I spend
so much time of public transport and even more time running to catch it!
I know
it may seem like a weird thing to blog about but the amount of time I spend on
Stockholm’s public transport is sort of insane! I take a bus to school every
day, if I want to go into the city I catch a bus then either the commuter train
called the pendeltåg or the underground called the tunnelbana, and if I want to
get to my contact families house I take a bus then two trains which takes
around one hour!
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| Snowy train station |
Using
the public transport gives me an idea of how big this city really is. When it
takes you over an hour to get where you are going and you have to change trains
once or twice, and catch one or two buses you start to notice that you are in a
big city! Sometimes it feels a bit surreal to be sitting on trains watching Stockholm
flash by. I am still not that used to seeing a wonderful and beautiful old city
outside of the train window. It also feels a bit strange to say to someone ‘I’ll
just jump on the next train and I’ll be there!’ Trains are still such a novelty
for me, so hopping on and off trains is such a fun, new and exciting thing for
me to do that I could do it all day!
 |
| A rare empty train! |
Stockholm’s
public transport is almost always busy. It is amazing if you see an empty train
or hop on an empty bus! One thing that I think will always amaze me about Sweden
is that if you are on a busy train or bus and you have an empty seat next to
you almost always no one will sit next to you. Some people go out of their way
to stop someone sitting next to them by sitting on the edge seat and putting
their bag on the other! You can hop on a bus with almost half of its seats free
and have to stand! Madness!
In New
Zealand we say thank you to the bus driver when we get off the bus. Do not do
this in Sweden! It is not the done thing and I feel so rude getting off the bus
and not saying thanks to the driver. I
have caught myself out quite a few times almost saying it!
I have
no idea how I would be able to live in this city without all of its transport
or if I lost my bus/train card. I don’t know what I would do!
