Tube Rage!

The thing I find most disconcerting about Londoners is their inability to express themselves verbally; I excel at verbal and nonverbal communication so you can imagine how this deficiency annoys me. Couple this deficiency with their misguided belief that mumbling simple pleasantries as they push/nudge/bump you somehow cancels out their bad behavior. Perhaps it's because they've let their fancy accents go to their heads? I think they believe that just because "Excuse me" and "Thank you" sound elegant coming from their mouths it counteracts the rude invasion of personal space and their complete disregard of the "no touch" rule.

I nearly went postal on a 50ish year old man who insisted on jamming his less than slender self on the tube the other day. He completely didn't realize that "Joisey don't play that" when he tried his combination Excuse me-push on me. When Londoners offend one another, rarely do they verbally counter attack; such behavior is considered uncivilized and rude. Anyone see the irony here?? After Mr. Pleasantly Pushy gave me his third Excuse me and harder than usual push, I turned to him and said, "There is nowhere to go." He then plodded through and looked back at me and said thank you in a snotty manner. I looked down at him (he was short too) and I said, "You are not very welcome." In New York this moment would have passed without notice; here in London it was a major altercation. I had clearly violated the no verbal interaction rule and my fellow tube riders were wondering what my next move would be. I let this man live and bore holes into the back of his head for the remainder of the ride. As I stood in silent rage I grew angrier and angrier. I was specifically sick of these psuedo-swanky Brits who justify their rude behavior, and sick of the tube in general.

At work, I shared my story with some colleagues and they said I had just experienced Tube Rage. I didn't realize it at the moment, but they were right! I felt better once they started to share their Tube Rage stories with me. One particularly funny writer told me how his intended verbal punch-back actually caused him great embarrassment. In a similar situation, a fellow rider asked him curtly "Can you please move in?," and he smartly replied, "Not without getting the woman in front of me pregnant." He felt proud of his comeback until he realized that the poor woman in front of him may be worried about some type of inappropriate contact and he spent the rest of the ride looking down at his feet trying to hide his red face. After we all shared a laugh about my colleague's experience, I felt better knowing I wasn't alone in this experience called Tube Rage.

Keep your eye open for my mug shot on the world news appearing next to the anchor person saying, "NJ Girl Verbally Attacks Fellow Rider in London Tube" ... I say, consider yourself lucky to walk away with just a tongue lashing!

Saving Money To Post Possible Future Bail,

The Mouthy, Temporary European