Connected

Trains connect places: major cities; small towns; rural villages, allowing people to travel between these places. A common theme I see on the trains is that people want to be connected. Connected not only by the rail network, but by the internet and mobile networks. I see so many people passing the commuting time on their phones. Emailing, texting, browsing the web, chatting on Facebook and just generally keeping in touch.

It's good for me, because people don't bat an eyelid when they see me holding my phone up in front of them, there's so many others doing it too.....

I can even get away with twisting about in my seat to get that perfect picture

They are usually so engrossed in what they are doing it's like I (and all the other commuters) are invisible. They are in their own little mobile world

This is something I can use to my advantage and get a really close beautiful shot, I can take my time to wait until the moving light is perfect, capture that unexpected smile as they read something funny

And there's just so many people on phones that it doesn't take long for me to get plenty of photos - I can already sense a second post about the connected commuters

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The Extended Office

It seems in these hard economic times our employers want more and more out of us so that they don't have to employ more people. I often see people working on the train, either on laptops or with notebooks out furiously scribbling away.





Indeed I am often guilty of this too. I regularly sort out my emails or finish off a document I'm working on the train. And why not? It's dead time anyway. I have a 40 minute journey each way. Outlook is always telling me my mailbox is almost full so I have over an hour of uninterrupted filing time. But should I do this day in, day out? I already do my contracted 37.5 hours in the office, there just isn't enough hours in the week to get everything I'm supposed to be doing done!


I wonder if all these other 'Train Workers' feel the same? Some probably enjoy it, uninterrupted time to release the stress a bit, some may claim the time back, finishing early or getting overtime. I guess some people are just workaholics.




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Waiting

Sometimes I wonder just how much of my life is wasted waiting. Especially waiting for busses and trains. Then if you add up all the time others spend waiting for public transport too, I'm sure the nation must wait years for delayed trains, no-show busses, slow trams....


I find when I'm waiting I start looking around at everyone else who's waiting, I love people watching. I reckon I'm not the only one.



Waiting with a group of friends is not so bad, things seem to happen faster if you've got someone to talk too. There's always groups of teenagers at the bus station, waiting to get home or just sometimes hanging around. Usually being noisy, annoying. As I'm getting older I find I'm quicker to judge teenagers, finding them disrespectful, assuming they'll be dishonest. This girl caught my eye; pretty, confident, at ease around her peers. She seemed cocky, seemed to be in charge. But then she blew me away - they got on my bus and were sat near me, a bit rowdy, a bit of swearing and cajoling each other. Then when I made to get up I had left my purse on the seat, I hadn't even realised that I didn't put it back in my bag. In a very kind, very sweet voice she got my attention and told me my purse was on the seat, restoring my faith in humanity and teenagers!



Boredom is a common feature among commuters, I'm noticing the signs of boredom more and more, stoney faces, arms crossed, vacant staring. People who are clearly travelling together but have ran out of things to say to each other.


Then there's the people who can't stay still when they are bored, some pace up and down, some tap out annoying little tunes on the metal arm rests of seats, some jiggle their knees up and down. This chap seemed to be in constant motion, sitting back then leaning forward, then raising his feet off the floor, then sitting back again. It was quite amusing to watch.




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All images are owned by Nicola Dawes unless otherwise stated

A new journey

I have discovered through my involvement in a daily photo photo challenge, that I love street photography and photographing people, especially when they don't know and are just going about their daily lives. I watched the BBC documentary on Vivian Maier the other night and felt really inspired to do more street photography. She had taken thousands of photographs of people and I loved them. I then realised that I have a rich source of interesting (and unsuspecting) people around me everyday on the train and at the train stations, sometimes on the bus. Those, like me, on their daily commute to work, or a day out somewhere and it got me thinking, this could be a little project, snapping people on their daily commute.



It's not as simple as just taking pictures of everyone you see, it's got to be interesting. The composition has to be good. The lighting has to be right. I like the picture above because this man looks wistful, maybe contemplating the day ahead. But what really struck me was the size of his hands!

I see interesting faces everyday, interesting clothes, people asleep, people working, or like this young man, preparing for an interview (I hope he did well)



One thing that I imagine will appear in many of these photographs is mobile technology. Phones, tablets, electronic books, people wired for sound. These three were all on their phones, like many on the daily commute.



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All images are owned by Nicola Dawes unless otherwise stated