Punctuality!

I have lived in England more than 7 years now and I have always admired its transport timetable. Time to time that there are delays but it is neither often nor important. My journeys to work have been safe and sound almost everyday. Therefore when other people kept telling me about their horrible journeys to and from work, I always thought to myself that they are exaggerating!

It was only yesterday that I was talking to my friends about it and how much I appreciate the culture of punctuality in every single cell of this society.

But today was one of those days! I can tell you that anything that could possibly go wrong went wrong! This morning. I decided to take the late train because I was too lazy to wake up early. I went to the station and the train came on time. After few stops, I got off to change my train. The next train was only few minutes late. I started to calculate how late I would be to work. I decided that it will be fine and I will still be at work in time. I got off the train to take my last transport to work, which was a double Decker bus. As I was sitting on the bus, I realised that the driver missed a turn. It was too late when he realised it himself!! He had to go round and round to find out how he could go back to the same route! His radio was on and he had to report to “the centre” why he was out of his main route and he was being guided. Again I started to calculate in my mind how long this delay would be and if I needed to call the office and let them know that I would be late, but I decided against it! I only had one stop left to reach my destination, unlike some of the passengers, I was happy that my journey was going to end soon and I was kind of celebrating in my mind that I would be getting off this bus in no time, I was floating in these thoughts when all of a sudden the driver’s voice took me from heaven and brought me back to earth! The bus was broken down, it was announced, and we had to leave the bus and wait for the next one, which would be arriving in 5 minutes! I felt so miserable having to walk all the way down to the office and more miserable having to call the office and letting my manager know that I was going to be late and then him asking me to go and explain what the delay was about! Anyway, to cut it short I got to work with only 35 minutes and 43 seconds delay!
In the afternoon when I was coming back home, my bus driver was fine and an expert in his job. There were no “wheels going round and round”. The First train came on time. Things were looking good and I was happy that in 15 minutes I would be home and resting my feet after a very busy day running up and down in the office and dealing with more than 20 clients! As soon as the train came I jumped into the train and just two stops before I got off, the train stopped. There were no announcements from the driver to tell us what was going on and why we were not moving. After 15 minutes, he started speaking to us and apologising but he still couldn’t get any information on why the train had to sit outside the station! After ten minutes he said that there was a train in front of us that was broken down and as soon as they move it, we will be able to carry on! Thank God it was eventually moved and we could continue our adventurous journey home! By the time I arrived home, I was 59 minutes and 23 seconds later than usual, but the good thing is that my manager at home didn’t question why I was late; he was just concerned that I was too tired!

"You may delay, but time will not."

Franklin, Benjamin