Only in a city like New York can something as innocent as a baby stroller become a weapon of choice. They serve the same purpose of a machete for a man who works in the fields. I strongly believe that 10 New York moms pushing their strollers could’ve opened their way across the Panamanian jungle much faster than the poor workers who actually accomplished the task of building the Panama Canal many years ago.
It’s summer, and in spite of knowing that I might have to chop off one toe if it ever touches the subway floor, I decide to wear flipflops. And that’s when I see her: psycho-mom charging her way towards me with her Maclaren Quest Sport 2008 Stroller in Charcoal and Silver, featuring foot-operated anti-lock brakes, 4-wheel independent suspension and Reversible Handlebar for City & Rough Terrain.
I barely have time to react. All I hear is the “clooomp, cloooomp” as the wheels go over my right and left foot. Psycho-mom keeps on rolling just like Proud Mary, never even looking back at me. “Excuse me, I have a stroller” is all I hear as people in front of me move away in panic.
Why do moms who decide to ride the subway carrying a stroller containing a diaper bag, bottles of water, formula, fruit juice, a small plastic container with cereal, 2 stuffed toys, one toy not very stuffed, shopping bags from Century 21, Payless Shoes, the ubiquitous Duane Reade bag containing God knows what, oh… and a baby somewhere in there, think they deserve more than any other mortal riding the subway? They use those strollers just as Moses used his hands to part the Red Sea.
Finally, I manage to get into an extremely crowded train. I do this thanks to the fact that I lost a couple of pounds and just had a haircut. Otherwise, I would’ve never been able to squeeze into such a tight space. Just before the doors close, psycho-mom resurfaces, charging towards the train with her stroller. She yells at me: “Excuse me, I have a stroller!” Knowing that there’s absolutely no place for me to move, I look down at her stroller then look back at her face, smile one of my biggest and whitest smiles and tell her: “Oh, thanks, but I don’t think that’s big enough for me. I’ll just stand for now. Thanks for the offer, though.” She just stays there in front of me in total shock, and the doors close. As the train begins to move, I mouth the words “thank you!” and wave goodbye at her.
I manage to hear a “Hahaha, good going, man!” from the guy who I believe owns the elbow that’s parked right next to my cheek.
∞∞∞
Today is one of those days you fear when you look forward to the summer in NYC. Along days of dry warm weather, sidewalk brunches and semi-naked people, there are the days when then city is captured under a dense humidity cloud and you have to descend to a clammy subway platform. This is what hell must feel like, but with a more efficient service and a better public announcement system, I am sure.
Today’s experience is particularly enhanced by a large woman carrying an also large bucket of fried chicken. It’s a total olfactory feast. She drags herself into the car and seats across from me. You can almost see the smell of the fried chicken like a cloud suspended in the air on top of her. As the train begins to move, she also begins to swing sideways and finally collapses face down on the floor. Her chicken gets a chance to fly again, as a couple of chicken wings, extra crispy, land on my lap. I move my head quickly enough to avoid the drumstick that gets stuck in the hair of the woman sitting behind me.
We all stand there looking down at the passed out woman, trying to figure out what to do. Finally, somebody decides to raise her head and she opens her eyes. In this very moment, the door between cars opens and I hear someone who yells “Omelets! Omelets!” with a very thick Caribbean accent.
All I can think is that I finally know the answer one of the most intriguing questions in mankind history: The chicken came first… then the egg!
The man walks by us and I can see it’s not omelets he offers but umbrellas. He stops when he sees the woman on the floor, looks at her and runs the other way, running away… like a chicken.
∞∞∞
Everybody must be having a really hard time going back to work today after a long weekend – President’s day. In addition to the 2 or 3 semi-sleeping people with white wires hanging from their ears (Somehow the iPods feel today like an IV at a hospital – a life support device), there’s a black man in his ghetto, hip-hop, oversized uniform watching a portable DVD player. He is so concentrated on the screen that he misses his stop, so he just yells “shit!”, gets up and paces sideways next to the closed door, like a caged animal. And like a caged animal, he jumps out the moment we reach the next station and the door opens, hitting everybody on his way, dropping the DVD player and breaking it. I can hear another “shiiiiiiiiiiiit!” coming from the station as the doors close.
Next to me, an older man reads a very old edition of “War and Peace” and smiles peacefully. Maybe it’s a sign of the peace he finds in the subway ride compared to the urban war going on up on the surface of the city, everybody’s day-to-day battles against a mundane and tedious life.
Another guy who looks like an Italian-American contractor reads the New York Post and swears. He swears with a thick accent, so thick I don’t understand whether he said “shit!” or “fuck!” It sounded something like “shiuck!”. Next to him, 2 thin Asian tourists try to make some sense of a subway map. They ask something to the Italian guy but he doesn’t understand. They older man reading War and Peace talks to them in Japanese. They seem grateful. This is what I hear:
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“Rocket fuelling??”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“Yes, yes. Fuelling Center!”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“Big Rocket fuelling”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“Ro-cke-fe-ller Center!”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“No Rocketfuelling Center?”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“No rocket?”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese, rocket taking off sound)
“Theater?”
(unintellible -to me- Japanese)
“ahhhhhhhh”
“ohhhhhhhh”
I’m glad our “War and Peace” reader is an expert on all the rocket-fuelling stations we have in Manhattan.
∞∞∞
Karma is defined as the sum of a person’s actions in the past, viewed as deciding his/her fate in the future. This could also be applied to a country, which is, after all, a very large group of people.
It is a historic fact that Mexico lost a big part of its territory to the US. So now, New York has to pay part of this karma by putting up with the Bamba Karma. Yes, the Bamba Karma is a new form of terrorism, worse than suicide attacks or chemical weapons: it’s musical terrorism.
It comes when you least expect it, and it works like this: The terrorists, usually disguised as a trio and armed with an accordion and big charro hats, come in the subway car where you are and play an endless rendition of La Bamba:
“Para bailar la bamba, para bailar la bamba, arriba, arriba”. That’s all they sing. Nothing more. An endless loop designed to drill into your head and stay there.
They demand money for this. They know we are trapped in the subway car and we have nowhere to run. “Para bailar la bamba, para bailar la bamba, arriba, arriba”. They will find which train you are in, and right before its doors close, jump right in. With faces full of sadness that contradict how cheery this song originally was, they begin: “Para bailar la bamba, para bailar la bamba, arriba, arriba”.
“Arriba, arriba”, that’s were I want to run to right now. Unfortunately the doors are closed and I am trapped for now, abajo, abajo.
They got you now: The Bamba will be stuck in your head for the rest of the day.
∞∞∞
