The Longest Night of My Life

Howdy ladies and gentlemen. Today I wish to tell you another dramatic tale from my life journeys. Now I know I tend to talk about a lot of dramatic stuff on blog from love to friendship and the hardships of life especially with recent posts like “Living The Rough Days” and “A Day of Endurance“. But From Saturday night into early Sunday morning I went through the definition of a travelling nightmare and I feel compelled to tell my story on the internet just because of how ridiculous it was.

Travelling around the UK normally isn’t hard, but sometimes it can be one of the most frustrating experiences ever.

So let’s go back to the beginning. Basically I was meant to be working as a bar steward at the Standon Calling music festival. So I had to travel from Luton to Standon by coach, that part went well, and I had a fairly good day at work and getting to know people even if some of it was very tedious… The problems however began when I tried to get home.

I finished my shift at 11pm and had to make it back to the bus stop from the festival site. It was almost impossible to make it back to the main road because I was running on a narrow road in the forest, I had to use the light on my phone to make it back. So then I got to the bus stop and waited for my coach to take be back to Luton, but it never arrived. The National Express website lied to me a few days beforehand. So there I was in a town I barely knew, with no means of travelling home and a phone low battery. I was in the shit.

Bloody National Express, the website is so questionable and it likes to give out false information!

So then I attempted to walk down an unknown path but there didn’t look like there was any civilization anywhere, it was at this point where I started to panic and the chorus to Alexisonfire’s “Crisis” really started to sink in: I feel like this could be the end, And there’s not sign of hope, We’ve got a crisis on our hands.

Luckily I ran into a man on the same path who was kind enough to help me out, The man not only called someone to get a local taxi number, but he even called the number and sorted me a place to be picked up from. He was truly a good Samaritan who saved my life and is prove that there are some good people in this world. 🙂

After waiting a few minutes after midnight the taxi came to pick me up and take me to Ware train station (I went there because there was meant to be a train there I could get to get me back to Luton). I got to Ware and the town was pretty barren, so I went to the train station and waited for the train. Besides the one train heading in the opposite direction my actual train never arrived, typical shit for me. I then bought a burger and chips and proceeded to walk around Ware town, lost and looking for a local cab service, but I couldn’t see one anywhere. There really wasn’t much in the way of civilization and the only people around were drunk people, after around an hour of walking around in circles I asked someone if there was a place to get taxis and he pointed out a spot behind the train station (trust the taxis area to be behind the place I first started at!).

So I waited at this place, but it technically wasn’t a taxi place, it was just a point where taxis drive by and you have to be lucky to catch their attention as they move by. I waited for around 30-40 minutes while some drunk people got taxis before me and then sat there as there was a lack of taxis for around 30 minutes. After that I said fuck it and started walking around town again and it was at this point I thought I was actually gonna stranded there until morning, I totally thinking of the song “Stranded” by Alien Ant Farm. While this was going on I was texting my sister on my dying phone as she was telling me what my options were (at this point I was just waiting for my phone to die). I eventually came back to the taxi spot again and I got talking to these 3 people who were heading towards London, one of which was a very drunk lady who asked me what race I was when she could clearly see that I was a black guy! It was ridiculous but hilarious at the same time.

Dunno what Ware is like in the daytime but at night the place is practically a ghost town yo.

After that I luckily got a taxi that would take me to Luton if I gave him £60 upfront, it was a hefty price but at this point I just wanted to get home so I paid the guy and I was FINALLY on my way home. While in the cab I found out that the cab man was from Luton and the same area too so he said he’d drop nearby, what a legend! The radio was on in the background and the song “I’m Still Standing” by Elton John came on and felt that was a fitting song as after all my dramas I was still emotionally intact and still ready to keep going. I got back into Luton around 2:50am and walked home with a bit of Coheed and Cambria’s “Welcome Home“, an appropriate song considering I just gotten back to my home town and was heading back to my house. When I got home just after 3am I had a short chat with my sister and then crashed out.

It seems like for every travel journey that I get right, there are at least a few that go horribly wrong. I mean look at my history:

• At New Years 2011/12 me and my mates got stranded in St Albans after coming from London and had to haggle with a taxi man to get us back to Luton.
• I got lost in Sheffield on the other side of town and had to walk and had to walk around 7 miles back to my uni accommodation
• I had to travel 4 hours from Sheffield to Luton where my ticket got denied in Derby, had to buy a new one, travel to London, buy another ticket and then get back home
• Or the time I got my train delayed by almost an hour when heading to London

And then there’s a good few occasions when I’ve been lost or had to deal with travelling delays. Now I can add this recent adventure from Standon/Ware to my collection. And to think if I hadn’t run into that man in Standon or got that specific taxi in Ware I basically would have been fucked, man life is a frigging random adventure yo!

I seriously can’t understand why this stupid shit keeps happening to me but it seems like for whatever reason life wants to test me and make me suffer. Well what I’ve taken away from this experience is 1) Don’t trust travel information on the internet. 2) I doubt I’ll ever do coach travelling in the near future. And 3) Never go to a town that doesn’t have a train station!

Well that’s it for another life journal experience I’ve relayed upon you lot. Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading about my dramas and all that jazz and feel free to comment too. Until the next time peeps, laters. 😀