People in big cities are too busy to notice the other people around them. Guilty as charged.
I spend on average three hours a day on public transport and very rarely notice what happens around me during this time. On the occasions when I did look up from my book or newspaper and saw a pregnant lady or older person, someone who was physically less able to stand, on their feet rather than sitting I have felt guilty and chastised myself for not checking the passengers that have stepped into the tube carriage at the last stop. I never sit in the priority seats for this reason. People seldom ask for a seat even if they legitimately could because to cause a fuss over themselves was just unthinkable.
I cannot think of an occasion when I have regretted being attentive to what goes on around me. One such occasion provided the name for this blog.
My New Year's resolution was to take more of an interest in what happens on my daily travels and to record this in a blog. Keeping records provides an incentive to keep looking. Of course the blog needed a name and one event, a few years back, while on a flight home with my sister, gave me the name. She had insisted on a window seat by the wings at check-in and been staring out of the window for a while when I asked her what she was looking at. At the time my clever little sister was learning to design and build aeroplanes, and she had been looking at the flaps on the wings. She took the opportunity to give me a crash course on why aeroplanes can fly- revisions for the then upcoming January exams, I guess- and described her vision of a simplified aeroplane fuselage. The image stuck and is all I can think of every time I take a plane.
I spend on average three hours a day on public transport and very rarely notice what happens around me during this time. On the occasions when I did look up from my book or newspaper and saw a pregnant lady or older person, someone who was physically less able to stand, on their feet rather than sitting I have felt guilty and chastised myself for not checking the passengers that have stepped into the tube carriage at the last stop. I never sit in the priority seats for this reason. People seldom ask for a seat even if they legitimately could because to cause a fuss over themselves was just unthinkable.
I cannot think of an occasion when I have regretted being attentive to what goes on around me. One such occasion provided the name for this blog.
My New Year's resolution was to take more of an interest in what happens on my daily travels and to record this in a blog. Keeping records provides an incentive to keep looking. Of course the blog needed a name and one event, a few years back, while on a flight home with my sister, gave me the name. She had insisted on a window seat by the wings at check-in and been staring out of the window for a while when I asked her what she was looking at. At the time my clever little sister was learning to design and build aeroplanes, and she had been looking at the flaps on the wings. She took the opportunity to give me a crash course on why aeroplanes can fly- revisions for the then upcoming January exams, I guess- and described her vision of a simplified aeroplane fuselage. The image stuck and is all I can think of every time I take a plane.
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