Stranded

It felt like a scene in a Final Destination movie as Lui waited with a group of at least forty other stranded passengers for the Ersatzbus (Replacement Bus) one night at Bietigheim-Bissingen — a place he only ever knew of as a station that the S4 train passed by.

Will this Bus even fit all of us? He was starting to worry…

It was already five minutes late, and any further would mean they won’t make it to the next train on his already over-elongated way home from Heidelberg.

Just earlier that day he was so proud of making it from Stuttgart to Heidelberg in just two hours — a rare feat. With only two trains. No delays. No cancellations. No sheeps were on the tracks so we have to stop this trip.

Now he’s already been on his way for three hours and it was still some ways away to get home…

In the beginning as he took his first S-train from Heidelberg to Karlsruhe, at 18:00, it was all looking good.

Two hours until Stuttgart, the DB app said.

But there was already some risk as he only had five minutes of transfer time between this train to the next.

The train arrived a three minutes late, but it promised to catch up to its planned arrival time. Lui watched the clock carefully along the way.

Good thing was that he knew the station of exchange well and knew that he only needed at least two minutes to change platforms easily, even at his walking pace.

The DB app was updating almost constantly.

It’s down to four minutes transfer time.

Three minutes transfer time.

Two minutes transfer time.

By the end, they arrived at 18:36, and the next train was to leave at 18:37.

Everyone was ready at the doors way before the train halted.

Open. And off the people ran.

From Platform 5 to Platform 1.

They could see it from Platform 5, the train wasn’t even there yet. This was reassuring. But still they hurried.

It was a huge amount of people wanting to make that train, it seemed.

And they all made it in time. A few seconds to spare until the train came driving in.

It was a very short train. Two carriages.

This was going to be a problem, Lui thought. He knew this train well, it begins from Karlsruhe, just a station before this one and there it already gets filled up.

With a longer train it would’ve been no problem.

But on this one — chaos.

Everyone wanted to get in, the seat free areas at the doors were easily filled, and people hardly budged inwards of the carriage to the aisles between where the seats were.

As comfortable as the seats are in German trains, they were very uneconomical. Only four people could sit on each side, some people even taking up seats for their luggages. The spaces in between these seats were wasted for the awkward air between strangers forced to face each other or look away…

It looked hopeless. Lui didn’t even try.

The next train comes in one hour and he wanted to stop at the bookstore anyway.

So he knew to be smarter for the next round.

He took a short trip to Karlsruhe station where this train begins, to secure a seat.

And the station there had a big bookstore that he wanted to check out.

Time at the bookstore passed quickly, he spent it scanning titles and going back and forth on whether to buy a copy of Thomas Mann’s Buddenbrooks, they had one in a pocket-sized form for 20 euros.

Do I buy it now, when i know i’m moving very soon?

But it’s so compact, it doesn’t even take up space and weight.

But it’s still such a big book, you won’t have time anytime soon to read it.

I want it in my collection though — Kafka is there, how can Mann not be?

You don’t even know if this book will resonate with you.

But it’s an insight to the bourgeois family life of Germans in the early 20th century…

The debate in his head kept on for at least thirty minutes.

Around 19:20 he left the bookstore and made his way back to the platforms. As expected, the train was already there waiting and there were still seats to be had.

Lui chose one next to an Arab man on his phone who seemed conscious about having someone sitting next to him, and Lui made sure he didn’t see what it was the man was watching on his phone.

The train left on time at 19:31.

It was all smooth on the first 30 minutes of the ride, Lui was on his headphones listening to Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha while also observing the people around him. As this train was three times as long as the one from the previous hour, it wasn’t as packed and barely anyone was standing on the aisles.

His headphones died just in time for him to hear the train announcement inside. There had been a technical issue on the route and the train could no longer make it to Stuttgart. It will stop at Vaihingen Enz.

The nightmare began.

Not that it was the first time.

Anyone living in Germany had become so accustomed to this now that they’ve learned many ways to work around it.

Lui was glad that his German was good enough then to understand the announcement. He could tell from the face of the Asian woman sitting across him that she didn’t comprehend the announcement but sensed the sudden change in demeanor of everyone around her.

Lui went to the DB App right away to check for alternative connections.

It didn’t even reflect the Störung (disruption) yet.

With that RE train, Vaihingen Enz was only one stop away from Stuttgart that if the issue had only happened 15 minutes later they would’ve made their destination.

But with any other way it would take an hour and a half and three different rides (an MEX train, a bus, and finally an Sbahn).

Alternatively, Lui could wait about an hour on Vaihingen Enz for another RE train that hopefully will make it to Stuttgart by then.

All this was explained by the train’s announcer too…

The announcer made two more updates, each time the passengers hoped that the situation had miraculously improved, but no, it remained the same.

The Asian girl had moved to the now empty seat next to Lui, said Xi xi to which Lui responded Kein Problem, to let her know that no, he didn’t speak Mandarin.

She didn’t even ask but Lui explained to her anyway, with some mixture of English, German, and hand gestures, that this train was not making it all the way to Stuttgart.

Somehow she understood. And by the time they reached Vaihingen Enz it was clear anyway that everyone was getting off.

A big AUSSTEIGEN (GET OFF) was printed on the screen too.

Vielen Dank, bis zum nächste Fahrt, the train bid the passengers goodbye. It wasn’t easy to feel very grateful at the moment, Lui thought.

Normally Lui took these situations calmly. Especially when he wasn’t rushing to catch anything, as on that night.

But he had been tired that day helping his sister finish setting up her new apartment in Heidelberg, and he himself had some early moving of things to do the next morning.

So an extra hour and a half to get home, especially when it had already been an hour later than planned was very unwelcome to him.

Add to that, Vaihingen Enz was a very dreary station, in the middle of the fields, without even a vending machine to get him something to drink. And it was cold that night, even in August, as it had been raining that week.

The big question left was, does he risk waiting for the next RE in hopes the route is working and he could make it to Stuttgart in just 15mins (before 21:30)? Or does he take the long and winded but more reliable route and get there at 22:00 (hoping nothing fails between the three rides he had to take).

People were crowding around the driver who was nice enough to entertain their questions.

But as expected, there was nothing he could do for them. The route is blocked and he was told to stop. The alternatives were as he and the App had told them.

He also spoke of stories of the many other cancellations that had happened already that day, just between Karlsruhe and Stuttgart. (Lui must have been very lucky that morning).

After ranting a little to his sister on chat, Lui decided to take the more secure longer route, which starts in 10mins and would at least warm him and let him sit. Albeit for an hour and a half, and with transfers in between.

The first MEX train was smooth and quick.

Before reaching Bietigheim Bissingen, a train attendant went to every passenger to tell them that if they wished to get to Stuttgart, they should go to the very back of the train and follow the lady she instructed to guide them on the way to the Ersatzbus.

Everyone followed (at least half of that train was apparently off to Stuttgart), but there was no lady waiting for them. When they got off, a young blonde lady finally called out and asked everyone to follow her.

It was a bit of a walk from the station to the bus stop and the Bus wasn’t there yet.

Lui realized that many of the faces stranded have become so familiar to him now. Some of which may have even been with him from the very first S-train from Heidelberg.

Everyone looked defeated — yet again failed by the promise of German efficiency. They had nothing to do but watch each others’ faces and share a communal disappointment.

It was a cold Saturday night and they weren’t even sure if this Ersatzbus was coming. Bietigheim Bissingen was still 24km from Stuttgart, so taking a taxi was still an expensive option, costing around 50 euros.

Heidelberg, according to Google Maps, is 115km away from Stuttgart. To contextualize that for Lui who doesn’t drive, it’s the same distance between Quezon City and Tarlac City.

And while it would’ve taken him four hours, 300 pesos, an uncomfortable seat, and possibly a life-risking driver to make this analogous trip by public transportation in the Philippines, it should’ve taken him only two hours, no extra costs (to their fixed monthly DeutschlandTicket subscription), and fairly comfortable seats in Germany.

Instead he had the unlucky, but no longer rare experience of a four-hour, stressful, and costly (in terms of time and energy) trip.

The Ersatzbus finally came, two of them, which was enough to carry every single one of the stranded, and took them all the way to Ludwigsburg station in about half an hour.

It seemed like the catastrophe with the trains was still ongoing as most trains from Ludwigsburg were all only going up to Stuttgart Hbf, at an unusual 8min frequency.

Lui immediately got on the next one.

Ludwigsburg was just slightly north of Stuttgart so they were there within 10mins.

It was 22:07 when he reached Stuttgart Hbf and he still needed one more quick U-bahn to his apartment but he was starting to feel home.

His back tired, eyes sleepy, body cold, he finally made it to his apartment before 22:30.

If there was anything to be proud of in this whole experience, he thought, it was that he didn’t have to stand in any of the seven rides he took that night. Wow, seven rides and 4.5hrs to get home from Heidelberg — he realized.

Scheisse Deutschebahn, he murmured to himself, and he felt a bit more German that way.