On the Last Train Home

Hell is not other people. Hell is Northern Rail.

I know some people harbour romantic notions about the age of rail, and how awesome trains are, and how much they're like a neglected puppy, kicked and abused until all you're left with is an aggressive hate-fueled animal full of spite and urine. I suppose that isn't too far from the truth.

I hate travelling by train. Modern 21st century rail use is just like travelling in a car only you're squashed into the back seat between two meatheads. The window is open, so you're really cold and you just can't reach it to close it. Someone else is playing music obnoxiously loud and it's the kind of ear-splitting din that makes dogs howl. The men on your left and right are having a conversation where most of the English language has been left out, altered, or replaced with swearing. Someone has taken a leak on your seat. The car then proceeds to break down every five minutes, stop for no reason, or issue rambling statements in mumble-language so you don't really know what's going on.

When you arrive at your destination, two cops with machine-guns are watching you darkly. There are discarded coffee cups and newspapers all over the floor. The carpark smells of tramp, and before you can leave you have to navigate sets of elaborate barriers that wouldn't look out of place on a farm. You have to pay to use the toilet and any unattended bag could harbour certain death.

Is this how people choose to travel? It's enough to have Thomas the Tank-Engine rolling in his grave, if he handn't been smelted down into I-pods or sold for scrapping in Bangladesh.

"Thomas we hardly knew ye."

Trains are expensive. Most, with a few exceptions, are cramped, smelly, unclean and slow. That's only when they choose to turn up, which they don't always. They are often filled with the kind of people I'd usually avoid. Most evenings one can be sure to find a bunch of macho blokes, drinking Stella and being racist. That might be unfair, I don't know if they're being racist, because I can't understand what they're saying. I wrote some stuff down and put it into Google Translate, but unfortunately it only came back with the harsh, gutteral noises associated with Goblins.


Simply put, trains are hell.

My interaction with trains started from a young age, and as with most things, my memory usually characterized by all of the horrendous things that happened. I was kidnapped by a train once. It pulled into Dewsbury and I tried to get off, a young boy of 13. Only the doors were jammed, presumably because there were so many people aboard it was like being buried alive in a mass grave. I waved frantically at the conductor, and he waved back nochelantly. He pressed the button a few times, and when the door didn't open, he just shrugged and my journey continued until I was freed in Leeds.


My most recent train related nightmare was just a few days ago. Where possible, it is acceptable to fare dodge. I do this in memory of the hundreds of pounds I've spent on rail tickets only to be kettled into a piss dungeon instead of getting a seat. Oft times, on short journies, I attempt to reinburse myself for all the emotional abuse I suffered as a child at the hands of Northern Rail. So I was fare dodging, and some people are going to say I deserved this. I got on a train in Todmorden and travelled towards Halifax. I was originally going to get off at Sowerby Bridge, but I was crashing with my girlfriend so I thought I'd just stay on.

The best way to fare dodge, apart from turning invisible, threatening someone with a knife, or locking yourself in a toilet, is to pretend to be asleep or reading a newspaper with your headphones in. This not only creates the impression you've been there awhile, but also that you shouldn't be disturbed. So you'll imagine my surprise as I'm reading the Metro, blasting out Mudvayne to the point where I'm sure my ears are bleeding, and the countryside takes a turn for the unknown.

Long story short, the train didn't go where I assumed it would. I left Sowerby Bridge station, still on the train, and ended up in some godless hamlet somewhere in the backfield of nowhere with abused ears. I missed the announcement because I was listening to loud music. I spent half an hour in the pub next to the station having my sexuality examined by strange old men before finally getting the right train home.

There is a lesson here. I'm not sure what it is.

Anyway, in conclusion, the best advice I can offer is don't travel by train. Although buses suffer from the same problem. You could try something like Megabus, but my previous interaction with companies like them and National Express is that their drivers are simply hate-fuelled sociopaths, and that there is something vaugely upsetting about being driven down a deserted motorway late at night by a pair of men who are so morbid. Not least because if they did turn psychotic, they could just kill you and bury you in a nearby field.

The other alternative is car, but as we know, that is both expensive and liable to cause the very earth itself to erode into nothing. So you might as well not bother. Just stay in. It's easier.