next bus and finally made our way to our destination —  a little late yet a little wiser.