People all over long to live in New York City and while New York is an amazing place to be, there are always faults. No matter what you believe in, or where in New York you’re from, there is one thing we can all agree on: the MTA has pretty bad service and accounts for a lot of the difficulty in our day-to-day hustle. To many, it seems that the prices go up, but the service gets worse. I understand that things happen; sometimes there is a sick passenger on the train or someone gets hurt at the station. There just seems to always be a sick passenger or some sort of construction, or something happening in Brooklyn that somehow affects the train service in the Bronx. As someone that does not have a car and takes the train every day, multiple times a day, here are some of my MTA experiences.

It is a joke amongst many of my friends that crazy things always happen on the train when they’re with me and at this point, I cannot even argue. It seems to be a gift at this point, one that is common amongst daily train riders, where we can ignore certain things and manage to remain unphased by many of the crazy things that happen.

Many times, people come on the train begging for money and I understand that times are hard and for that, I always try to give something if I have.This leads to me seeing the same people all the time, which just makes you wonder. There have been times where I've seen homeless people fight each other on the train and get into arguments with random people. It’s scary in the moment, but when it’s all over, you can laugh about it in the end.

There’s showtime, which while it has become somewhat of a meme, is very much alive and well. It comes in different variations and makes them some serious cash. There is the dancing version, where they become the embodiment of Tarzan and leave people (like me) terrified that I'll have to take a detour to the hospital. Thankfully because of much practice, it never happens and it leaves them with some nice cash in the end. Then there is the singing version of showtime, which is always on the shuttle train but it leaves you with a nice feeling and good sounds.

Even with the MTA’s terrible service and me living on a train line that is notoriously terrible, it has given me some long-lasting memories. On many of these trains is where I've built relationships with people. The long rides home from work where my friends go home with me and we rant about all the craziness that happened that day. The same train rides where I've lost some friends in heated arguments over the phone and become extremely close to others through our long rides home after school. The constant construction gives you some extra homework time and lets you catch up on those hundred page readings for class.

We all get it — the MTA might not be the cleanest or the prettiest, but it belongs to the city. It is ours and it gives us new experiences; it also gets us to places so that we can experience new things. Those days that the train gets you where you need to be early and gives you extra time to get a coffee make up for all the bad ones. Until I get a car, I'll keep taking it. While it has its fair share of problems, I can’t do anything about it except ride.