Proper etiquette dictates that there are things you simply don’t do on the MTR: you don’t play music on full blast without headphones, you don’t hog the pole, and you certainly don’t try to force the doors open as they’re trying to close.
True, true, we’ve all at one time or another gone for the last-minute hop-on, but there’s big difference between a botched hop-on and whatever the hell one volatile passenger was doing at the Lok Fu MTR Station on Friday night.
A video of the incident, which went viral after being posted on Saturday, shows what may have begun as desperate attempt to board quickly morphing into a one-man campaign against the closing doors.
Apple Daily reports that the incident took place at about 10pm on Friday evening on a Kwun Tong line train heading towards Whampoa. As the doors are closing, the man can be seen making a last-ditch effort to get on, wedging himself into the platform and train carriage doors, wriggling aboard, and delivering a few vengeful kicks to the train doors for good measure.
That’s when the truly baffling part starts. Despite being safely aboard the train, the man immediately turns around, blocks the doors from closing with his leg, and wrenches them open again. He then plants himself squarely in doors’ path, allowing them to close on him twice more, each time forcing them back open (all while nonchalantly trying to untangle his earbuds, weirdly enough).
A moment later, a member of station staff appears only to be berated by the man, who yells, “What are you doing not starting the train?” (Right, because it’s the station staffer’s fault.)
The MTR staffer tells the man to get off of the train and to not block the doors, to which he responds by yelling: “You come here you motherf****r!”
“What kind of MTR service are you running here?” he adds.
HK01 reports that the train left a few minutes later, with the man on board, and was met by more station staff, who boarded at Shek Kip Mei and Prince Edward MTR stations.
By the time the train reached Mong Kok station, police had arrived and asked the man to leave the train.
Section 9 of the MTR’s by-laws states that wrongfully entering or leaving a train after the doors have closed can land you a fine of up to HK$2,000 (US$255). But in spite of that, as well as the man’s bizarre and somewhat threatening, behavior, Apple Daily reports that police determined no crime had been committed, and no one was arrested.
The news comes after another video went viral last week showing a man forcing his way onto a train carriage.
It’s not clear where or when the second video was filmed, and according to the South China Morning Post, the MTR hasn’t received any complaints about the incident.
Illegal or no, given that MTR trains tend to come around every two minutes at peak times — or, God forbid, every five-and-a-half minutes at non-peak times — holding everyone on the train up (not to mention the people on all the trains behind it) so you don’t have stand on the platform for a negligible period of time is pretty rude.
That being the case, maybe it’s time we revisited this helpful Transport Department video featuring feisty actress and singer Deanie Ip laying down the law on all those public transport louts out there. God, we wish she rode our train.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNrIpj8bYyQ&frags=pl%2Cwn
