Stealing someone’s place in the subway

33 comments

1. [deleted]

2. No experience but I like to stand on that spot by the door too!

3. If someone is that adamant about being in a certain spot I would give it to them. They probably have something wrong with them.

4. Once boarded an empty train leaving Ikebukuro, but there were quite a few people in the line ahead of me so, by the time I got on, only one space near the middle of the row was still empty. Just as I was lowering myself into the seat, a bag flew from about a meter away and landed in the empty space below my hovering ケツ. I look up to find the thrower was some old granny who was now yelling to her companion “I got a seat! I got a seat”. It was so funny, and she was so desperate to sit down, I just let them have it.

5. It’s the Wild West on Tokyo trains sometimes, you just gotta let it go

6. I remember having an elbow war with an ojisan on the hankyu Kyoto line.

   I was sitting down and the guy sits next to me. He places his elbow on top of my forearm, so I move my elbow out from under and put it back in place, he does it again. And I do what I do again. It looked like we were playing jenga. Anyway he finally speaks to me in English and asked where I’m from in classic ojisan voice.

   I’m still friends with him to this day and he used to take English lessons from me all the time when I lived in osaka. Shout out to Yoichi San

7. Just remember, there are crazies everywhere.

8. Not mine, but my brother’s story. My brother and I can’t do the whole knee on top of knee sitting, so we cross our legs with our calf on top of our thigh, but of course we don’t do it in full trains. One day he was riding in a almost empty train with his legs crossed, mind you there were a lot of seats and no one was close to him, when all of a sudden an old man slapped the crap out of his leg dropping it on the floor and started to scream at him and berating him. My brother, who speaks japanese btw, got annoyed and started speaking to the old man in english, when the old man realized he was a foreigner he shut up and went away.
   I know that you don’t cross your leg like we do in a full train, but why the hell did the old man felt the need to do that when the train was basically like 3-4 people with more than a whole row of seats available per person is beyond me.

9. thats happened to me in Europe.

   it happens, either it’s someone with a mental issue or someone that’s such a giant prick that its effectively a mental issue. either way ehh, you’re still way ahead.

10. I agree that when someone behaves in the way you have described, you’re better off backing away slowly. They’re ‘special’ in some way that may not be benevolent.

    Back in the early days of the women’s only carriages’ introduction, I once told a guy he was on one, and he just stared at me in that way that suggests he hadn’t just rushed on unintentionally or leapt on before the doors shut. He was not safe, and I moved well away.

11. Tokyo subway is fucked up and I hate it for it.
    Few times there was a situation like someone was giving a seat to my pregnant wife, but she couldn’t even seat. As in seconds second someone else was already sitting in that place.

12. I had some big guy sit next to me, and he starting pushing me along the seats, I held my ground but he keep shoving into me so I said to him in Japanese お前なに様だよ？　to which he responded す、すみません~ and I realised he was mentally handicapped. 　He kept pushing. Train was full. Grand

13. I recall seeing a poster on a Japanese bus about this sort of thing. It was suggesting that the individual might have some kind of mental problem or disability (Autism?) and they may strongly want to be in the same spot every day, so please be considerate of their disability.

14. The key is never to take it personally. These people are deeply unhappy with their lives.

15. not train related but

    Recently I went at some Brazilian? fest. There were tons of half naked dancers with feathers in bikini. So… Every nerd with huge cameras from Kanto area was there. I had to fight for a viewing spot with one of the nerds with that huge camera and a huge backpack on the back with what he tried to move me. Just to film some not that young and not that sexy girls in cheap costumes.

16. I didn’t steal his seat, but he didn’t like how I used it.

    Morning commute, crowded train, I was sitting, and this man around 50 gets on and ends up stood in front of me.

    Right from the beginning he’s inaudibly muttering under his breath, and within a few minutes his frustration had built up and he yells loudly at me “正常に坐りなさい！”, “Sit properly!” I looked up and saw his face in a rage.

    Passengers nearby startled, looked at him, then assiduously looked away.

    As I looked at him quizzically, he yells again “Sit properly!” and starts **kicking my shins**.

    So of course I tell him “stop kicking me” and “is there another way to sit?”

    “Oh so you speak Japanese? Then you should know how to sit properly!” And trods heavily on my foot, putting all his weight on it.

    So I tell him to get away from me and leave me alone. He kicks my shins again; then pulls out his phone and apparently starts recording a video.

    “Look at this foreign ass, doesn’t know how to sit! He never learned how to sit?” This is punctuated by additional shin kicks and foot _stomps_ and increasingly rude ちゃんと座るぜ！ “Sit fucking properly!”

    I keep telling him to back off and leave me alone, break out my own phone to record this nonsense and he’s like “you want to video me!? It’ll just show you’re causing the trouble!”

    Edit: I got sarcastic at this point and said “how should I ‘sit properly,’ should I do seiza?” Which pissed him off more.

    We arrive at Shinbashi, he yells “learn to blasted sit right!” and after a few farewell kicks gets off the train.

    Of course, I get off right after after him, try to alert staff, tell them he was assaulting me and call the police, but he’s heading down the stairs in a hurry and out the gate before I can get anyone’s attention.

    Finally when a cop does come over they look at the video, acknowledge that he did kick me and his face clearly shows up but that they can’t station cops at the station for future commute days looking for him because in the end there’s no major injury and it’s impossible to tell who started the altercation so maybe in future just avoid people who start acting like that and get off the train and wait for the next one to defuse the situation.

    They said they would be willing to take a report and a copy of the video if I wanted but that it was unlikely anything would come of it so did I really want to take the time?

    I didn’t really, and in the moment I agreed I wasn’t really injured, but that stomped-upon foot started hurting later that day and wasn’t back to normal for a few weeks.

17. When I’m standing in front of an end seat, then person sitting gets up. While I’m waiting for them to finish getting up so I can sit, person in the seat next to it slides over and sits where I was going to sit. This. It really grinds my gears. It probably shouldn’t, but it does.

18. Happened to me twice. I’m over six foot and fat, both times they eventually gave up. That’s my own personal gaijin smash success story and I am proud.

19. Once, this weirdo guy sat beside me eating an ice cream cone on the crowded train. Can you believe it? He was slurping and licking it and it was dripping…I was disgusted and hurriedly got off the train in a huff. Well, the guy also got off and chased after me yelling something…I was like uh oh…weirdo guy is following me..I rushed down the stairs but he grabbed me and I turned around with an angry look. Then he handed me my phone which I had left on the seat when I rushed off….I felt bad for being so judgmental…

20. I got onto a crowded train once and to my surprise there was one open seat so I sat on it. The guy next to me was this huge guy and he had his head covered with a hood. I didn’t think any of it before. This guy suddenly grunts and starts pushing me from the side so I nudge him back thinking he is dozing off on me. Then he starts getting irritated and pushes me again harder starting to grunt even more. I know why the seat was open now. I just got up and left knowing this guy was probably off somewhere.

21. What about when you are on a crowded train directly facing a sitting person. He gets up to leave the train and you stand back to give him a comfortable exit when some adjacent sly person does a diagonal jump and steals you seat. What do you do?

22. I usually stand like an unmovable rock when the dudes come butt first with a backpack pushing an already packed train. Pushing with their butt makes it fine to push? No way buddy.

    Did this today and the guy tried to elbow me lol.

23. Morning rush hour Yamanote. You take what you can get. Pull no punches. The weak will be left to rot.

24. I was on the morning rush hour train. I was standing in the middle crush row (middle row of people between the 2 lines of people standing holding the hanging handles). There were others in this row but it wasn’t full yet. There was room by the door but it would soon be a sardine can at the next stop and I was taking the train all the way to Shinjuku. Anyway, a man with his back to my back started pushing me so I grabbed the hand rail between the two people in front of me. I pushed back to steady myself even locking my elbow but he kept pushing harder. Finally the pressure was too much and I decided to let go and let myself bump the other people from his pushing. The force was greater than I expected and I almost fell onto the laps of the people sitting. I yelled at him on the silent and packed morning train in English to stop pushing me. He got really embarrassed and told me to stand by the door. As if!! That’s the worst spot in the morning train! Everyone stared at him. He got off at the next stop.

25. In the west this is called special needs. Here in Japan, I’m not sure what it is called. Psychologists categorize this stuff using a protocol called DSM-5. He is in the spectrum. Best to back off.

26. Was really stressed out from work, and I get on the Toyoko line train waiting at Shibuya. There’s a section of three seats with bars on each end and there’s a salaryman man spreading in the middle of all three seats. I looked at him and “REALLY?” just escaped from my mouth. He immediately moved 😂

27. Not exactly stealing but some people on the train get oddly protective over what little real estate there is. In a packed train, I was standing next to the seats when my hand that was holding onto the top of the seat (no where near anyone’s head, mind you) was forcefully pushed off. I looked down to see an annoyed set of eyes belonging to a skinny middle-aged man who was aggressively chewing his lower lip. As I was trying to piece together what was happening, the train rocked violently and I reacted by reaching for the the top of seat again, only for the man to pre-emptively react by quickly moving his hand over his shoulders, covering the area where I was aiming for, as if he was waiting for it. I managed to avoid touching his skeletal hand but would’ve fallen forward if it wasn’t for the support of some dudes around me. The man in the seat gave me a super annoying smug smile of satisfaction. This was over a couple of years ago but it still bothers me.

28. Unless I have a specific need for the seat in a visible way, I’ll let whoever have it. The stress of being Japanese is something I mostly don’t have to deal with, and who knows when the other person is just going to snap, anyhow.

29. Back in 2019 my mom and brother were visiting to meet my daughter for the first time. We were waiting for the Enoden at Fujisawa and we were first in line. Just as the train pulls up a women (not Japanese) shoves her way in front of us, ran to the priority seats and stretched her arms across them so the others in her group could sit there.

    Seeing that we had our 6 month old daughter with us, we didn’t want to make a scene, but I was seething. I made sure I stood as close as possible to the front of the seats with my rear facing them. Even bent over a few times to “get something from my bag” and “accidentally” stepped on their feet. Petty I know, but people like this would be at risk of getting knocked out where I’m from, so I’d say they got off easy.

    Needless to say, as bad as COVID was, I was elated when they announced Japan was closed to for foreigners.

30. Consulting the *Go Rin No Sho*, it advises that the correct strategy is to drop a chumbler.

31. There’s a commuter on my line who (a few times now) I have seen doing the old “I will block the door because it’s my favorite spot and will not budge for anyone” approach. He’s got oversized pointy shoes and a wide stance. There’s more than enough room behind him; he’s just got something to prove I suppose. For me he’s an inconvenience, but for his family he is a lifetime of disappointment I am sure.

32. Not stealing anyone’s space, but when someone is standing in the wheelchair/pram section and don’t move when someone comes with said thing.
    90% of the time they move, but sometimes they don’t and look ‘busy’ on their phone. I just push the pram right up into their space as close as I can, so they are almost trapped.

33. I once saw a middle aged women hurry and sit where there was a man in the process of sitting! Like, his ass was about 30cm from the seat and that woman slid in between and he ended up sitting on her. He looked at her like “wtf?!” but she didn’t make eye contact and pretended to sleep, lol. The guy sat back up grumbling but it ended there. And it was rush hour so she had to push people on the way to get there.