Commuting, And The Collapse Of Society.

I commute to university in the UK and before then to college, so I've done my fair bit. A lot of people moan about their commute but I honestly have no real problems with it. Something about it worries me, though, specifically about the lack of interaction between passengers.

Trains on the Southern networks are split down the middle as you'd expect, and are generally formed of two types of seat arrangements: two pairs of seats around a table, and a pair of seats alongside eachother, usually in some cramped space. Why am I telling you this? Well, I've noticed a pattern, and it seems strange to me. The first people to board the train generally go for seperate pairs of the seats in the cramped spaces, but one pair of seats each; once these are all half occupied, the groups of four are used; but again with only one passenger per pair. Only when there are no seats free that aren't adjacent to another passenger do people sit on the other seats. It's a super-efficient algorithm to ensure minimum adjacency, but... why?

And once you do sit down, you have to watch your gaze; eye contact is a complete no-no, as is any other form of contact. So you have to constantly shift between once boring mid-point in space to the other.

It seems strangers are determined to remain that way with eachother.

I got increasingly tired of this, so during my first year of Uni, I started breaking the rules. I'd always sit opposite someone, and, given that they'd likely be students too, talk to them about their studies or whatnot. Once you got them talking; it was ok. So these people aren't socially inept. It's just like they're programmed to avoid eachother.

There's a few other things about it that mystify me, but, first, do you identify with this? This is something that really perplexes me. I used to see a stranger as a conversation waiting to happen, but I'm increasingly regressing into the conventional commuting etiquette, and I get so annoyed with myself.

There are so many friendships waiting to happen...

People just don't like to talk to strangers. Isn't that how most people grew up? "Oh you shouldn't talk to strangers, something bad might happen to you". I am fairly sure when your grown up you still don't think something bad will happen to you but the feeling is still there. So maybe they are just nervous and they don't want to talk to each other.

There is also the polite thing. A lot of people don't want to be bugged so they avoid talking to each other to be polite. Like you said though, most people will talk to you if you start it. Its really the same any where. Also they probably have nothing to talk about. Idle chit chat is probably the worst thing to think of. Only real safe thing on a train is, "oh so where are you heading?". Unless you carrying something else that might give something away. The more they know the more likely they are to say something. Say if you walk down a street, most people won't stop to talk to you. But then you walk down a street while walking your dog, now people know you like dogs and some times people will stop "oh thats a nice dog, what kind is it?" or whatever. The same thing happens if your carrying anything. Having a backpack doesn't help but nearly anything else will increase your chance of having someone talk to you.

And really, isn't that what you were also doing? You tried talking to people who were likely students, because then you would both have something in common to talk about. Its a lot harder to talk to someone when you have no clue about who they are.

Yeah, I'm not going to attempt conversation without having a talking point (i.e. being a student). But saying that I have got it wrong on several occasions... in that they aren't students. Sometimes it leaves the conversation dead in the water, but sometimes they carry on to be fulfilling conversations regardless (I talked to the lead singer of a band called Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster on a train once thinking he was a student.. nicest guy you could ever meet plus I listen to a few of their songs on YouTube every now and then now, they're quite good.).

But a lot of trains I go are like 95% students so a lack of a talking point is no excuse. I guess it's just me.