Modern Catecombs

I love the metro. It is cheap, it is convenient, and it is an adventure.

CHEAP: I pay only 18£ for a whole month's pass, as opposed to the more than 30$ of gas for a week.

CONVENIENT: Do you have any idea how wonderful it is to slip some money and a metro pass into your pocket and just start walking? It you get tired, there will be a metro or a bus stop near by to whisk you back. If you want to see anything specific, the clockwork carriages will take you there.

ADVENTURE: Well, first of all it is underground, and makes me think of some sort of modern labyrinth, with signs and stairs and tunnels, advertisements scrolling on the walls and magazine stands crouching by the exits.

Most importantly, it is full of people, with entire universes of emotion and history and knowledge and opinion behind their blank faces.

Sometimes there are beggers, squeezing old accordiants with some little kid in tow to hold the squashed cup.  Sometimes there are dogs, since there are dogs everywhere. Sometimes there are groups of tourists, calling to each other in foreign languages about which stop they are waiting for.

Sometimes it is late at night and the metro is almost empty, with a few tired people slumped on the chairs, sometimes in each others' laps, the lights of the stations sliding over them. Sometimes it is rush hour, and the metro is so crowded that you can't even see the pole that you have in a death grip, and your bag is wedged between your knees so that there is more room at torso level. Your elbow is accross some guy's wrist and your thigh is pressed against some lady's purse, and heaven help you if you actually have to get off.

I like it, actualy. It is fun to pull my hand back from the abyss, duck under whole collections of arms at once, and slide through, cheerfully calling, "Permesso? Scusi!"  until I get to the door and leap (the occasion always calls for a leap, complete with outstreached arms) onto the empty platform, and then turn around to watch the doors close on a solid wall of people.

-Maria