I have this perverse desire to ride trains and subways or even buses instead of rental cars or taxis in a new city. This year for Thanksgiving, I am meeting my son in New York City (the first time for me). I arrived at JFK airport and of course, I could have apped up an Uber or Lyft or even a regular taxi to Manhattan’s 5th Avenue where I am staying but I have developed this ritual of taking public transportation from the airport when I land in one of the world’s biggest and busiest cities.
Honestly, before today I didn't really understand why I like the train/subway/local bus option. It hit me as I was riding the E Line from JFK’s Air Train’s Jamaica Station that the reason this option makes sense to me is how being thrown with individuals who live and breathe and work and procreate in the town I am visiting helps me quickly evaluate any peculiar cultural traditions or traits that might be useful to ‘blend in’ with the locals. I’m a traveler, not a tourist, and I would rather not stand out like Dorothy in Oz but rather blend in with the Munchkins.
I think the first time I really recognised the train was infinitely preferable to a taxi was during a train ride from Narita, Japan, to Ueno Station in Tokyo many years ago. I vividly remember a young Japanese mother with two perfectly dressed and matching twin boys who, tired after a long trip, had piled up on their tidy and perfectly dressed mother to take a nap with arms and legs akimbo on the bench beside her. A Nat Geo moment. And a subtle cue for me as I maneuvered and enjoyed my way through Japan’s precisely groomed environments.
On my way from Milan’s airport to Milan’s Retiro area by train, I met another traveler, a young American woman, who was taking her first ever trip out of the US. She had chosen the local option out of financial necessity but had learned very quickly the art of sharing public transportation with the local. We mutually affirmed this fascination with local transportation was NOT crazy but rather a wonderful tool for travelers.
Of course, I had called my hotel ahead to ask about transportation from JFK to Manhattan. After being provided with a list and costs of taxi and shared ride services and after a bit a prodding, the front desk person volunteered that the train/subway combination was not only possible but likely more time efficient at the time of the day I would be entering Manhattan. I’m pretty sure she even used the word ‘express’ and mentioned she had used this option every single day when she worked at JFK and it cost around $14 return. This sounded really, really good after being told my cost for a taxi or even a shared ride would be closer to or a bit above $50. Honestly, I would rather drink $50 instead of ride in it, particularly at the prices for one glass of wine in Manhattan.
Mistakenly, however, I took the EL (or Local) instead of the EE (Express). But was it a mistake or was it a hint from my subconscious that the best way to get over any anxiety I might have (and, yes, I get anxious in really, really big cities) upon entering the urban jungle is to get close and personal with the locals. There is no closer or more personal place that a crowded subway. And from Jamaica Station, I had aound 20 local stops to live through before reaching my lofty station at 53rd St and 5th Ave near Rockefeller Center.
I had already noticed the abundance of accents and languages as I strode through Terminal 8 of JFK to the Air Train. I’m pretty sure I heard German and some language that might be Indonesian, definitely Spanish and perhaps some Swedish. I heard Jersey and Wisconsin, South Carolina and Missouri in the mix, too. A cacophony symphony. I noticed a lot of the non-English speakers actually DID know some English as short phrases or words jumped from the phrase book to their conversations. Subway was definitely one of those words.
I also noticed a literal potpourri of eye and head shapes, colors and facial features. I noticed black men holding their children close and perhaps a MesoAmerican father trying to gently settle an argument between his bossy eldest daughter with her much younger, sleepy little brother. I witnessed a Hispanic mother grabbing her two rambunctious boys in a hug in order to remind them their voices were happy and laughing but loud. I saw a German couple semi-attentively (as parents often do) listening to their talkative adult son as he went on and on about something - what I don’t know because he spoke in German.
As the Subway left Jamaica Station and rumbled underground through Jamaica, Queens, and Astoria, more passengers climbed on board than got off. Initially, I had had plenty of room on the bench seat I shared with a somewhat imposing but really beautiful young very dark black man dressed in what looked sort of like raggedy clothes but undoubtedly were the highest and most costly fashion in hip hop. He wore heavy silver rings (costume but intricate nonetheless), one with a lion of flowing mane, another with a skeleton head with a weird skull cap with spikes (some game demon perhaps?), another skeleton worthy of Dios de la Muertos (a Hispanic cultural appropriation?) and lastly a ring of simple crosses. He was very tidy and polite in general. He smelled of weed.
The darkly Hispanic woman on the other side spoke very little and looked like she might have just left work. She had that tired, I have to get home so I can work some more getting dinner ready for my kids and then tidy the house kind of look that I see in so many faces of working women. She was in her zone and definitely wanted to stay there. That was fine by me because I didn’t feel like talking, I was in my listening and observing mode. I love to be the fly on the wall sometimes and no one pays any attention to a little silver-haired white lady who wants to be ignored.
Several stops down an elderly Asian man came aboard the now full subway car. I still had a bit of seat turf on either side of me and could scoot closer to well-dressed hip hop dude (a steel post was between me and tired mama) but I felt pretty comfortable with my little bubble of extra space on either side of me. The elderly Asian hopped from one foot to another, not really catching my eye but all the while letting me know he REALLY wanted to sit. I scooted over. Weed dude didn’t comment. Or move.
Since my space had already been invaded I took my chance to really look at other passengers. The New York Subway is not just a single ride from one point to another but it is the actual transportation for many, many New Yorkers who do not own a car and maybe don’t even know how to drive. Why should they? They’ve had pretty reliable albeit sometimes imperfectly working public transit (my Metrocard didn’t open the gate and after several tries a transit worker just opened another and told me ‘come on through’ like it was pretty common for the gate to malfunction) since 1903. So just like the guy at the end of the car toting a room air conditioner on a dolly, life goes on in the Subway and people transport whatever they need to transport. It’s the urban version of a chicken bus.
Somehow, though, all these small interactions remind me that basically we are all cut from the same cloth and have many of the same needs. We are busy people and we need to move ourselves, our loved ones and our things from one place to another in whatever way is available to us. We have family, we love them and we share our lives with them everywhere - even on the New York Subway, one of the oldest and busiest subway systems in the world.
Next time you enter a big urban jungle, try local transportation if it is available. Give yourself permission to escape your safe bubble in your rented car, your taxi or shared ride. Watch the locals and by the time you get to your hotel or accommodation you will already have found that common bond that helps a traveler engage with a new culture. The rest of your trip will be so much more relaxed because you know everyone there is just like you even though they might look and speak differently. And THAT is what I consider the wonder and the essence of traveling.
#publictransport #NYMetro #NewYorkCity
#publictransport #NYMetro #NewYorkCity
