The man went red. “That seat is always reserved for me,” he snapped. The driver, who had been listening, turned around. “Sir, this isn't your private bus.” Apparently, the man lived near the final stop and had been riding that route for years. He expected regular passengers to leave his preferred seat empty, even when the bus was crowded. Most people had simply humoured him to avoid an argument. That morning, the woman had boarded early and sat there because every other seat had a broken window or a wet cushion. “I have arthritis,” the man said. “So do other people,” she replied. “You can ask politely, but you can't demand that strangers arrange themselves around you.” Nobody spoke for a moment. Then a young passenger offered the man his seat near the front. He refused it because it wasn't the one he wanted.

A girl refused to give up her seat on a nearly empty bus when an elderly man asked her to move. When another passenger called her selfish, she pointed at the empty seats and said, “He doesn't want a seat. He wants THIS one. Ask him why.”