Something’s Not – Quite – Right
After having ice-cream with some colleagues after work yesterday at Central Silom (rum raisin – YUM!) and enjoying the view of others being caught in a torrential downpour, I caught the sky train home to Ratchatewi. This would normally require me to change trains at Siam but something stranage happened… something that had never happened before…
Maybe it was because I was too busy chatting with my friends who were heading to MBK to hear an announcement that I had no idea what was going on, assuming there was an announcement.
When I stepped off the train my brain was instantly yelling at me that something was wrong. Things weren’t in the place they normally were and it wasn’t just the dust bin – we’re talking shopping complexes people!
I turned around and watched as the train I had just stepped off zipped from the station, still trying to make sense of the revereso world I had stepped into and decided that the next train that stopped on the ‘normal’ side (ie not the reverso world side) was for me.
In no time (less than 60 seconds actually), the doors for the next train were opening and I stepped on. In the ten seconds I spent waiting for the train to leave a Thai woman was asking me if the train went to Mo Chit (the way I wanted it to go):
Woman: Does this train go to Mo Chit?
Me: I don’t know, but I hope so!
Woman: (puzzled look)
Me: I think it does.
Woman: (smiles and resumes puzzled look)
(doors close with woman standing on platform)
Me: Ok, Bye!
I tried!
Anyway, When I got off the train at Ratchatewi I waited until the train pulled away to see my friends standing on the other side with very confused expressions on their faces.
Them: What happened?!?
Me: I dunno, but there’s loads of people waiting to go where you’re going!
Them: We didn’t even know it could change tracks like that!
Me: Oh well, have fun – see ya!
With that, my reverso world righted itself.
I’m not sure I managed to follow that…
You know… the train that would normally head to MBK, didn’t. It went off to Mo Chit instead – weird!
That happened to me once too. When the car switched tracks the lights went out for a couple of seconds as the train found a new power supply. It was kind of eerie, coasting silently in the dark, but as no one else seemed to betray any kind of alarm, I followed suit and pretended like this happened all the time.
And, apparently, it seems it does. I just can’t figure out why. Perhaps it’s some kind of subtle anti-MBK gesture?
the OTP (Office for Transportation Planning?) are trying to reroute the BTS lines to have a North-South and East-West configuration. I don’t know why other than that it appears it is easier to draw a north-south and east-west config compared to the current one.
The OTP is the same government body that is trying to purchase the skytrain and refusing to allow it to press on with the taksin and samrong extensions.