Yesterday on my commute home on the #106, a fight broke out. A petite young woman wearing a traditional Muslim headscarf and ankle-length skirt was standing in the aisle of the bus, way too close to the front door. As a huge clump of people were trying to exit the bus, apparently a large man shoved her.

She wigged out.

“Don’t push me, MOTHERFUCKER!” she shouted, turning around to flip off the now-disembarked shover through the window of the bus.

The bus driver turned around. “Young lady, please move out of the aisle.”

“FUCK YOU,” she shouted. “He can’t push people around like that! That’s FUCKING BULLSHIT.” She adjusted her headscarf a little.

“Please just move out of the aisle,” the bus driver said.

“Like hell I will,” the young woman yelled. “This is FUCKED UP. That guy can say excuse me if I’m in his way. He doesn’t need to FUCKING TOUCH ME.”

“Please sit down,” the bus driver said.

“SHUT THE HELL UP,” the woman shouted with all 90 pounds of her body weight. “FUCK OFF AND DRIVE THE GODDAMN BUS.”

This went on for quite some time, with the woman shouting at the bus driver about the shover, and the bus driver trying to calm her down and tell her to stop swearing (”You don’t look like the type to curse,” he said, which got him cussed out all over again). They ultimately got it worked out, but the rest of us were treated to perhaps 10 minutes of fantastically colorful language from this tiny young woman.

Now granted, she totally overreacted and was bitching at the bus driver when in actuality she was mad at the shover. That said, the altercation shattered every impression I’ve ever had about traditional Muslim women. Wearing a demure headscarf and ankle-length skirt apparently in no way relates to your ability to curse like a sailor and irrationally bitch out of a bus driver. I love it when my cultural assumptions are dashed against the rocks of reality.