As a college student, I spend way more time travelling with train/bus than when I was in high school. Every weekend I go back to my parents’ house, a trip which takes an hour a half by train. And I just love to write blog posts in the train (I wrote this one in the train) or do a reading assignment. You only need to do it in a good way.
First of all, a lot of people think they can’t do work on school assignments in the train, because it is way too crowded and all. But I know many people who like to work on school in public places, like coffee shops and full libraries. I like those places because it inspires me, but also because I ‘want to look interesting’ or something like it, so I will work on something! The train is pretty much the same!
How to use the public transport correctly
- Wear headphones. Talking to people is fun, especially to strangers, but if you need work done, you shouldn’t. Wearing headphones works pretty well, it gives another barrier to people to talk to you. They have to tick on your shoulder first, you need to unplug the headphones and then they can finally start to talk. You don’t even have to listen to music, just wear the headphones!
- Have a goal. When I travel from Zwolle to Groningen (a trip of 50 minutes) I give myself the goal to write at least one rough blog post. Which works out pretty good, because when I’m started, I want to continue, so when I finish one blog post, I don’t have anything else to do, so I will write another one! Have a small goal which you know you can accomplish.
- Don’t study for tests, but do reading assignments. With all the noise around you, you probably can’t study really good for a test, but you can do reading assignments; it needs less focus.
- Have a bottle of water ready. In case you fall asleep, take a nip of your water. It works for me, probably works also for you!
So, community transport doesn’t have to be boring, you can make it as boring as you want. I do some serious writing when I am travelling, because it works. What works for you when you have to travel? Let me know in the comment section!
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Twitter: NielsGouman
October 27, 2009 at 9:15 pm
Since i’m not much of an active blogger (or student for that matter) I don’t write blogs in the train
problem for me is that I spend about 15/20 minutes getting to the train station by bike then another 15/20 minutes in the train, then 10 minutes in the bus
so I don’t have the convenience to spend 50 minutes in one place
obviously I can’t do much while on my bike
and the bus is too crowded to even try to open my laptop
15 minutes in the train isn’t much, I usually spend that with email, facebook, hyves, twitter, linkedin, rss reading and sometimes I play some videogames
all of that on my iphone, gotta love that thing
Hey Niels,
As a Dutch student also I know what it is to sit on a bike every once in a while! (I live in Groningen, well, that says enough
)
And if I am going to travel more than 10 minutes by bycicle, I get my iPod and put an audiobook on it and listen while on the road.
Works perfect for me, and I do get some information while commuting!
You can even put your school work on it, as I described in ‘iPod Studying’
I also find reading on the train is a good use of time. I often have to take a train from Sittard to Wagenigen. It takes about 3hours, a long journey. So reading is a MUST for me, if I don’t want to get bored on train
I take one bus in the morning to school, about thirty minutes. Because it’s a city bus, and I get off before the city, it’s usually pretty empty. If I had a laptop, I would definitely use it, as some of the newer buses have free wi-fi. I generally do planning for assignments in that thirty minutes.
On the way home, I have to take two buses, and that can take up to an hour and a half. It takes about 20 minutes to get a seat (there are about 30 kids from my school that take the same bus, needless to say, we aren’t liked very much). In this time, I listen to recordings of presentations I have coming up (We seem to have at least one every week). The second bus is usually quite empty, so I either read a book that I’ve picked up from the library while waiting for the second bus to come (its great that the stop I wait at is so close), or I write, usually short story. How long I can go for depends on the driver, and how reckless they are around bends. I get car sick when I read or write in buses that aren’t slow or straight.
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