The Metropolis

A possibly apocryphal story about the Tube (Part 1)

Mike Pollitt | Friday 13 May, 2011 10:48

A friend was on a central line train coming in from the East. It was morning rush hour, hot and squashed. This friend of mine wasn’t feeling great, having had a few the night before, and his mood was further soured by his position. He was jammed in at the end of a carriage between a large corporate suit and a builder in a paint splodged smelly tracksuit. At least the window was open. So my friend shuts his eyes, turns up his iPod and thinks: “Only two more stops til Bank. Only two more. Nearly there. Only one more now. One more stop til Bank.” Then he opens his eyes and sees a guy in the adjacent carriage turn towards the connecting door, pull down the window on his side, vomit through the gap into my friend’s carriage and onto back of the corporate suit, then pull his window back up and turn away as if nothing unusual had occurred. And then my friend got off, because it was Bank.

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