The iPod Wars

Right, so every day, I take a school bus (servis) to and from school. It looks a bit like an airport shuttle, seats maybe twenty, and somewhat worryingly, smells a bit like the stairwell by the art wing at my high school. Which is to say, like pot.

My school here covers kindergarten through twelfth grade. There are two buses for every route" one for elementary, and one for high school. For reasons unknown to anyone except the guy to coordinates the buses, I'm on the elementary school bus. So it's me and a bunch of, like, eight year-olds with their Barbie and Speed Racer backpacks. Yeah...

And. The driver likes to blast a mix CD that's something to the effect of current Turkish pop (pretty good) and hip-hop circa 1997. The Turkish pop is bearable. The voice encouraging me to "party like it's my birthday" is not. Hence: my iPod and I have become very, very chummy since I started riding this bus.

But! Here's the thing. Every morning, I get on the bus. The music is loud, but not overly so. I put on my iPod. I put on my Star Wars soundtrack or whatever. And then, and only then, does the driver start turning up the volume on the speakers. So I turn up the volume on my iPod. And he turns up his speakers. And I turn up my iPod. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

The driver can't see me from where he sits. There's no way he can tell that a) I have an iPod, let alone that b) I'm turning it up.

I'm more curious than annoyed. How is he doing this?!