Rattling Thoughts

On a recent trip to my nation’s capitol for the annual winter meeting of my country’s society of astronomers, I caught the capitol subway train, or The Metro, to several locations. I sought exotic lunches, devilish dinners, and even, on two occasions, cups of hand poured drip brew coffee. My mouth waters when I recall the barista gently pouring the scalding hot water over the single-origin estate coffee grounds. And the aroma floating over the counter to my anxious taste buds.

Anyway, snapping out of that delicious reverie and back to the point, the metro seems to be in a constant state of disrepair, or is it repair? Throughout my journeys I found many escalators out of service, and I was made to walk up or down a frozen escalator. Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining because of laziness. Sure I’m lazy, but even when an escalator is properly functioning, I seldom stand still. Which is probably why I have trouble on non-moving escalators.

It is a very disorienting experience. It is as if my momentum has a memory and when I step on an escalator, it propels me in the proper direction to maintain my stability. How many times did I stumble as I entered the non-moving escalator? Every time. I wasn’t even drunk, yet.

So what is up with all the escalators in the capitol metro? Are they collapsing under the weight of my country folk? I recall no such problems on my travels and metro riding experience in Europe. Similar long escalator paths exist in Paris, Praha, and Stockholm, yet I cannot recall such a state of disrepair? Perhaps it is a skewed observation, but I think I spent more time riding in Europe than I did in DC.

Another curious note about the capitol metro, “music”. The squeals and bumps, sounds of friction, as the people conveyors operate is akin to an atonal, non-melodic, post-modern orchestration, where the cavernous escalator shaft play the role of a clamshell bandstand.