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Published: December 9th 2009
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The transition my brain had to make upon moving to Spain was immense, coming from Asia. My first realisation I was back in ‘civilisation’ is ironically a very uncivilised tale itself. For the first time in my life I am living in a city with one of the best transport systems in the world. My first rides on the metro produced excitement akin to what the first moon-walkers must have experienced. I had thought unbroken pavement and occasionally effective pedestrian crossings the height of sophistication but the white and blue whish and whoosh of the metro literally blew my mind! After a year in S.E. Asia negotiating with a wizened, toothless fifty-something-year old man for a lift across town on his crumby Honda, arguing for the sake of five cents, the logical certainty of Madrid’s underground was somehow comforting if eventually boring.
My favourite trips on the metro are the ones when something unexpected happen. When the driver forgets to brake and does so suddenly, before exiting the station at which we are supposed to stop. When musicians board and play saxophone or guitar in return for donations. (But not those pesky tissue sellers or the dreaded accordion player…head
wreaking!) Or today when I saw that middle aged woman having a full blown argument with a soft toy (a rabbit to be precise) until she realised she had missed her station and began kissing the rabbit in a passionate woe-filled moment most passengers chose to ignore. I suppose they presumed it might get ugly in the end. What with the lack of natural light and the filmic quality I felt like I had fallen down into some sort of Wonderland. Here I was, a Viet Cong tunnel rat again, attempting to photograph the bizarre happenings in Madrid’s underworld. I felt the anticipation return briefly - one solo voyager, in a place no man has seen before, deep in the oesophagus of a city and….stupidly…missing…her station.
Anyway back to my first days in Madrid and my uncivilised metro story. I arrived 15th September, at what I innocently believed to be a really late time 9.30pm. Later I discovered that this is when most Spanish have lunch. After walking in opposite directions on Calle Sagasta for half an hour and mistakenly try to break into a bank, a passerby found my pension (like a small hostel/hotel) behind long term scaffolding. Most
of my time here I spent amusing the owner with hand gestures (my year of Spanish at UCD must have been a dream or something) and my never ending disastrous endeavours finding a ‘piso’ or flat. It was around this time that I stepped on a woman’s toe on the metro. Accidentally I should immediately point out. At first, with my ear phones lodged firmly in by ears, I noticed a women glaring at me. Realising I must have stood on her open toed stilettos I smiled uncertainly and apologised. Then she started screaming. Which taught me a valuable lesson about Spanish culture. Never apologise, even if you’re wrong. It must be the only city in Europe where I can walk smack bang into someone’s arm and the victim won’t even flinch. Apologising, as I instinctively try to do, only acknowledges something actually occurred which you must never ever do. Instead if you do bump into someone inadvertently, punch them in the face immediately and continue as if nothing happened. Nonchalant denial is the name of the game. Bury your head in the tortilla. No wonder Franco lasted so long.
The sudden sophistication of my means of travel has, on
the other hand, produced unprecedented imaginative ability. You could say fatalistic creative powers. It’s almost as if being deprived of such luxuries in ‘Nam have stimulated some unknown faculty in my mind to see all apparent dangers of such common accepted transport options. Now when I walk, take the bus or catch the metro, I can’t stop imagining these simple activities physically hurting me in some way. Never mind that I illegally rode motorbikes in ‘Nam after five Saigon’s and a few well chosen cocktails; there I was in control of my own destruction. In Madrid though, my fate lies in the hands of electrical sensors, buses’ brakes and other people’s alertness! Spanish people too! Who are clearly sleep deprived and are prone to exaggeration. (See future entry re social kissing). What if they ‘exaggerate’ the speed limit? What if they over-emphasise that familiar ‘ARRIBA’ shove as I’m trying to MIND THE GAP? What if they embellish the exact location of the pedestrian crossing? The developing world is an oasis of safety in comparison.
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