From the Mixed-Up Anglo-files: Advent Day 10: The Tube

Dec 11, 2009 00:31

As you read this, stand up and stick your arms straight out. Spin around in a circle. Reach above your head as high as you can. Bend down and touch your toes. Now take in a big breath of air.

If you are reading this while riding the tube, you have probably now smacked your arms against several yellow poles, accidentally molested several people at chest-height, revealed your sweaty underarms to the rest of the train, shoved your buttocks in some poor lout's face, and breathed in the second-hand fumes of a thousand recent riders - all of them sweaty, hairy Europeans who do not believe in bathing, deodorant, laundromats, or kicking their nicotine addictions. And since you stood up to do it, you probably lost your seat as well, not to mention your balance.

You are in a dark little tunnel plastered over with bizarre and shocking adverts and, depending on the relative income of the surrounding neighborhood, it might also be paved with rubbish. This is the London Underground, or, tube as the locals say.



The tube is a place where happiness vanishes. It's a place where people listen to music so loud you can hear all the dirty lyrics. It's a place where women with babies on their hips walk train to train begging tourists for cash. It's a place where only children, tourists, and crazy people talk. It's a place where you find out all about the person next to you: their smells, their wilting tattoos, their nose piercings, their real hair color, the content of their shopping bags, and the state of their latest romantic fling (and/or STDs) as relayed (quite loudly) to their roommate/best friend/mother via their cell phone.



The tube is an excellent mode of transportation.

You can get from anywhere in London to anywhere else, provided you don't actually have to get to where you're going in a reasonable amount of time. I remember Saturday nights traveling from Westminster to Gloucester Road in two hours with nothing to breathe but armpit air. Lovely, innit?



So, my London-savvy friends, before you take the tube, here are a few tips:

The tube is something you "ride" or "take." It's not something you: "ride in," "hitch," "flag down," or "travel by."

There are one thousand escalators. Many of them look like electric stairs into the upper levels of the darkest circles of the inner sanctums of dark, black, mystifying doom. They pop right out in the city. Well, most of them do, anyway. Don't try to run up these, you'll pass out. But if you do pass out, that's ok. Just be sure to faint delicately to the right side of the escalator, as people will climb past you on your left. This is a bit of escalator courtesy I miss terribly when I get back to the states. For people who might very well be in a hurry, the least you can do is let them sidle past as you rest your hamhocks against the (right) side of the escalator.

It's also important to obey all the posted signs. All of them.




Don't jump the turnstiles - police will come and extract 50 quid from you as a penalty.

This means you must also mind the gap, please.

If there is one photo that every first-time traveler to London has stowed in their camera before returning to the states, it's this one:


I believe you're not allowed to leave the country until you've waited at the tube station, stood just in front of the opening doors, and snapped a photo like this before hopping on the train. But, as you do, you'll likely have to steady yourself against the barrage of folk entering or exiting the train, as well as make sure all of your items are clear of the closing doors.

Once all the pesky people clear off, you'll probably hear a rapid bleeping. And then a posh British woman comes on:

"Please, mind the gap between the train and the platform."

Music to my ears.
Now, obeying posted signs also means you're supposed to give up the side seats for the elderly, handicapped and pregnant. It's something that not many actually do. Tourists do it because the signs tell them to (and because they read advice like mine). This does well to ease the trip for elderly folk traveling between Leicester Square and Covent Garden (the shortest distance between any two tube stops - it's easier to walk the distance than take the tube. Consequently, this is the length of track most packed with tourists).



This is actually Notting Hill Gate, a stop I frequented

As for actually getting around, I could tell you all the advice I've amassed over time (when you get to a platform, walk down to the door furthest from the entrance to the platform, it'll be less crowded and you might actually get a seat), all the little details that would help you have a smooth ride (always hold on to something, no matter how silly it makes you feel; you will fall over if you don't, no matter how seasoned you are), or things that just pop into my mind as I think about taking the tube (did you know someone once left 285 pounds of raisins on a train? and someone else left a suitcase full of dentures? and someone else left a human skull?), but the best thing I can tell you is just hop on and figure it out for yourself (so get lost - it's the best way to figure out how to get found!) You never know what you'll see.



Occasionally, something bright and wonderful happens on the tube.

It's usually this. A summer work day at five pm. The tube is so crowded you can hear people's thoughts. You can't tell if it's your body that's sweating or if the dampness of your clothes is seeping into you from someone else. The businessmen are texting or muttering into bluetooth headsets about the commute and the Persian gangsters are playing mp3s on their cell phones. Babies are crying, crazies are begging, and all the loud American tourists are lost and pronouncing the stops incorrectly for all to hear: "Lye-chester Square, Mom. Is this it? Are we supposed to get off at Lye-chester square?"
The doors open. A woman with a stroller and one kid at her hip is standing on the platform right in the middle of the opening doors. People shove past her as they leave the train, others shove from behind and squeeze past trying to get in, all of them taking whatever empty seats they see as she trundles her children onto the train. She looks around for an open seat for her and her child. Nothing. An exasperated sigh.

Then, one of the posh businessmen who had, only seconds before, been texting his drinking buddies not to wait to order up at the pub, stands up, slips his blackberry into his pocket, and folds his newspaper under his arm, "Please," he holds out his hand, "have my seat."

Not all posh folk are this courteous, but for some reason they definitely occupy the seat-giver-upper majority in London. Whenever this happens, a ripple of silent goodwill seems to spread across the train. "There are still good people out there in the world," we all think in unison, careful not to look each other in the eye (no realizing the sympathetic existence of other human beings on the tube, please). And yet, some people will always be there to give up their seats, just as surely they'll always be wearing Italian leather shoes, or that they'll have names like "Steve" or "Mick," or that they'll actually buy The London Times instead of taking the free celebrity gossip newspapers that Indian men in their twenties are handing out at tube stop entrances.

And that's when you know, London is a city full of people. Not crazies, not tourists, not a collection of sweaty, stinking misanthropes. We're all just people. And we have places to go.


people, england, the tube, london, humor

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