When I was a child, my parents used to sometimes leave me spend the day with a neighbor, an old lady, in her 70's, who had no children. She loved me as if I were her grandson and she was the kindest figure of my childhood. One day, when I was about five years old, I went with her to the market and she bought a watermelon. We then went to a train depot, we sat in a compartment of a train there and we ate that melon. It was the best melon I ever had.
I guess that's when a switch was made.
When I was ten years old, I decided to run away from home. My destination ? The train station, to take a train and go travel. That's when I found out you needed tickets to get on trains and tickets required money. So I went back home.
Later on, in my teenager years, I always found comfort in going to train stations. Sometimes, I would go into dingy pubs in the main train station, have a beer and listen to people around me talking about all sorts of things. I loved hearing other people's bits of conversations.
Later on, I started traveling a lot by trains, both nationally and internationally.
Now, having passed forty, I'm still as enthusiastic about trains as possible.
But, shortly put, a wonderful old woman and a great watermelon first sparked my interest into trains.
