A psychotic experience: On the train with David Lynch

In order to reach Debrecen I travel by train from Vienna to Budapest and from there to the East. I change trains at Keleti station in Budapest and get a seat in a compartment with a young student who sits at the window. Except for that boy nobody on the train speaks English. We travel for hours and hours. As I don’t know when I have to get out I have to ask people for the whereabouts of the train at every station where we stop.

After some time a bald-headed guy enters the compartment. He barks at the young man in Hungarian and takes the seat right in front of him although 4 other places are available. The bald guy seems eerie and looks aggressive. Just some days before my trip I read in the newspaper of serial killings committed on Roma people in Debrecen. The far right in Hungary is getting stronger and stronger and the nationalist Fidesz party is constantly gaining votes.

With that story in mind I watch the bald guy. He just looks like a rightist extremist. The student looks scared, in one particular moment he even seems to cry. The bald guy soon falls asleep but wakes up every now and then. I watch both of the men and try to catch the student’s gaze which is reflected in the window but the young man continues to stare out of the window and does not react on the signs which I make. I just don’t know if the baldhead threatens him and he does not dare to get up.

I spend one hour being proccupied until I finally get an idea what to do, just as the train stops at another station. I open the door of the compartment and get out on the aisle. I leave the door open, a young woman comes inside and takes a seat. The baldhead gets up and leaves.