It started innocently enough. A father, sitting opposite me with his son. I'd noticed the man before on my commute - he was one of the regulars, transported to work in the bowels of the city every morning. Since April though, his young son, now of elementary school age, has joined him as far as Iidabashi station, about a third of the way through my commute. I found it quite touching to see a man in public take such pleasure in being with his son - you don't often see it in the mornings in Japan. He reads the paper to him, and explains things like baseball and the share market, and thoughtfully skims past the naked women and racially sensitive outbursts. When the boy got off the train at first, his father accompanied him, holding his hand. Now, as the train pulls out of the station, he cranes his neck to watch the boy and his little friends as they wander off together, in their little sailor suits, through the station ticket machines. It takes a few stops for the smile to fade as we commute on.
The problem is, that this angelic little urchin has started to make friends. Too many friends. Who all seem to live in Mitaka, the station before mine, first on the train route. The seating on the 6.52 to Myoden was always a delicate balance - I always got a seat, but it was usually one of the last two or three. Now, these little scavengers have disturbed the whole ecosystem. Now, I've started to find myself standing in the mornings on the way to work. The only good thing about my morning journey used to be that it was obscenely early enough for me to be able to get a seat. Now, that one small consolation has been taken away.
I normally decide to stand in front of the boy and his friends, certain that, at the least, I will be assured of a seat by the time to train gets to Iidabashi. Inevitably though, about 4 stops before, a whole other crowd of kids get on and suddenly I am surrounded by these little creatures, being kicked and elbowed and bumped and having my reading disturbed by endless games of Jan Ken Pon. I've found myself unconsciously tutting and sucking my teeth at them, like the mad old women who used to hit random kids with her umbrella for cycling on the pavement back home. And on top of everything, it wasn't helped by being stabbed this morning by one of the regulation crucifixes hanging from their bags and the realisation that they were both regularly annoying and Christians.
Not only do I have to pander to little bastards like this all day long at work, but now I have to do it on my way to work too. Something is going to snap soon.
