I just boarded a busy peak-hour train from one of the busier stations, where masses of people are boarding to head home for the day.

For this train line, there are two levels in a carriage, and the seating arrangement has two seats to one side and three seats to the other.

There are few seats available, but I’m lucky to just get a seat. On these trains, you will end up sitting next to strangers as there is simply no space otherwise.

But in one of the three-seat rows nearby, there is a woman sitting in the aisle seat with no one in the two seats next to her by the window. She has no large items or bags, just a small purse on her lap.

Someone approaches her and asks to sit. She looks incredibly irritated and tries to ignore them, but eventually stands up, lets the person on to sit by the window, and she sits back down in the aisle seat.

We get to the next station, which is one of the biggest in Sydney. Even more people board, and there are now people standing in the aisles as there are no seats available, except for the middle seat next to the woman.

Someone else approaches and asks to sit there. She again tries to ignore them with an annoyed look on her face. They ask again, and she stands up, looking furious and muttering something unintelligible. She then pushes past the people to go up the steps to the boarding space, and hits the button to open the doors to change carriages.

Only then does she look around. She looks shocked as she sees that the next carriage is the same, full seats with people standing in aisles. She looks back and realises that other people have just sat in the seat she vacated, and now there are no seats left.

After a few moments, she storms into the next carriage, pushing past people to get through on her way.

I’m on a subway train. I look up to see an old woman standing right in front of me. Out of instinct, I immediately offer her my seat, which she gladly accepts.

Another woman (sitting) remarks:

Woman: “Hmm, lots of women on this train but you wait for an old White lady to get on before offering a seat. Interesting.”

Me: “I offered because she’s right next to me and I just noticed. Plenty of people on this train looking older than you. Are you going to offer them your seat?”

Woman: “Just think it’s interesting, that’s all I’m saying.”

Me: “You’re one of those people that sees people donating to a ‘save the whales’ charity and shouts ‘what about the dolphins!’ It’s whataboutism and it’s exhausting. I can’t offer a seat to everyone needing one on this train because I only have one a**. You seem to be the biggest a** in here, though, so by standing we should all be able to get a seat.”

She had nothing to say to me after that. She remained seated until the next stop, where she got off. I’m hoping that wasn’t actually her stop, but she felt too ashamed to remain on board and had to get off and wait for the next one.

My girlfriend and I are on a packed train from Paris to Avignon to take part in a very famous festival. Every seat is reserved; there are even people sitting in the aisles. This guy comes up to us with a ticket in his hand and speaks in English:

Guy: “Uh, you’re sitting in my seat.”

Me: *Checking ticket.* “Seats x and y, carriage z? Nope, we’re definitely in the seats we booked.”

The guy stared us down for a moment, realised we weren’t moving, and walked to the next seat.

Guy: “Uh, you’re sitting in my seat.”

He tried it on at every seat in the carriage, even though everyone caught on to what he was doing, and then moved on to the next carriage.

Back in the early 2000s, I worked on the Eurostar trains, running from London to Paris. I worked the first-class area, so I would bring pre-booked meals to customers in their seats.

I approach a woman travelling with her young child, likely no older than five.

Passenger: “Excuse me, when do we go under the sea?”

Me: “We’re in the tunnel now, ma’am. We should already be under the English Channel.”

Passenger: “Okay, but when are we out of the tunnel?”

Me: “We should be out on the French side in—”

Passenger: “—No, not in France. Under the sea?”

I’m confused for a second, but then the child asks a question that explains my confusion:

Child: “Mummy, when do we see the fish?”

Me: “Ma’am… do you think the train goes through the water?”

Passenger: “Yes! It goes under the sea! That’s what I was told!”

Both mother and child are looking up at me expectantly. I decide to answer in a way that will save me time, and them some dignity.

Me: “Uh… It’s nighttime, so it’s too dark to see anything, I’m afraid.”

Passenger: “Really? Oh, bother.” *To her child.* “Sorry, love. It’s too dark to see the fish. But on the day we come home, we’re taking the afternoon train, so we should see something on the way back!”

Am I kicking the problem down the line? Sure? Will I be working that afternoon train? I will not. I apologise to whoever ended up with my problem!

I was on an eastbound train from Colorado two days before Christmas. There was some kind of incident in another car around 11:00 that night — a dude got wasted and started threatening other passengers — and we had to make a stop so the local police could come and collect him.

After the delay, the conductor came over the speakers and announced that if anyone was feeling upset or shaken by the incident, one of the passengers had offered to play his guitar in the snack car, and anyone who was awake was welcome to come down and join in for a singalong. I’m always down for weird train activities, so I decided to grab my harmonica from my bag and head down.

There were about fifteen of us in the car, ranging in age from sixteen to mid-seventies and from all over the country. We sang every song we could think of that even kind of referenced a train. We were somewhere in rural Nebraska at that point, and nobody had cell service to look up lyrics, so at times I was pretty sure that we were making up more of the words than we actually remembered. The conductor came through after a while and offered to play a few songs, so the guy with the guitar handed it off and pulled out a mandolin, and my harmonica got passed around the group while one guy drummed along on his backpack.

After a while, the conductor got up and left, and then he came back with a copy of The Polar Express. He read it out loud to our absolutely captivated group of mostly adult travelers while the snow flew all around us in the night, and I swear that for a few minutes, our trip felt every bit as magical as the visit to Santa Claus in the story.

Sometime well after the snack car was supposed to have been vacated for the night, we capped things off with the most ridiculously earnest rendition of Don’t Stop Believing that has ever been performed and went our separate ways. I never saw anyone from our little makeshift band again, but I’ll always remember that weird, wonderful late-night celebration of Journey and the magic of winter travel that came about because some guy was a jacka** on a train.