Yellow

I’m sitting down in the subway on my way home, listening to a Coldplay’s song (Yellow) on the i-pod and minding my own business. This was right after class and I was heading home to have some lunch and do my homework before heading back out to the city to meet up with some people from school in the late afternoon. In the background I could hear the usual announcements that I can now repeat by heart: “nächste Haltestelle: "Am Hart” (next stop: Am Hart), “bitte zurückbleiben” (please stay inside). Then the doors close and the subway takes off. At some point during my journey there was a longer announcement which I did not pay any attention to as I was very much into the song. All of a sudden I see that everyone, absolutely everyone, but me gets off at that station and stands right outside the train without going anywhere. I looked at a guy who was riding on my same cart and he signaled that I should get off the train. It was at that very moment that I realized what the longer announcement was all about. I had heard that announcement before. For some reason my train was not going to continue to the final stop and all of us passengers were to get off at this station and wait for the next train to continue on our way. I got up as quickly as I could and ran to the door; but the doors closed on me. And then I heard that sound machines make when they are turned off. I tried to open the door but no luck. I ran to the next door: again no luck. They wouldn’t open. I looked at the people standing outside and gave them that “Y ahora quien podra defenderme?”-look (“What do I do now?”). Of course most of them were staring back at me. We didn’t know what do: laugh, cry, and/or scream. I was laughing because I couldn’t believe this was happening. My fear was that my train was no longer in service for that day and would be taken, until the next day, to some sort of dark, dirty and isolated parking lot for trains not in service. And the problem is that the cell phones have no reception once you enter the subway system. So there was no way for me to call anyone for help. I also looked at the windows but they were way toooo small for me to try to get out of the cart that route. I didn’t know what to do. Thank God some of the people standing outside were more concerned about what was truly happening to me than about laughing at what was happening to me. One lady approached the window and started to point at it. The only thing I was able to hear was the word red. So I looked around trying to identify what she was pointing at and finally saw a red handle. I pointed at it, she said yes. It was the emergency/alarm handle. But don’t worry. I did not pull it as I realized on-time what it was. I finally understood I needed to push a button which ended up being a call button. But of course, no one answered. So I gave up and decided to wait and just let things be. Luckily the driver showed up shortly afterwards and opened the door for me. Apparently, when they are going to take a train out of service like this they go cart after cart making sure there are no clueless people like me who stayed behind. I got out of the cart, thanked the people who helped me, laughed a little with the others and waited for the next train.