Re: Metcard - one card, many adventures.

["RexManning" <cc44@mailandnews.com>]

thought this may be of interest.
forwarded from melb.general
"Peter Greaves" <greave@hunter.net> wrote in message
news:4d34btsvlqk512nj7529nc9p91n7dinfrq@4ax.com...
> I had never given the most recent ad campain on Melbourne tv much
> thought until my most recent "adventure" Connex's train system.
>
> There I was, travelling home on the 9:05pm train from Central station
> to Jordanville Station on the Glen Waverley line.  I get on the last
> carriage and notice two scruffy looking youths sittng at the very back
> of the train.
>
> They were loudmouthing along most of the journey to Richmond station,
> but were easy to ignore.  At Richmond station, as the train was
> pulling away from the platform and building up speed, one of the
> youths stood at the door while his buddy held the doors forced open.
> The reason for this was not immediately obvious.  The train was
> rapidly approaching the end of the platform and was building up quite
> a bit of speed when suddenly the youth standing at the door threw a
> full large MacDonald's cup of drink all over some poor person who was
> standing near the end of the platform at Richmond Station talking on
> his mobile phone.  The last I saw as the train sped away was his look
> of total amazement on his dripping face as the train sped him out of
> my sight.  I knew then that these guys were more than your typical
> loud mouth youths.  I was rather incensed by this behaviour.
>
> Further down the line they started picking on a man sitting next to a
> female friend of his in the seat immediately diagonally behind me.  I
> thought then that something might happen then, but the guy being
> picked on wisely engaged them in harmless conversation and they ended
> up walking up the isle and sitting opposite him and had a relatively
> harmless chat.
>
> The trouble for me began when the conversation with the other train
> passenger died down and one of them started to harrass me by knealing
> immediately behind my head and moving his hands extremely close behind
> my head without actually touching me.  I was watching the whole goings
> on in the reflection in the train window and could hear the other
> youth snickering as his mate got more and more brave.  I don't know
> what came over me, whether it was fatigue after a long day in the
> office, or seeing some guy on a Friday night out get drenched by these
> fools, or what, but I flashed into a rage and stood up and faced the
> youth knealing behind me.  A split second later I had his throat in my
> hand.  He managed to break my grip before I could do any real damage,
> but I managed to nearly dislocate one of his fingers in the process.
> About that time while I was occupied with the first youth, his mate
> stood up and shoved me backwards and I lost balance on the moving
> train and fell onto the floor between two empty seats.  I quickly got
> back up on my feet, but by this time the guy who was originally picked
> on had stood up between the three of us and managed to subdue the
> situation.
>
> What followed was a lot of sitting and staring with the odd threat
> thrown in.  I was invited to get off the train at the next station so
> that we could continue our fracus there, but I just ignored them.  I
> was rather worried that they would follow me off the train at
> Jordanville Station where I was getting off and then I would be
> vunerable to an attack, but decided what must be done, must be done.
> The other option I thought of was to go to the end of the line at Glen
> Waverley where I assumed the bulk of passengers would get off and I
> would stand the best chance of avoiding attack in the crowd
>
> When the train pulled into Jordanville station, I acted as though I
> wasn't getting off, and then, when I had waited as long as I dared, I
> got up and left the train. It took them by surprise, and  I was rather
> relieved to discover that they made no attempt to follow me off the
> train.  I think by that stage the guys nearly dislocated finger was
> starting to really hurt as I could see him bending it and trying to
> keep it moving.
>
> Well there you have it, you start out one minute on Melbourne's
> transport system minding your own business reading a book, and the
> next your battling two youths.  I am not proud of what I did.  Now
> that I have had some time to think about it, I realise how lucky I was
> that neither of these scum were carrying knives or worse.  In
> hindsight it would have been better to have simply not made a scene
> and got up and moved to another seat, but it just wasn't my night for
> passively sitting idle while a scumbag attempts to make me look
> foolish.  I can do that all by myself :-)
>
> ______________________________________________________________________
> Posted Via Uncensored-News.Com - Still Only $9.95 -
http://www.uncensored-news.com
>  With Servers In California, Texas And Virginia - The Worlds Uncensored
News Source
>