So I took a train to Amsterdam this morning, where I would rendezvous with some foreign investment personnel and interview some pharma people for a possible article. I booked a 30-euro ticket last night for a 2.5-hour trip from Brussels to central station (with that all-important stop in Antwerp).<\/p>\n
Half the seats on the trains face “forward’ and the other face “backward,” so that 50% face forward either direction the car is traveling. So I sat in the middle row, with a set of seats facing me, so that I’d have more leg room than in a seat that faces the back of another row.<\/p>\n
Pretty empty train; comfyish seat. The guy in the row behind me spilled his coffee, but I noticed in time and lifted my bag from the floor so it wouldn’t get wet.<\/p>\n
Two stops into the trip, leaving Brussels, a bunch of passengers boarded. This included pair of Thai women with fake boobs and rock-hard bodies. They decided to sit in the two seats facing me, and began groping each other. I smiled, laughed, went back to reading Stephenson and listening to the iPod. They kept trying to catch my eye, every time that I looked up to check out the landscape. (For the record, I got to see the sun for a 2-minute stretch outside of Brussels. This marks the first time since Saturday that I’ve seen the sun. I’d go on a kill-spree if I had to live with that weather.)<\/p>\n
The women continued to flirt with each other and stare at me, which made me laugh. Everytime a man would walk through our car, they’d do the same thing.<\/p>\n
At Rotterdam, they got off the train, and the football fans (Island Defenders) who had boarded a few stops earlier congregated in my row, so they could all hang out, facing each other, and drink some beers.<\/p>\n
Oh, not just<\/em> drink some beers. One of them also broke out a bag of weed and started rolling a massive joint; he was only stopped from lighting up when one of his compatriots pointed to the “no smoking” sign on the window.<\/p>\n So that was my morning: Thai prostitutes and soccer fans rolling a bone on the commuter train. It’s going to be an interesting two days . . .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" So I took a train to Amsterdam this morning, where I would rendezvous with some foreign investment personnel and interview some pharma people for a possible article. I booked a 30-euro ticket last night for a 2.5-hour trip from Brussels to central station (with that all-important stop in Antwerp). Half the seats on the trains … <\/p>\n