Most people think of time spent in public transport as no-time, a sort of interstitial void time. Half an hour a day in the tram that don’t count in the big picture. You’re only going from A to B, and only A and B matter.
This is a shame, as traveling by tram can actually be an interesting experience. Lots of different people – myriads of styles. Lots of ways of ‘not being there’. And ways to try to ignore the fellow passengers as hard as possible: iPod, book (that’s me), magazine, look out of the window, unfocus.
Yesterday and today, coincidentally, there were people singing along with their music. One was a wee guy of moroccan origin, rapping along with his gangsta’ stuff. Not my thing, but i had to admire the way he kept it up. He obviously knew the song intimately.
Then today, R’n'B. Black girl. Funny actually, because she liked the song enough to want to sign along, but she was trying to sing as low as possible, so to not attract attention. In vain, because anyone doing anything louder than breathing gets a lot of looks anyway. From the corner of the eye of course, you wouldn’t want anything like eye contact.
I like my interstitial time. Makes me smile.