Sleeping on the Subway

Don’t do it. Don’t ever, ever do it. I’m going to make the case for why it is really bad for people sleeping on the subway. That’s it, this post is over. Thank you. Lol, nah, I’m just kidding y’all. Let’s elaborate then, shall we?

Recently, a friend of mine that shall remain unnamed, experienced a pretty crappy day in NYC. What happened to her was something that could (and has) easily happened to the best of us, on our best day! My friend was robbed blind while riding in the subway and sleeping on trains!

Why did this happen? Well, because like many of us often do with our busy, hectic schedules, late nights, being overworked and overplayed, she innocently nodded off and fell asleep in the train.

Sometime ago I wrote a piece entitled “New Yorkers are not bad!” I still stand by that claim! Although I’ll be the first to tell you that you can have the whole gamut of experiences here! You can get robbed at gun point, get your laundry detergent stolen after one minute away, or be saved from getting raped by good conscience gang bangers! You’ll find it all here, and there is no question that there are very bad people among us, but there are also many good people around too.

New Yorkers are not bad people; you’ll find that most of us are inherently good people. Though my unnamed friend may not agree at the moment. The thing that New York City is, is a very crowded city. A city that has millionaires and homeless people riding the subway system at the same time. The difference in money and poverty that you find here is astounding. This means that yes, inevitably with so many people in the mix; some bad apples will make their way into the bunch. Law of numbers. The greater the volume, the more the good AND the bad people you will encounter. Mind you, the money doesn’t determine whether a person is good or bad, it is just a point of reference to illustrate how much diversity there is here.

So yes, there are some truly bad people here, there are good people, and then there are those that are not really bad, but they sit at the edge of opportunity. They don’t want to harm you; they won’t actively seek to take advantage of you, but they sure as hell can’t resist a sleepy passenger, a drunk party goer, or someone who is simply unaware. Those people just present too beautiful a temptation to these “borderline bad” individuals.

I can’t say for sure what happened here, but I can tell you that she did not encounter a truly bad criminal. If that were the case, maybe we’d be reading about her in a newspaper or on the news. Thankfully, all they took were material things that can be replaced. At the end of the day, the take away here is to try to stay awake on the train, especially if the train is empty, its late, etc. You have a “better” chance of making it to your destination with everything if you fall asleep during rush hour than you would if it’s late or otherwise an empty train car.

One of my techniques to stay awake, especially when I’m very tired is to make sure that I stand instead of sitting down. It’s easy to nod off sitting down; I do it all the time. However, I only sit down, if ever, during times where the train is packed, and I don’t sit by easy places to snatch your property. For instance, sitting by the door, makes you a super easy target. Watch this video clip below.

That guy was far from asleep, in fact, he was wide awake and very animated. However, he still got jacked for his beats. Why? Positioning and being unaware. That thief would never get that close to me on such an empty train, I would have moved away or made some form of contact. This is what I mentioned before, the unaware individual. Bottom line, you gotta be careful on the train and don’t present an easy target. Stay awake my friends, stay awake and stay in possession of your belongings.