My Train Journeys

Motivation to do something in your life is very important but I think more important than that is the commitment to work hard towards what you want to achieve. My taxi driver this morning was committed to having a conversation with me. Or it could be that he was gathering information from all his customers and compiling that into a book. He asked me where I worked, what I did, how long had I been travelling to London, if I enjoyed it, if I travelled daily etc etc. I think there's almost a sense of, ' I can ask all these things because we're both Pakistanis". That's a license to be nosy.. I'm surprised he didn't ask me what area I was from in Pakistan, as that is normally a question very commonly asked by a fellow Pakistanian who you're meeting for the first time...lol How can you not move your lips at all for almost 25 minutes. Thursday morning in my train to London, a girl wearing a long, white, thick fur coat caught my eye because she looked lik...

When I woke up this morning, I was a bit tired and felt a little grumpy for some reason. When I ordered my taxi in the morning, it showed it was 5 minutes away. So I waited 5 minutes, it was still not moving towards me and it kept showing 5 minutes away even then. So instead of calling the driver and having a rant, I decided to cancel it and order a different one which arrived in 3 minutes. I was picked up by the same taxi driver who picked me on 9 December 2019. I've also mentioned him in my blog for that day and I remember him because he thought he could have a go at me for not entering the correct drop off details which I had.. Lol. Then I went to the coffee shop at the train station which was pretty busy for 6.30 in the morning. Not only it had a long queue but there was only one person serving. May be it was because there was only one person serving. I queued for 10 - 12 minutes but then chose to go to the shop in the train instead of wasting anymore time. Even though I ...

Asking questions is a skill and that's how we learn new things. The kids that ask a lot of questions turn out to be the smart ones. But turning what is a confident statement into a question right at the end is a skill in itself. This morning the girl who served me in the coffee shop, demonstrated that skill quite flawlessly. But I still feel she can't beat a pro who almost does that everyday and so perfectly and skillfully that he almost makes us believe (every single time) whatever he is saying is absolutely correct. But then at the end of the sentence he makes that sound like a question. I'm talking about someone who a couple of the readers would also know about. Going back to this morning, so the girl took my order and was repeating it very confidently, while looking at the croissants and said Almond croissaaaaannnt...? Making it sound like a question. Instead of saying we don't have the plain ones do you want the almond one instead. She saved herself from say...

This morning at the coffee shop, I was served by the same young lad who's been mentioned in my previous blog, "Two types of people". He took my order and I placed my loyalty card on the counter. He was about to turn around to make my drink but stopped and said in a bit of a loud voice, "Oh you've got a loyalty card". That made me think.. "am I doing something wrong?". But there was nothing to worry about. I think he was excited to see someone use the card, so even before making the drink he grabbed the stamp and stamped it twice. I am not sure if that was due to the excitement of being able to stamp an actual customers loyalty card or if it was a gesture of good will. He then made an eye contact with me and I wasn't sure if that was a confident eye contact or just to check if I was looking that he'd stamped twice but, I gave him a nod of gratitude. I find this lads behaviours, actions and body language hard to understand because ...

Monday afternoon, when I got on to my train heading back to Birmingham, the carriage was quite full. I was standing next to a seat with a bag on it, but the lady who was sitting on the seat next to it looked like she didn't want to pick the bag up. She was spread across two seats and there was I standing there trying to find a seat. Why would you even do that?  What kind of a person you have to be to do that? She had the headphones on and was watching something on a tablet. I said to her, 'is anyone sitting here'. I'm sure she heard that but first pretended she couldn't hear me and said, "sorry", so I pointed at her bag and said, "is that yours?“. It looked and felt like she didn't want to answer that in an attempt to make me walk away and find a seat somewhere else. But because she behaved like that, I ensured she picked her bag and I sat in that seat. I could tell she wasn't pleased. She could have been a bit humanitarian (a person ...

'17.03 Avanti West Coast service to Birmingham New Street will be leaving from platform 4'. Due to the trains being delayed earlier yesterday there was a lot of people waiting at the concourse at Euston trains station who were constantly looking at the electronic boards on the top. It was like a marathon had started when that announcement happened. Everyone started walking really fast towards the platform and some eager ones started running just in case there was a prize for someone who gets on the train first. Being the 23rd of December I didn't think it would be this busy but turns out they're all going to the Midlands for Christmas. And they were all in some sort of rush. When someone brushed past me while running towards the train I almost felt like saying (in ferdi's voice) , " you can't see meee!!! Why you running fast, the train will still be there for the next 10 - 12 minutes, don't go anywhere". Having this thought in my head made me...

'Excuse me, how do I know if one of these have an outlet... I mean the electric socket' a man sitting in my train back to Birmingham on Wednesday evening asked the lady sitting opposite me. He said excuse me with a bit of loud voice which got everyone's (including me) attention immediately. They way it sounded, It almost felt like he was going to say something confrontational but it wasn't. Sometimes we make assumptions 'without knowing the full story' or even just by looking at someone. The lady said, 'Errrm by looking' (lol) then she tapped on the table  in front of her and said, 'it's normally on the seats with the tables like this'. I think the man who asked the question was from America (I assumed from his accent). Not only do they talk differently in America, they phrase questions differently too. But this British lady shot him down straight away by answering his question the way it was phrased (she could be a comedian or may b...