Full Frontal

So the wondrous public transport system in London claims another victim. Actually nobody died, it was a woman who'd fainted at the top of the ascending escalators at Holborn station. I didn't witness the fall but she was stretched out on her front surrounded by members of the Tube staff as I walked past. Odd place for a person to faint in my experience as usually faintees (is that correct terminology for someone who faints?!) on the Tube are those who've been standing too long on platforms or on packed trains. That woman must have fainted in mid-stride as she walked off the escalator so nobody could have caught her (ouch) as sometimes happens on the carriages and platforms when people are standing about.

There must be something at Holborn station that makes it an eventful place because it's where I witness plenty of weird and wonderful things. For example, the time I was walking through the connection between the Piccadilly and Central lines when, at the top of the stairs there was a girl of about 20 or so who'd stripped naked, her clothes all about her on the floor and commuters filing past staring. Pretty surreal really but it certainly spiced up that journey! To this day I don't know what that was all about as she looked pretty compus mentus and not seemingly drunk. Some Tube staff were there trying to cover her up with a coat - perhaps it was a student prank or some publicity stunt by a far-out media company, though I didn't notice any bodyart on her - not that I looked that closely or anything!

Sick On PT

Going home from work yesterday, I got on a Piccadilly line tube from Holborn station and had to stand in the carriage as there were no seats as usual during the rush hour. As the train moved off, what can only be described as a stench began to blow through the carriage but I couldn't see the source for all the commuters standing in the aisle. When people filed off at the next station I saw a dishevelled old man asleep on a seat halfway down the carriage with vacant seats around him, the obvious malodorous source. I was about 15ft from him and a sharp acrid tang of stale urine and alcohol rose off him like fumes. A woman sitting opposite him was actually trying to control herself from retching.

It's logical that if you use public transport you have to be prepared to deal with members of the public. That old man last night was also a member of the public, no matter what social level he may have been (probably homeless) and had every right to be on that train provided that he'd managed to get a valid ticket from somewhere somehow (difficult to get through an underground station's electronic gates without one). Sure, it wasn't pleasant; in fact I've never seen anybody retching because somebody smelt so bad before - but on public transport you'll come into contact with other members of the public, so no matter what you just have to deal with it.

Anyway, it's sad and unfortunate that he came to be that way in the first place; he probably had nowhere to go so the best he could have expected was a homeless centre, if he could even get to one that is.

NYC

No, not the Big Apple but a condition known as New Year Cramp which I suffered this lunchtime whilst at the gym during my first session back after the festive season. Full with unfamiliar faces to the regular hardcore gym-nuts who were there before the overindulging began for Christmas etc, there was much red-faced exertion going on. Was doing fine with my usual stint on the cross-trainer (ski) machine followed by a punt on the rowing machine but a last-minute pang of guilt pushed me to try a kilometre on the running machine which eventually proved a feat beyond my legs (now more accustomed to being propped up on a sofa than pounding on a treadmill) which succumbed to NYC. Have New Year resolve to get as fit as I was when I ran the London Marathon (2001 & 2003) though I have no plans to run it this year despite yearly sequence dictating I should (one year on, one year off) - my last marathon could literally be my last marathon, though I do think three is a nice round number (and the magic number according to De La Soul).

There was supposed to be a national three minutes of silence today to commemorate the dead after the Asian Tsunami disaster. Our building's frontdesk sent a message through the tannoy to all the offices to remind everybody just before midday. I'm all for respecting the dead but wonder why this disaster warrants a three minute silence whilst others are just one minute, such as that for Memorial Day to commemorate those who died during the two World Wars, the Twin Towers terrorist attack and the Hillsborough Football disaster etc. Who decides these things, I always thought one minute was standard? Just a random thought.

This disaster is so far-reaching in terms of the nations directly affected not just in terms of the indigenous people of those countries directly devastated by the wave but tourists as well. The news scenes convey pure nightmare scenarios of injured people lying about makeshift, under-equipped hospitals and people looking for missing relatives and friends. My brother has been travelling SE Asia and was in Bangkok on his way to Cambodia when the disaster happened and so was lucky not to be caught up in it.

Whilst some First World countries (eg USA, Japan) have had their share, it seems the Third World suffers a disproportionate amount of natural disasters. They have definitely got it all against them. If the First World can exploit these countries to their own economic ends, they should be first in line to aid them when catastrophes occur. Sadly, it takes some kind of disaster like this to unite countries in humanitarian causes as opposed to warring with each other for a change and even then it's only temporary.