To Conquer a Subway

Give me a car, Google Maps, and the road, and I’ll be all right. But public transportation? That’s a whole other topic.

A few of the “joys” of living in Southern California are its high gas prices, spread out services, and lack of efficient public transportation. (If you comment on this post complaining about gas prices, please expect that my next post will only be a rant of profanity infused political bashing. Don’t make me go there.) I had a great experience a couple of weeks ago when I was in San Francisco checking out graduate schools in Northern California. I took my car, my phone (the new iPhone with Google Maps), and hit the road for Stanford University. The route I took was gorgeous and I found the university in no time. Needless to say, I had the completely opposite experience the other day on different graduate school visit.

Time: 12:05 pm

Place: New York City

Destination: Columbia University

I walked out of the hotel doors on 32^nd street, turned to the right, and started my journey down to Penn Station. As I strided confidently down the street, I reviewed my directions once again as given to me by my mum’s friend who was a New York local.

“Oh, to get to Columbia University, just go down to Penn Station, take the 1 line, and get off at around 116^th or 120^th.”

As told, 32^nd dead-ended at Penn Station and I walked down the crowed stairs to the 1 line. However, my mum’s friend forgot to mention one thing – Penn Station is frickin’ gigantic! Was the 1 line on the NJ transit, Amtrak, or the Long Island Rail?! I stood in the center of the branching hallways teeming with commuters, feeling like a leaf pushed in the center of converging rapids. I took a chance on going into the Long Island Rail to find a mess of people, very little helpful signage, and no employees to ask questions of in sight.

After blindly drifting about for 5 minutes, I saw a couple of Police officers on a platform. Now, usually it’s the damsel in distress stuck in the tower, but at this particular moment, she was stuck on the floor in a labyrinth passageways while her two knights towered above her.

Having left all pride upon entry into the underground obstacle course, I pleaded to my knight in blue, “Excuse me officer, I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing! I was told to take the 1 line to Columbia University, but I don’t know where the 1 line is or even what exact stop to get off at!”

The officer chuckled (I’m hoping at simply my naivety). “I’ll tell you what, 90 percent of the people in here don’t know what they’re doing! The 1 line is around the corner to the right and you’ll get off at 116^th which is right in front of the University.”

“Thank you so much!!!” And I took off to buy my metro pass and enter the turnstile for the 1 line. So now I had to decide if I needed to go Uptown or Downtown; I settled on Uptown and took the stairs up to what I thought was the platform for Uptown. The train (is it called a train or a subway?) pulled in, I climbed on board, and found a seat. Granted, it was a little hard to stay put on the seat since my skirt was a satin-like material, which slid on the hard plastic with every acceleration.

After a few stops, I began to have doubts as to whether I was going in the right direction. Most of the time, this is when I whip out my trusted 3G internet and find my own answers, but the yards of steel and dirt above me prevented my love from reaching me.

I glanced around the car to look for a person who might be of help, all the while trying to avoid eye contact since I did not know the social norms of subway etiquette. There was a guy (with a really cool Yarmulke) sitting diagonally from me who looked like he could be a respectable college student. But after he got off, not on 116^th, I seriously began to doubt myself. After a couple more stops, everyone in my car exited and I was left alone in the deserted tin can underground. I felt like the last drop of Pepsi that you can’t get over the rim of the Pepsi can, so you throw it away to be buried in a landfill and disintegrate after a thousand generations.

After a second, the conductor woman came out and saw me sitting in fear for what happened next. “Where are you trying to go, honey?”

My wide blue eyes looked up in a cry for goodwill. “116^th,” my voice squeeked. “I’ve never ridden the subway before. This is my first time. I went the wrong way, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, you went the wrong way. You should have gone Uptown, but instead you’re by the South Ferry. But don’t worry, I’m headed back up that direction, but it’ll take you about 30 or 35 minutes.”

“Oh, thank you so much!” I replied and continued to sit in my spot as new people boarded the car and we turned around. And the conductor was right, after 35 minutes, 116^th rolled up to my utter bemusement. I rose from my seat triumphant and took my leave of the metal beast to climb the stairway to the sun. And what do you know? The gates of Columbia University greeted me with glee!

---

Leave a comment...