I got ATTACKED at the train station

As some of you may know, I have started to

do some driving lessons recently, and this

might be kind of surprising because I've

been pretty anti-driving for most of my

life up until now. But a few things have

happened in the past few weeks that have

made me rethink my ways of thinking and my

life choices when it comes to driving. I

used to do most of my dating back in

Japan, where public transport is very

good. But here in England, even though

public transport is not too bad, there are

some problems with it that I've noticed.

Worst thing about using the trains in this

country has to be British teenage boys

hanging around the train stations and just

messing around. I recently had a bit of a

scary experience when I went to the train

station. I got verbally and physically

attacked by a gang of teenage boys. I was

going on a date, so I had to get the train

to London, and I went to the train

station. When I got there at the platform,

there was about 8 or 9 of these teenage

boys, maybe aged between 14 and 16,

and they were running around over the

bridge that goes over the tracks, and they

were smashing glass bottles. And then they

see me, and because I look Asian and I

look very different to the regular people

who are around here. I instantly attract

their attention and they start throwing a

stick at me, a pretty big-sized stick,

and I heard one of them say something

about my eyes. Luckily the stick missed,

but it was a pretty big stick and they

threw it pretty hard at me. They left me

alone after that, but I felt pretty scared

and I felt pretty trapped because I was on

the platform and they were running around

the exit area and there was no one around

the train station. There was no one

working there, no nearby adults or

anything. They could have very easily

surrounded me and attacked me, and they

could have done anything they wanted to

because there was no one around to stop

them, and I couldn't really fight off all

of them all at once. Maybe I could fight

off one or maybe 2 at most, but these

boys, British teenage boys, are pretty

big. They're not that much smaller than

me. They're around here, or maybe even the

taller ones are my height or even taller,

and they're very intimidating. They're

very loud, they're constantly swearing,

and they're always smashing or breaking

stuff. So thankfully they left me alone

because I went to the other side of the

platform, and I stood right in front front

of the security camera. I don't know if

they care about that, but luckily they

left me alone and they went back to

throwing glass bottles of beer— beer

bottles over the tracks so they could

smash the other side of the platform.

They also started pressing the assist

button. We have this assist button on the

platform where you press it and it

connects you with an operator that can

assist you if you really need help. So

they were pressing that and then screaming

down it and then running up and down over

the bridge. I thought they were going to

jump onto the tracks at one point. They

only stopped because the train finally

arrived and then they had to stop messing

around and get on the train, I guess. But

I just don't understand how they can get

away with it. They're doing all of this in

front of the security cameras, and it

should be pretty illegal to do that kind

of stuff on a train platform. And this

isn't the first time I've seen this gang

of kids hanging around the train station.

I think it's actually the third time I've

seen maybe this gang or maybe another gang

of kids, and it's pretty scary. It's

pretty intimidating when you're the only

person there on the platform and there's

all these violent, rampant kids just

acting like animals and there's no adults

or security or any kind of figures of

authority standing around to make sure

they're behaving. And it just reminded me

of when I was at school because, because I

look so different to everyone, I always

attracted the attention of these bullies

and these wild kids. They would always

have some kind of rude comments to make

about the way I look or my eyes or

something like that. I just get so much

anxiety when I see a gang of teenage boys

hanging around. I want to hide my face

so they can't tell that I'm Asian, but I

think even just my hair would give it

away. And because I don't look very

masculine. I don't look macho. I don't

have a big intimidating frame. I look very

weak and like a, like a weak easy target.

I think if I was a big strong-looking guy

or even a fat person who looks pretty big

in size, then they would have left me

alone. But because I look like I'm not

that much older than they are, I'm pretty

skinny and fragile looking, they, they

don't feel scared or worried about having

a go at me. I think it's just pretty sad

that even 20 years after I left school, I

still have to deal with these same

problems that I had when I was a kid. And

to make things even more embarrassing,

these kids at the train station are

probably the kids of the kids that bullied

me when I was a kid. It's just so

frustrating having to be tormented by

multiple generations of kids. Usually I

try to avoid using the train station on

the weekends or when it's some kind of

bank holiday because there's no school and

they'll be roaming about. But sometimes

when I go on dates, I have to go on the

weekend because the person I'm going on a

date with has to work and they only have

weekends off. So I have to go to the train

station station on the weekend. So that's

why I decided to start taking driving

lessons again. If you remember, I actually

did a lot of driving lessons back when I

was 18 or 17, and I even took the

practical test, but I failed it, and I

didn't try to retake the lessons, and I

just kind of gave up on the idea of

driving. After I failed my driving test

the first time when I was 18, I became

very scared of the idea of driving and

roads and cars and stuff, and I just kept

thinking to myself, well, I'll never need

to have a car because I work from home and

trains are good enough. But after these

experiences of being intimidated by gangs

of British teenage boys, I'm starting to

think that having a car and being able to

drive would actually be quite useful and

quite good. Also, I think girls would be

quite impressed if I was able to drive and

I showed up on the dates with a nice car.

So far I've had 2 driving lessons and I'm

really enjoying it. It feels completely

different compared to back when I had

lessons as a teenager. When I was a

teenager and I had lessons, I remember

feeling really scared of the road. I

really hated driving. It was very scary,

and I felt very anxious and nervous the

entire time. But now that I'm a lot older

and I've had time to mature a little bit,

and I'm used to being on the road on my

bicycle, and I'm just used to traffic more

in general, I don't really feel scared at

all being on the road. And I actually

really had fun driving the car. I managed

to drive all the way to Maidstone and all

the way back home without too much help

from the instructor. And Maidstone's about

10 miles away, so it's quite far away.

It's just kind of annoying because I can

only have about 2 lessons a week because

the instructor's pretty fully booked up.

I would really like to have lessons every

day, and I would like to have much longer

lessons because the 2-hour sessions just

go by so quickly. I couldn't believe the 2

hours was over already. It felt like 10

minutes. So it kind of sucks that I had

this bad experience at the train station

with these kids, but in a way, maybe it's

a good thing because it's finally

motivated me to get driving lessons and

try to get a license. The biggest thing I

was scared of was stalling the engine,

Because I remember when I took lessons as

a teenager, I kept stalling it at traffic

lights and it was really embarrassing.

But for some reason, this car that I'm

driving in now, it's, it's a diesel and

apparently that's harder to stall. I

barely stall it more than once in a

lesson, and even when it stalls, it's

really easy to restart the engine again.

Just press the clutch down and it's ready

to go. It doesn't really feel like this

big embarrassing thing that happens. I

actually wanted to buy an electric car

like a Tesla or something cool like that,

but I'm actually enjoying the manual way

of driving quite a lot. It feels quite

satisfying using the clutch and smoothly

changing the gears and getting to the

biting point and not stalling it. So as

you can see, I've been looking at cars to

buy because when I get my license— I don't

know how long it's gonna take to get my

license, but eventually I'm going to want

to buy a car. And some of these electric

vehicles are pretty cheap. Look at this,

a Renault Zoe is only £16,000.

And these cars here look pretty good as

well. You can get this Nissan Leaf Or a

BMW i3 for only about £20,000.

And then if you keep scrolling, you

eventually get to the Teslas. Oh, first

there's the Hyundais. The Hyundais,

stupid name, so hard to pronounce. I think

this car looks pretty nice, the Hyundai

Ioniq, £25,000. It looks quite nice,

looks like a Tesla actually. That looks

pretty cool, I think. Look at the gallery.

Yeah, I like that. And then around £40,000

you can get a Tesla Model 3, and they

look quite nice as well. I don't think I

can afford it now, but I'm not too far off

being able to afford one if I just save up

a bit more money. I could eventually get

one, I think maybe within half a year.

You can also get them on finance, so you

could pay £800 a month, but I don't know

if I'll be able to do that since I'm not

really officially employed anywhere. They

have this Model S as well, £56,000, but I

don't think Model S or Model 3 has the

Falcon doors that open up like wings. I

think that's the Model X. I really want

the wings, the doors open up like wings.

They look really nice.