Bus Fahren.

So I ride the bus as well. I take the train & the bus to school. Bus ride from Mellingen to Baden, 15 minutes. Train ride, 2 minutes. Today I was on the bus listening to Elliot Smith, when all the sudden I feel someone tapping me on the shoulder. I look, take out my ear phones and say 'wie bitte' and its a old lady! she starts rambling off in German on how she doesnt like sitting backwards, that it feels awkward, and if she could sit by me. My reaction : Yes of course! I was about to put back in my headphones (I swear I am turning into an awkward anti social swiss person), and she starts rambling off to me again. She asks me where I am going, and I say school. I tell her I am an exchange student and I speak High German and then we had this long coversation about how no swiss people talk to eachother on the bus, and everyone keeps to themselves because it is apart of the culture. She is from France, so she told me that it is normal to speak to your neighbor on the train or bus there. But what made me happy was..

I could understand almost everything she was saying.
on top of her heavy french accent.

This is huge for me. I came here only knowing 2 or 3 words of German. I couldn't even count. Now, I can understand. I felt like a little kid, all giddy afterwards walking off the bus. She told me to promise her to speak to my neighbors on the bus or the train. I promised, and we went our separate ways.