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3 comments
I live very close to what is essentially the Bay Area equivalent of a Regionalbahn line (BART being the equivalent of an S-Bahn and the MUNI being some kind of weird cross between an U-Bahn and a shitty tramline, btw [what is this utterly fugly map](https://imgur.com/a/asWS6Qy) that looks like it hasn’t been updated since the 70s, I mean is it really that difficult for one of the richest cities in the world to pay for a graphic designer to update it a bit?). My car’s at the mechanic and besides, I like knowing there are places in between where I’m coming from and where I’m going without having to rely on GPS to guide me, so I thought, why not use this as an excuse to take this line to another suburb that I’ve been wanting to go to for a while and look out the window to see what the rest of this part of the Bay looks like.
The train apparently comes once every two hours on a Sunday, despite going along a major population corridor and parallel to a motorway that almost always has heavy traffic. You can’t just recharge a card and tap in, but instead have to either book online or pay at the station kiosk. So I go up to the kiosk, I ask for a single ticket. He asks for my ID. My ID? Yes, my ID. To buy a train ticket on a normal commuter line? Yes, to buy a train ticket on a normal commuter line. So I give him my ID, and then I pay and then he asks me to sign my ticket. Why I had to sign my ticket, I couldn’t tell you. In the history of me buying train tickets in multiple countries in the world, not once have I had to *sign my ticket*.
Now despite all of that faff to actually get on the train, the train was actually relatively full, in other words, the fact that people are willing to go through all that faff to take a train clearly shows that there’s considerable demand for trains, even in the US. At one point, a couple of 10 or 11 year old boys get on and sit down in front of me. They start having a long and loud conversation with each about trains and brainrot memes and at one point, one of them says “Every kid I know was really into trains when they were little”. I thought nerdy kids liking trains was a British(/European?) thing, but apparently not. Not only do American kids apparently like trains, but *this generation of American kids*, many of whom have probably never even *ridden* a train, also apparently likes trains.*There is hope for the future yet*.
Using internet in Turkey without VPN isn’t as bad as China, but it’s bad. Some years ago, one might have missed out on having one’s immortal soul corrupted by, I don’t know, being able to peruse the library of cartoon stick figures demonstrating sex positions on sexinfo101, but nowadays I can’t even use Discord. Why? Who tf knows?
Also, I keep taking too little money with me when I go out to buy stuff. Luckily shopkeepers are chill. I had 15 lira too little when I went to get bread for breakfast, and the bakery boy said I can just drop it sometime. You won’t see such courtesy in your local Kamps or BackWerk.
It’s also ridiculous that the largest note is still 200 lira. That’s like a six-pack of mineral water and a box of candies.
My new addiction: Videos about rewilding. It’s just the most wholesome, heartwarming content ever and [this guy](https://youtu.be/_g_4G1LR71Q?si=kvFBD5mkiw6zeW-V) needs to be our national treasure when David Attenborough leaves us.