The heat wave

We’re experiencing abundant blue skies these days. The mini heat wave is back. It’s as if summer is fighting the dawn of winter. I can’t let you arrive so soon, sunny days must have said, banishing rain and colder weather we feared we’d experience. We can’t complain. When summer wins, the sun shines copiously, we simply can’t complain.

But when the weather is hot outside, inside, in the underground tubes, which ferries us to work and back, it’s scorching. We enter sauna every time we travel. When the experience is over, we’re rendered with sweat soaked clothes.

Yesterday, travelling to work was even worst. I’d miscalculated the weather, donning a jacket. The trains were all running late, after encountering problems. That’s the thing with the Underground in London. When we need them to run smoothly, they invariably fail. We're either left stranded on the platform, or inside their non air-conditioned carriages.

I've also noticed the Underground makes us look like ants. In Central London, this is specially true. We come out of the holes, go to our offices to earn our living, and work done, we scurry back down the hole. Just like ants. We walk as fast as we can out in the open, as if a prey is lurking around, and only after we enter underground, in the escalator taking us down, we relax.

When I walked inside the platform today, I wasn’t relaxing. Delayed trains meant the crowd couldn’t be transported. They’d swelled and swelled, all hoping for the train to arrive. I knew I wasn’t in for a pleasant journey. I walked towards the far end of the platform, hoping for crowd to thin. No chance.

The train's arrival lead to a fracas. Everybody wanted to get on it. Nobody wanted to be late for work. But a single train wasn’t enough to accommodate all the waiting passengers. I sidled my way inside, and was sandwiched between a large, tall man, with his back towards me, and a woman.

Inside the carraige, it was so hot I felt like a potato inside an oven, waiting to be baked. In no time, my face was like a waterfall, cascading drops after drops of sweat. The train journey usual takes roughly twenty minutes. I wanted it over with in seconds.

Soon, a pungent, puckish odor from the woman’s armpit nearly fainted me. I wasn't furious, and instead, felt pity for her. From such an attractive lady, that was the last thing anybody would expect. Maybe the smell from my body was equally puckish. You never know how your body smells. All the perfumes and after shave actually doesn’t help when they mingle with so much sweat.

The further the train went, the closer the woman got pushed towards me. I was desperate. In every stop, more passengers wanted to hurled themselves inside. We got pushed and shoved. There wasn’t any space. Finally, when my stop arrived, a wave of passengers left the train. I realized, even before my day had begun, I need another shower.

Phew…I blame London Underground for our plight.