Last night I got a call from my friend who rides the bus to work in Tacoma (from Seattle). She had accidentally gotten on the wrong bus, fallen asleep, had just woken up and didn't know where she was. She was panicked and I was totally panicked for her.
Like anyone (I hope) who's commuted with a metro system, I've gotten on the wrong train many times and had the same "oh shit" realization, waking up to the sound of the wrong station being announced. I've also had my fair share of getting on the right train to have it become the wrong train without my knowledge (usually late at night, when I'm not at my problem-solving best). But there's something different about taking the wrong bus, especially buses that go from one town to another. I imagine it would be much scarier. (Maybe an "oh fuck" realization as compared to the aforementioned "oh shit" realization experienced on the subway.) Buses don't run very often in general, but when you're talking about commuter buses there's the real possibility that there might not be a way back into town until the morning commute. Luckily, my brilliant friend got off the wrong bus at a Sounder train station (in Puyallup), was able to catch a train back into Tacoma and could then catch a later bus back into Seattle. All in all, my guess is that it probably added 2+ hours onto an already long commute, all because of a simple mistake that all of us have made before.
I guess I'm lucky that this is not really a possibility with the van...
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Writing this entry reminded me of another transportation mishap that this particular friend & I shared: we got on the wrong overnight train in Thailand. The conductors then kicked us off the wrong train at this tiny, deserted train station in BFThailand, and told us to wait for the next train, which came along an hour later. Seriously, I think that the only structure at this train station was the men's room that we had to break into to use the disgusting facilities. Thankfully the lights didn't work, so we couldn't see exactly how disgusting they were. That did mean that not only did we each have to stand guard for the other, but we had to use the facility with the door open, to let in some navigation light. What do you do when you're stuck at a deserted train station in the middle of the night in nowhere Thailand waiting for a train that may never show up, with only one person with which you can hope to communicate? Pick a fight, of course.
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2 comments:
You are funny. Wish you would right (ha! first I wrote "ride") more often, although probably that would require more crazies on your van-pool commute. Your stories in this post remind me of falling asleep one time on a train in Japan (in highschool). It was pretty horrible. I didn't speak or read any Japanese and was going to a city an hour away by train from where I was staying to visit my brother. My directions had been to "get off at the 4th stop, go to the train directly across the platform and go two more stops." well, there were long stretches between the stops, and I. Fell. Asleep. Turned out when I did get off, I was then followed and stared at (a tall blonde in semi remote areas of Japan is apparently an unusual sight) by a midget. Yes, it was a memorable trip. I luckily ended up finding my way and obviously made it back home safe ... eventually.
Ha! Where is my brain? "right?" I meant "WRITE." Durr. Time for coffee.
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