all aboard!

When the people started pushing, I thought, "oh good, there are some officials who will stop all the shoving." then to my utter surprise, they started shoving even harder.

I still can't believe it. How hot and cramped it must be in that train.

I lived in Tokyo for a year, and my morning commute for a couple stations looked like that almost every day. It's not too bad, so long as you're not the one being pushed. And so long as the train doesn't sit on the tracks, leaving you crammed in there with nowhere to go.

One of our instructors got it bad, though, his commute was even busier. A couple times it was so packed and the crowd pressed against him so tight that his feet weren't even touching the ground. Another time he was pressed against one of the metal poles and ended up with a cracked rib.

That said, even with the crowds the train system is one of the things I miss most about Japan.

...the crazy train.