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Ticket to Ride - Lost and Found in America
We've been to Paris with one, India with another. Now it's time to catch a Greyhound - and much more - and cross America as another intrepid Sarah tries to make sense of the vast new country she's won.
After a lifetime of winning nothing but the right to be designated driver, Sarah Darmody strikes it rich in a contest so bizarre most people think it's an urban legend - the Green Card lottery. Her prize: the right to live and work in America forever, all for less than the price of an instant Scratchie.But it's going to cost her much more.
Fingerprinted, stripped, x-rayed, measured and investigated, she's warned that unless she commits serious time to her new country and uses her Green Card, she loses it. So, armed with an ugly red backpack, a tattered map, and a wad of hard-earned tips stuffed into her bra, she sets off to circumnavigate the continental US of A by way of another legendary American ticket to ride, the Greyhound bus - and to go where no tourist has even been before.
However romantic it might look in 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' Sarah soon discovers the Greyhound is more 'Midnight Cowboy' territory, favoured by the desperately poor, the despicably odoured and the dubiously paroled. But she gradually becomes at one with her new tribe as each trip becomes a private Jerry Springer show on wheels, filled with truly unforgettable characters and their stories. And as she is expelled into ever more amazing and improbable places, from New York to Santa Fe, Montana to Minnesota, New Orleans to Savannah, and is inexplicably drawn to a town called Truth or Consequences, she finds herself falling in love with the huge, unwieldy, crazy, ugly, beautiful and mixed-up kid that is the US of A, along with an addiction to airconditioning, fried food and the great American refrain: "I gots rights!'.
In the tradition of HOLY COW! and NOTES FROM A SMALL ISLAND, this is travel writing at its best - edge-of-your-seat, funny, deliciously insightful and thoroughly addictive.
After a lifetime of winning nothing but the right to be designated driver, Sarah Darmody strikes it rich in a contest so bizarre most people think it's an urban legend - the Green Card lottery. Her prize: the right to live and work in America forever, all for less than the price of an instant Scratchie.But it's going to cost her much more.
Fingerprinted, stripped, x-rayed, measured and investigated, she's warned that unless she commits serious time to her new country and uses her Green Card, she loses it. So, armed with an ugly red backpack, a tattered map, and a wad of hard-earned tips stuffed into her bra, she sets off to circumnavigate the continental US of A by way of another legendary American ticket to ride, the Greyhound bus - and to go where no tourist has even been before.
However romantic it might look in 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' Sarah soon discovers the Greyhound is more 'Midnight Cowboy' territory, favoured by the desperately poor, the despicably odoured and the dubiously paroled. But she gradually becomes at one with her new tribe as each trip becomes a private Jerry Springer show on wheels, filled with truly unforgettable characters and their stories. And as she is expelled into ever more amazing and improbable places, from New York to Santa Fe, Montana to Minnesota, New Orleans to Savannah, and is inexplicably drawn to a town called Truth or Consequences, she finds herself falling in love with the huge, unwieldy, crazy, ugly, beautiful and mixed-up kid that is the US of A, along with an addiction to airconditioning, fried food and the great American refrain: "I gots rights!'.
In the tradition of HOLY COW! and NOTES FROM A SMALL ISLAND, this is travel writing at its best - edge-of-your-seat, funny, deliciously insightful and thoroughly addictive.
- GenresTravelNonfictionMemoir
336 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2005
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46 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
June 4, 2011
I wanted to like this book so so much. I liked the cover. I liked the way it felt in my hand. But getting through it was surprisingly painful. What has been my obsession lately with reading books about foreigners in America? I get on kicks or I just happen to be in that section of the library where all books of the same subject are located and I get distracted and end up with books that are similar. It happens.
This book was about an Aussie girl who has wild dreams about America and has spent some time here when she was in college and after, but couldn't live there because of her citizenship status. So she ended the green card lotto and won. She came to America to try it on and see if she liked it enough to stay. So much stuff annoyed the hell out of me starting now. Her father lived in FL. Granted, he is a citizen of Oz, but he works here. Seriously, you couldn't come with him? And when she met with someone from immigration to see how she could maintain both her American and Oz citizenship, she nearly shat a brick with the answers she got. And she left the Boyfriend at home and she didn't want to leave him forever. Give me a fucking break. Either you want to come here forever and like grow up and get a real job or you just want to vaca. So she lived with her dad for 6 months, worked, earned money and went on a bloody road trip. Seriously, all this you could have done on a tourist visa. The green card aspect was pointless dribble in this story. She went on a greyhound road trip around the country to see if she really really wanted to stay. Ew. Greyhound? You are white and you have money. There was no point to the bus unless you want to torture yourself.
I did like hearing her stories and quips about places around the US. Made me miss it. Made me not want to be a citizen of anywhere else. But were we supposed to feel sorry for you? Because I sure as hell didn't.
Entertaining, but whiny.
Grade: C-
This book was about an Aussie girl who has wild dreams about America and has spent some time here when she was in college and after, but couldn't live there because of her citizenship status. So she ended the green card lotto and won. She came to America to try it on and see if she liked it enough to stay. So much stuff annoyed the hell out of me starting now. Her father lived in FL. Granted, he is a citizen of Oz, but he works here. Seriously, you couldn't come with him? And when she met with someone from immigration to see how she could maintain both her American and Oz citizenship, she nearly shat a brick with the answers she got. And she left the Boyfriend at home and she didn't want to leave him forever. Give me a fucking break. Either you want to come here forever and like grow up and get a real job or you just want to vaca. So she lived with her dad for 6 months, worked, earned money and went on a bloody road trip. Seriously, all this you could have done on a tourist visa. The green card aspect was pointless dribble in this story. She went on a greyhound road trip around the country to see if she really really wanted to stay. Ew. Greyhound? You are white and you have money. There was no point to the bus unless you want to torture yourself.
I did like hearing her stories and quips about places around the US. Made me miss it. Made me not want to be a citizen of anywhere else. But were we supposed to feel sorry for you? Because I sure as hell didn't.
Entertaining, but whiny.
Grade: C-
October 10, 2011
I gave this book a 3. As an Australian who always dreamed of living in the U.S, I love hearing about U.S adventures. I did not however like this author. Her complaining about the U.S, her being upset because her immigration lawyer said she would have to choose between the countries. Um greencard is immigration NOT for people who just want to try it out. Does this self righteous girl not realize how many people enter the greencard lottery to make it their permanent home?!?!?
As an Australian who immigrated to Canada and makes lots of trips across the border, sorry Sarah but the U.S is by far better than Australia!!!
As an Australian who immigrated to Canada and makes lots of trips across the border, sorry Sarah but the U.S is by far better than Australia!!!
October 27, 2012
To be upfront, this review is totally biased because it is my book. I didn't actually write it; that would involve considerably more effort than that for which I am known. But I lived most of it, and if I collected the letters I sent from various points, written in streaks of Greyhound grime to while away the long hours rolling down interstates, they would read much like this.
And for that reason, when I was given this book years ago I promptly shelved it with a sneer, like I need anyone to tell me about THAT! Seven or so years later and in desperate need of something to read during my commute to work, I finally picked it up again. And to my great surprise, enjoyed the heck out of it.
It could've gone either way- with the author's voice, experiences, and background so similar to my own, it could be like reading my old diaries, inspiring a deep urge to roll eyes and yell "Oh for Pete's sake, SHUT UP!", as self-rumination is wont to do. Or it could be like one of those great conversations where you feel compelled to exclaim "YES! Exactly!" because it's so wonderful to have found someone who thinks the same way you do, particularly on such esoteric topics as the best bus station restrooms for bathing.
Fortunately for my commute, it was the latter. The author was my new best friend, or the infinitely more motivated- and thus accomplished (published)- version of me. We both grew up in Australia, lived in Sydney and took on America solo by bus in our early twenties. I beat her to the punch by a couple of years and was younger for my first journey, but I was also a slow learner, a repeat visitor and Greyhound offender until I learned that the only more exciting and ill-advised way to discover the US was in a $500 car purchased from a backwoods stranger.
As one reviewer here noted, we are also spoiled brats, to a certain degree. Australia is known as "the lucky country" for good reason (especially as a young, middle-class white girl), and America is the land of opportunity where anything is purportedly possible. To have the option of one or the other or both for traveling or living is disgustingly good fortune and it's pretty difficult to come off as anything other than a stuffed child at a buffet whining they don't have enough room for the dessert bar.
But I also know the lure of the vast possibilities America holds to the small-town feel of Australia. I too lived the "privileged poverty" of being a twenty-something with the security of parents you vaguely (possibly incorrectly) believe will remortgage the house in order to pluck their fool child from some dire fate- but short of that occasion, only a meager bank balance from an entry-level job is to be stretched to cover a lousy exchange rate and as many days as possible, and relegates flights and restaurant meals to luxury status.
I also appreciate knowing someone else takes the wildly erratic hit-and-run tourist approach to travel- I often feel like a deadbeat visitor when I meet others or read their accounts of investigating every nook and cranny, gorging themselves on people and places with wide-eyed wonder.
And I share the same love-so-much, loathe-some, desperate-to-stay, miss-home mentality that riddles the author's adventures...it's far from a purely objective voice, but it is such a familiar one that I found it impossible to not feel comforted and warmed by the shared reminiscence. I know those bus drivers, those seat-stealers and fast-friends-for-a-few-hours, I know that unwashed cretin in the dirty restroom mirror and am still disturbed that it was indeed me.
Reading this book was like the fantasy I had all those times trapped against the window by my dirty seatmate on a Greyhound plowing across the plains- a friend with whom to slouch down in the seat and whisper "What the hell are we doing here? Did you see that? Ewww...Wanna split a burger with me next stop?". It was such very good company for my ride.
And for that reason, when I was given this book years ago I promptly shelved it with a sneer, like I need anyone to tell me about THAT! Seven or so years later and in desperate need of something to read during my commute to work, I finally picked it up again. And to my great surprise, enjoyed the heck out of it.
It could've gone either way- with the author's voice, experiences, and background so similar to my own, it could be like reading my old diaries, inspiring a deep urge to roll eyes and yell "Oh for Pete's sake, SHUT UP!", as self-rumination is wont to do. Or it could be like one of those great conversations where you feel compelled to exclaim "YES! Exactly!" because it's so wonderful to have found someone who thinks the same way you do, particularly on such esoteric topics as the best bus station restrooms for bathing.
Fortunately for my commute, it was the latter. The author was my new best friend, or the infinitely more motivated- and thus accomplished (published)- version of me. We both grew up in Australia, lived in Sydney and took on America solo by bus in our early twenties. I beat her to the punch by a couple of years and was younger for my first journey, but I was also a slow learner, a repeat visitor and Greyhound offender until I learned that the only more exciting and ill-advised way to discover the US was in a $500 car purchased from a backwoods stranger.
As one reviewer here noted, we are also spoiled brats, to a certain degree. Australia is known as "the lucky country" for good reason (especially as a young, middle-class white girl), and America is the land of opportunity where anything is purportedly possible. To have the option of one or the other or both for traveling or living is disgustingly good fortune and it's pretty difficult to come off as anything other than a stuffed child at a buffet whining they don't have enough room for the dessert bar.
But I also know the lure of the vast possibilities America holds to the small-town feel of Australia. I too lived the "privileged poverty" of being a twenty-something with the security of parents you vaguely (possibly incorrectly) believe will remortgage the house in order to pluck their fool child from some dire fate- but short of that occasion, only a meager bank balance from an entry-level job is to be stretched to cover a lousy exchange rate and as many days as possible, and relegates flights and restaurant meals to luxury status.
I also appreciate knowing someone else takes the wildly erratic hit-and-run tourist approach to travel- I often feel like a deadbeat visitor when I meet others or read their accounts of investigating every nook and cranny, gorging themselves on people and places with wide-eyed wonder.
And I share the same love-so-much, loathe-some, desperate-to-stay, miss-home mentality that riddles the author's adventures...it's far from a purely objective voice, but it is such a familiar one that I found it impossible to not feel comforted and warmed by the shared reminiscence. I know those bus drivers, those seat-stealers and fast-friends-for-a-few-hours, I know that unwashed cretin in the dirty restroom mirror and am still disturbed that it was indeed me.
Reading this book was like the fantasy I had all those times trapped against the window by my dirty seatmate on a Greyhound plowing across the plains- a friend with whom to slouch down in the seat and whisper "What the hell are we doing here? Did you see that? Ewww...Wanna split a burger with me next stop?". It was such very good company for my ride.
September 5, 2020
I felt like quitting this book about a third of the way through, but I finally managed to finish it after a week. It wasn't the most enjoyable read - I was expecting there to be a lot more narrative about the places the author visited, but most of this book was a whiny account of the Greyhound bus and the passengers onboard, who were clearly in a lower socio-demographic group to the white, middle-class author. Why the author decided to "see America" in this way is beyond me - she spends more time on the bus than she does in the actual cities and towns she visits. How was she supposed to get to know America in this way? And finally, what grated me time and time again throughout this book was how the author unfailingly described non-white Americans by their ethnic appearance - a Mexican woman (quite ignorantly describing all people of South American origin as "Mexican") , a Chinese waitress (not all people of Asian appearance are "Chinese"), a black man etc. Whereas when she encounters a white person, they are just a regular American, and not a "Swedish man" or a "British woman" (I mean, why not, their ancestors had to come from somewhere, right?). After all that time in the US, it seemed the author still didn't get her head around racial diversity, and that Americans come in all colours, not just white.
August 29, 2020
This book reeks of white privilege. Incredibly tone deaf. Particularly painful are the chapters on NY -where she has flashbacks of her oh so hard times as an unpaid film intern sharing a studio flat with her boyfriend, and SF- where equates herself and her group of international students to beggars in the street. Not to mention the chapter where she visits her Republican friend in Colorado who she met backpacking in Asia, and she considers him to be privileged and spoiled (as opposed to her who is...not?).
June 30, 2024
An interesting travel journal with enjoyable antidotes. A book that you can read a few pages at a time each day which is what I did. Well written.
August 19, 2015
Enjoyable book about an outsider's search for the "real America". Many places she visited, I have visited, too. Particularly when she went to Bar Harbor, ME. I spent the whole chapter squealing "I've been there! I've ridden that bus! I know that place! OMG! That's the movie theater I went to all the time!!!!" It was about all I could do to not book a hotel room and call in "sick" for a week and take off! (Seriously, I checked priceline...) Once she was west of Colorado, though, she was in new territory for me as well.
I have wanted to take a cross country trip for most of my life, but I now know that by bus will not be my preferred method (if there was any doubt before). Still, I think one of the most important parts of this book is the looks at the "real America". Had she driven, flown, or even taken Amtrak, she would not have seen how hard many people in this country have it. If you work a minimum wage job, are in the military, disabled, or a college student, and need to get somewhere, Greyhound is going to be your option. Yet she also sees South Beach, Hollywood, and, even yes, my beloved Bar Harbor, where, quite frankly, many inhabitants will never even see the inside of a Greyhound station. In the end, she concludes that the people, the poor riders and the wealthy with their jets are all on the journey and all fiercely proud of their lives and their home, America.
I have wanted to take a cross country trip for most of my life, but I now know that by bus will not be my preferred method (if there was any doubt before). Still, I think one of the most important parts of this book is the looks at the "real America". Had she driven, flown, or even taken Amtrak, she would not have seen how hard many people in this country have it. If you work a minimum wage job, are in the military, disabled, or a college student, and need to get somewhere, Greyhound is going to be your option. Yet she also sees South Beach, Hollywood, and, even yes, my beloved Bar Harbor, where, quite frankly, many inhabitants will never even see the inside of a Greyhound station. In the end, she concludes that the people, the poor riders and the wealthy with their jets are all on the journey and all fiercely proud of their lives and their home, America.
August 7, 2008
This is Sarah Darmody's account of her Greyhound bus trip around the US after she won the Green Card lottery. While in Australia two years ago, I found this at a bookstore in Sydney and was intrigued by the subtitle.
I found quite a number of inaccuracies and some typos and instances of poor writing style. In addition, she comes off as very kneejerk-liberal when decrying aspects of American culture with which she does not agree, instead of more carefully examining the motivation behind it or admitting the imperfections of her native Australia. For instance, she is vehemently anti-Bush and against the Iraq War, yet she fails to acknowledge John Howard's friendship with the American president and Australia's participation in the "coalition of the willing." I'm not saying that I don't agree with her on many points, but she comes off a bit condescending. Maybe I'm getting my back up because I'm getting weary of reflexive American-bashing. Overall, I did enjoy her account of schlepping around our great nation in sketchy coaches.
I found quite a number of inaccuracies and some typos and instances of poor writing style. In addition, she comes off as very kneejerk-liberal when decrying aspects of American culture with which she does not agree, instead of more carefully examining the motivation behind it or admitting the imperfections of her native Australia. For instance, she is vehemently anti-Bush and against the Iraq War, yet she fails to acknowledge John Howard's friendship with the American president and Australia's participation in the "coalition of the willing." I'm not saying that I don't agree with her on many points, but she comes off a bit condescending. Maybe I'm getting my back up because I'm getting weary of reflexive American-bashing. Overall, I did enjoy her account of schlepping around our great nation in sketchy coaches.
July 31, 2011
The tale of Sarah Darmody's 45 day trip across American and back on the Greyhound Bush. Having recently won a lottery green card, Sarah decides to see America to help her grasp the U.S. and decide whether to stay as a resident or to move back to Australia. Sarah is an amusing writer but I think you need to be an Australian (or at least not from the U.S.) to fully enjoy her book. As a citizen of the country producing the cavalcade of freaks she describes, I grew weary of the constant exaggeration in order to get a laugh. And, yes, I know this country IS a cavalcade of freaks in many so ways but her descriptions were constantly over the top and I tend to enjoy a bit more realism. Still, the book is somewhat amusing and an okay choice for a quick summer read. Oh, also, it will cure you of any urge you might have to save some cash and take a Greyhound on your next vacation!
December 23, 2013
this book had some of the same show-off-y tone as the year of yes, but it was entertaining. this author won the greencard lottery and then, when she couldn't decide whether she actually wanted to stay in the us forever, she took a trip around the us by greyhound bus. even though it was more about the buses and herself, it made me want to travel and see more of the us. maybe i should enter the greencard lottery, too...
January 8, 2009
Read it for a reality check on Greyhound transportation and recall the recent beheading incident on just such a greyhound in 2008. Read aloud with my wife in a cozy family sitting room in Ahmstorf, it reminded me how much of "home" I have yet to see. Otherwise a bit repetitive and not the best writing.
July 31, 2011
An entertaining read with a fantastic look at the world of bus travel in the states and the scary passengers. I love Sarah's humour and her style of writing. She reminds me a of a good friend of mine! Sarah's diet was rather concerning, though, I hope she doesn't get diabetes : )
December 13, 2012
True tales of a 20-something year old girl who wins the Green Card lottery and travels around the USA on the Greyhound. She does a big loop around the country and shares the stories of her travels. Really, really funny. Especially enjoyed the stories of the parts we’ve been to.
May 22, 2007
read this book about an australian girl traveling around the US by greyhound while i was living abroad so perhaps it was appealing to my homesick side but i loved it
April 1, 2011
Has to be single most unbearable narrative voice in history. I absolutely loathed it.
May 21, 2010
Funny at times, but took a long time to get through
October 25, 2012
Wanted it to be Bill Bryson-esque. Have read it many times. At times I read it for wanting to visit the US and it turns me off, other times, I read it for a travel book and find it hilarious.b
August 26, 2013
Account of an Aussie's trip across the U.S on a greyhound bus- very funny and most enjoyable.
June 1, 2015
Found this in a bargain corner at my old job. There's nothing particularly groundbreaking about this book but it's funny, down to earth, and gave me a real bad case of wanderlust.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews