Please, Smell the Roses, But Not on the Escalator

Ever felt like one of the crowd? If you've ever been trapped in a metro station when all of the escalators break down at once, you probably have. It's unreasonable to expect the metro women to do anything as drastic as leaping out of their hiding places and using their red caps to direct traffic until the problem has been solved, of course, but utter inertia is not much of an answer, either.


Standing among hundreds and hundreds of your fellow lemmingi in such a situation, shuffling and pushing but essentially keeping all of your inner terror and sweaty desperation to yourself, it's hard to know what everyone around you is thinking. Everyone stops talking. A hypnotic hush descends over the station. Shuffle, push, shuffle, push. In 10 minutes or so it'll be their turn to walk down the wounded escalator, and they'll do it in a fairly relaxed manner. No hurry in the world. This, like all things, will come to an end.


A similar scenario elsewhere in the world has one of two possible conclusions. One, level-headed municipal professionals trained to deal with just such emergencies leap out of their hiding places and guide the angry hordes to safety. Two, the professionals don't make it in time and the angry hordes trample each other to death trying to force their way to the front of the line. Some people just don't feel like they've got time to wait around, especially if it entails anything as unsettling as being uncomfortably close to a number of people they've never seen before in their life.


That reckless desire to keep things moving apace can drive some foreigners crazy in Russia, where people run to catch the trolleybus or to get out of the way of oncoming cars, but not for much else. There's something to be said for stopping to smell the roses, or, more prosaically, for walking slowly because you're tired or because where you're headed is not all that exciting in the first place. But there's also something to be said for having a little spring in your step. Putting all that boring diplomacy aside, there's a basic truth in life: There are people who walk fast and people who don't, and neither gets along with the other.


Fast people who get frustrated by slow people are the classic example. In Russia, however, it's just as often the case that people take offense at what they clearly consider showy displays of overly enthusiastic motion. Swinging your arms when you walk is a sure way to attract attention in Moscow. "Molodoi chelovek! Is it really that important?" and "Devushka! Did you serve in the army?" can be heard echoing down the streets after people who aren't necessarily panting or mowing down helpless victims in their path, but simply moving a little bit faster than the rest of the crowd.