Dreaded N.Y.C. Transit

Thursday night I took the train home from work as I always do, and as always, asked that I be delivered safely to my family. Well, the going that night was such that I thought some of the peril I witnessed on the train may have impeded that wish. Upon the car that I normally take pulling in front of me in the station, I noticed three people in the usual seats that I sit acting rather haphazardly, leaning and gesturing aggressively. When entering the train I made haste to the opposite direction of the acrimonious noise they propelled for all to hear. After listening to what anyone with any sense could decipher was the babble of drunk people, I settled in for the ride with the knowledge that though drunk persons were on board my car it would not effect me.

Others on my car, however, were intrigued by the spectacle of drunk people on their train and wanted to take in all their antics, and trust, their were quite a few. I have seen much on The NYC Transit so what was going on was nothing new, but I guess to the guy sitting a seat from me it was. He stared at them so much that they asked him why he was staring. He then averted his gaze, but when one of the woman of the group kept loudly insisting that she had to relieve herself and took measures to do so between the two cars of our moving train with an assist from the other woman who stood steadfastly in front of the windows of the door of the car to block anyone's view of her friend, he started to stare again. Why, oh why did he do that? The friend acting as a shield to the disgusting act her friend was performing asked the guy, again, what he was staring at and why. When the woman performing the lewd act finished and came into the car pulling up her pants, she was told by her friends that the same man who stared before was staring at her again while she was performing the act, and so she ran up to him, and after being egged on by the members of her party, slapped the total stranger for doing something he has every right to do considering the spectacle presented to him, and did so four times in the face, hard. Her companions, screaming support, laughed hysterically. The occupants of te car including myself, were horrified as we did not know what to do. The man, a Latino, kept saying he did not speak English which seemed to infuriated said vile group of persons to a frenzy. He finally stopped talking which in turn seemed to satiate the group into leaving him alone. Finally, thankfully, their stop came and they proceeded off the train.

Upon their departure many on the train exhaled. Some laughed, and questioned the man as to why he didn't fight. One guy actually said, "Poppi, why you let that girl do that to you. I would a choked that B, yo!!! Word!" The ride was surreal, to say the least. The man, now amazingly able to speak English, said he didn't want trouble. From this I assumed that the man perhaps was here in The States illegally and as such did not want to do something or have something done to him that would ultimately involve police and they then finding out his dilemma.

I was sitting one seat away from this man and felt the impassioned yearning that was his to have this terrible episode in his life stop. I wanted to do something to help him make that happen, but also wanted to go home to my family. To confront or not confront three drunk persons about their abuse of a small man who himself took no measures to stop the abuse was a dilemma. It has always been a question of mine of what I would do in similar situations, and seeing that no one else reacted, even the person being abused, I continue to ponder about my decision though, ultimately, I know I did the right thing that Thursday night. I did not becoming involved in a fight that wasn't mine to fight.

I need to look into purchasing a car.