Last time on the London Tube

I was on my way from Hackney, on bus no 38 to Victoria in South London, just after 5 pm on Wednesday afternoon to get my couch back to Brighton after a short visit to my former volunteering placement.

As more minutes passed after 5 o'clock, the traffic was getting slower and slower and the driver confirmed my fears when through the speakers system announced that the next stop was going to be not before 10 or 15 minutes more. The reason: bad traffic.

So, I jumped out of the bus to ask where the nearest Tube station was. Holborn was just 3 minutes away and after topping up my Oyster with the only £2 necessary for my single trip, I boarded the Picaddilly Line, changing at Green Park to the Victoria Line to get to the couch station on time. It was the best decision, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to get back home....

Given the rush at peak hours on the bus and then the subway, I had to cope with the usual uncertainties, unwanted details and obstacles that getting on the tube entitles... So, instead of fighting such things, I just decided in a split second to take the chance and try to enjoy my last journey on the bicentennial underground system of London.

So, like sardines in a can, with smelly armpits, a deficient air conditioning system limited to a few vents open allowing the air come in, uncomfortable stares, tiredness, anguish and a concert of unwanted conversations with which my brain had been better off without, I endured my 15 minutes ride on this snake of wagons...

That was just half of the fun, I assure you! Once I running like a manic among hundreds of people running in the same direction too, and some against it, towards the light at the end of the tunnel, I embarked in the mission of getting to the surface faster and more sweaty than the rest and at the same time, trying to exercise my abs...so on the escalators, the best technique is, as every good londoner knows, running up or down on the left sight as you murmur in your mouth a nice "get off my face and move!".

So, Oyster in hand, I passed the ticket barriers and emerged to the broad light (not by that I mean warm light, it was as cold as hell can get to be...) and got to the station just in time... to find out my couch was delayed 30 minutes. So, that's life and there was nothing I could do about it. This is how this time on the London Tube came to be my last time on the London Tube.

Cheers England!!!