Claustrophobia in the underground

It was Friday night at around 6:00 and the streets seemed pretty empty. I wondered where the large crowd that filled the streets on a daily basis had gone. I figured people were home from work, ready to get their weekends started. Boy was I mistaken.

We took the escalator down into the MTR (the subway) and tapped our Octopus Cards (metro cards) against turn style machine. These Octopus cards can be used at stores such as 7Eleven and Starbucks. They are linked to your credit card and all you have to do is tap the card on the machine. You don't even get a receipt for your purchase so it's easy to lose track of how much you are spending. It's a good thing for D that I don't drink coffee. The pastry shops charges on the other hand, may prove to be a problem.

As I looked up ahead of me I saw a massive group of people trying to get down an escalator. We waited our turn in line. Although there were several hundred people, no one seemed to be pushing or in a rush to get anywhere. As we approached the lower part of the escalator, my mouth dropped open. Never in my life had I seen so many people waiting to get on a train.




Now the MTR stations in Hong Kong are very clean and efficient. When you arrive at the train platform everything is clearly marked. There are slots for you to stand in so when the train arrives the doors always open right in front of you. There are four slots per door. People stand in the slots and then line up behind each other. On a usual day, the slots might be 3 people deep. On this night, however, the slots were about 35 people deep.

The trains come every 3 minutes during rush hour so you don't have to wait long for your turn, but once you get on the train you are packed in as tight as a can of sardines. It's not like the NYC subway, where each car is closed on both sides by a door. These trains are completely open so you can see from the beginning of the train all the way to the end. This allows a lot more people to ride the train at once.

We filed into the train and I quickly looked around the area we were standing to make sure no one near us was wearing one of those masks indicating they were sick. Then, I buried my face into D's chest so I didn't have to smell the breath of the people standing next to us.

The train began to move and I thought "2 stops Marisa, 2 stops." The train pulled into the station and I got ready to jump out. Getting off the train, however, was not as easy as getting on. People were pushing to get on the already overcrowded train, which left no room to walk out. A small child would have been suffocated in the space provided to exit. Thankfully, D pushed through the people and we got off the train.

Well, that was a week ago and now it's Friday night again. I'm supposed to meet D in Central after work to start his weekend birthday festivities. Well you know one place you won't find me....Taxi please!