I’M sure everyone has experienced this before: you’re standing on the Metro minding your own business. After a few minutes, you arrive at your stop. You hope, beyond reason, that you can get off the train without too much trouble. The doors of the train open and whilst you are trying to get off, dozens of people barge on.

Xianxia Houshang (let passengers alight first), apparently does not have any meaning in this city, or China in general.

This irritates me. Every single Metro station has nice flat screens on which people are shown how to use the Metro. Every single Metro station has nice markings on the floor, telling passengers where to wait in line. Every single Metro station has a nice speaker system that constantly repeats “Xianxia Houshang.” Every single Metro station has people in uniform that should be guiding passengers, people that should tell passengers what they can and cannot do.

In reality, however, nobody cares about the instructions on the screen. People ignore those markings on the floor as if they were simply decoration. Everybody wants to get on as soon as possible. In reality, the supervisors in uniform don’t seem to care about what is happening in the stations.

Why is it so difficult just to wait in line and let your fellow passengers alight first? It is going to take five seconds at most. I know that we all have busy lives in this city, trying to make the most of our time. But does that mean we should just abandon all common sense?

As Confucius said, “do not do to others what you would not like done to you.” Maybe, in a day, our fellow passengers will learn how to do this as well.

Wouter Savelkoul via e-mail