So today I had a bad train day. The train system gave me a fair amount of exercise as they decided to make me run as often as possible. It started when the car park at St Albans was full and I was running a little late so had to park in the new car park that is a little walk away from the station. Then I get my ticket, check the departures board and head for platform 3 for the 933 to Brighton, first stop London St Pancras. From there I will use the Victoria line to get to Vauxhall.
Listening to my iPod I see a lady in station uniform waving at me from platform 4. I pull out an earbud to learn that the train I am waiting for is now present on platform 1. Now I know this is my fault for wanting to pass the time on the station platform listening to podcasts rather than listening to the important information around me. So I thank the lady and run for the bridge and over to platform 1. The train is full by the time I get back down the stairs so I have to jog to the front of the train where there is just enough room for little old me and my PC case.
The rest of my journey was fine until I returned to St Pancras on the underground. As I step off the underground train I pull an earbud out to listen for any announcements and here an alarm. A loud alarm with a clear voice message that was saying "there is an emergency in the station, will all passengers leave the station as quickly as possible". The quickest way for me to leave would be to step back on to the train from which I have just vacated. But the doors where shut and it was leaving without me. So I (and a few others on the platform) started to walk quickly (run) in the direction of the way out. I am not a fit man and with a PC bag, an umbrella and slip on shoes, I am less able to run than I am to fly to the moon. A while later I arrive in the tunnels where I can here the alarm but not the message. I keep going and eventually arrive at the escalators. Here I can here the tannoy message. It now says, "sorry but a fault caused the emergency message to play, engineers are now fixing the problem". I stopped running.
Later as I am telling this story to a friend, she reminds me that today is 7/7, the anniversary of the London bombings. I am glad I didn't remember that at the time.
Time heals and years after these events we forget just how frightened the world was when these thing where happening around us. The same things that are happening day to day in other countries around the worlds and the people there are also trying to get on with there lives.
