This semester most of my exams are at 17:00 as opposed to in the morning. It's nice not having to wake up super early to rush to the university for an exam (especially since I don't exactly live in the area nowadays), but 17:00 isn't exactly my finest hour.
By the time I'm done with my exam and ready to go home, it's pretty dark out and rush hour is in full swing. The mental stress from sitting around all day trying to cram as much information as humanly possible into the black abyss that has taken up residence in my brain finally begins to take its toll and exhaustion takes over.
As I make my way home I find that I'm just the perfect mix of delusional and disoriented. This precarious balance opens up a world of possibilities for exciting new adventures.
Last night I arrived at the train station just in time for the 19:46 train only to discover that the train wasn't scheduled to leave from the train station that I was in. It turns out that the 18:46 train hadn't left from that station either and there were a lot of very confused passengers that had been waiting nearly two hours for a train that wasn't coming.
An announcement came over the speakers saying that the train would be leaving from the next station. Passengers waiting for the Jerusalem train were to take a train to the next station and transfer there to the Jerusalem train. The crowd surged as one and we pushed onto an already full train to head to the next station.
Propped up by my fellow passengers, I took a look around. An older woman maneuvered herself towards me and asked "Are you also trying to get to the Jerusalem train?". I nodded and she looked relieved. When we got to the next stop I watched as she pushed herself through the crowd and elbowed her way up the escalator at lightning speed yelling for them to hold the train to Jerusalem.
Spurred into action by her reminder that we would all miss the train, everyone began to run. In the most unorganized fashion imaginable we made it onto the train and I even got a seat.
Knowing that I would be going home on the later side, I had made a chicken salad to eat on the train. There wasn't much in the way of elbow room but I was hungry so I decided to eat my salad anyways.
All eyes were on me as I struggled to retrieve my salad from the depths of my backpack, unknowingly loosening the top of the container. Victorious, I held the container in both hands and gave it a good shake to try and mix everything together. Everyone watched in horror as I showered the guy sitting next to me in my dinner.
My immediate reaction was to avoid eye contact and pretend that maybe no one had noticed. Except it was a crowded train and everyone had watched me throw chicken at the guy sitting next to me.
Eventually I apologized and tried to be helpful by picking the pieces of chicken and various vegetables off of his sleeve. Fortunately for his jacket, I forgot to dress the salad so clean up was easy with minimal staining.
He was nice about it. Didn't make a big fuss or anything. Just politely nodded and began intently reading some papers that he had with him. We avoided eye contact for the remainder of the ride as I ate the remaining salad.
Maybe next time I'll pack a sandwich.
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