Friday, May 18, 2007

You can sit or help

I am sure most people can remember a time when they ran out of gas and needed a push. Maybe was getting stuck in a muddy field and being the only person not having to scrape the mud off after convincing your friends that pushing you was what was needed to prevent a costly tow.

Somehow, the idea of pushing a train for something other than a Guiness World Record is something i doubt would ever happen in the United States. That is exactly what happened the other day in the Buxar district of Bihar India. One of the largest railway networks in the world is in India and although they carry more than 14 million passengers a day, they are often poorly maintained, leading to numerous accidents or disruptions of service.

I can only imagine the grumbling, swearing and cellphone calls here if a train ground to a halt and the passengers were then asked to assist in moving it by the driver. Get out and push? There would be a field day of threatened lawsuits, complaints of poor service, the fear of a broken heel or torn suit jacket.
Train passengers in India must just have a different view of it though. When the electric train they were riding on halted after losing it's electrical conection, hundreds got off the train and pushed it the 60 yards forward to a spot where it could restart and then hopped back on for the rest of the trip. I guess a "normal commute to the office" is just a bit different than it is here.

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