A friend is relating a fun story about an adventure at Port of Spain's main transport hub, City Gate. She tells you the bus driver made a joke and she couldn't stop laughing.

Imagine what that bus driver looks like. Was your first thought, a man? If you did think it was a man, don't feel too badly.

Out of 556 drivers and conductors at the Public Transport Service Corporation (PTSC), 14 are women. That's less than three per cent.

Even without official data, it is clear to anyone who uses public transport that that figure is disproportionate to the number of women travellers. The reason for such a low penetration of women drivers may likely be because fewer women apply for the position.

WMN spoke to two of PTSC's 14 women drivers, Kathy Ann Garcia and Shirlyn Mark Thompson, about their reasons for applying to the male-dominated career and what's it like being women of the road.

Thompson, who is from Point Fortin, spent 18 years before becoming a bus driver playing the piano professionally and teaching music to children in South Trinidad.

[caption id="attachment_889845" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Shirlyn Mark Thompson first saw a woman driving a bus when she visited New York as child. She was awestruck and the memory – and possibility – stayed with her for years. - Marvin Hamilton[/caption]

Music was something her father loved and encouraged her to pursue. Music, though, was not her first love. Since she was 11, she wanted to be a bus driver.

"I will always remember the moment it happened. My parents took me to New York for vacation and we were going somewhere and took the bus, and it was the first time I ever saw a woman driving a bus," Thompson said.

She was awestruck, and the moment stayed with her for years. But Thompson had a problem.

How does one tell their parents they want to be a bus driver? For Thompson, the answer was clear. She couldn't.

"You crazy? You couldn't tell Daddy you wanted to be a bus driver, because in those days they looked down on bus drivers.

"So he liked music and I had to do piano. I studied music, did all my exams and was teaching music at a music school in Point Fortin. I loved interacting with children. I did that for 18 years – and got up one morning and said, 'Wait a minute, Daddy's dead and you need to do what you want to do and follow your dream.'"

Thompson had a chat with her husband and he encouraged her.

"I must say I was a little scared, because my mother was alive at the time and she said, 'Girl, you think you could drive that big thing?' She knew I liked to drive, because I used to steal my father's car and run away to drive and come back, but she still thought it was too big a vehicle for me.

[caption id="attachment_889843" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Kathy Ann Garcia says don’t let her height fool you; the bigger the bus, the more excited she is to drive it. - Marvin Hamilton[/caption]

"I told her not to worry."

In June 2010, PTSC called Thompson for an interview and she got the job. Her mother had died in January and would never