Tube Traveller Tales: What's your story?

My 50 minute commute to work requires at least 25 minutes tube journey. One day I stopped where I was sitting (luckily this didn't require a huge change in momentum...) and looked at the situation. What a strange and rather comical situation I find myself in. Same time and place every morning, sharing this cramped metal tube that is shooting through tunnels deep under ground like a futuristic mole colony with many of the same faces day after day. In this strange and slightly romantic way, our lives which up until now have been so separate, intersect quite physically, sharing the space and air we breathe. The intimacy of this shared personal routine is not dissimilar from sharing a bathroom sink with a partner or flatmate. Each doing their own teeth but sharing a most intimate ritual.

My curiosity thus piqued about the not-so-strange strangers around me, I started to wonder about their life stories and about what more their was to them than just this face sitting across from me. I started to map out the timelines and stories of the people sitting around me, at first just guessing and then eventually starting conversations and asking them more about themselves.

It's an incredible honour to make visible the invisible connections that surround us wherever we go.

I hope you enjoy the stories.

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