I'm just wondering if I did the wrong thing.
I spent the day on the train from my parents', almost 8 hours total on 4 trains. The main one was horrendously crowded, about 10 people crammed in the vestibule at one point. It was also really delayed, over an hour stuck in a field.
Next carriage was a family, parents and two under 7s on the floor of the buffet. All of them in and out of the bit where I was, parents constantly opening the window to look out and leaving it. It was freezing! I have a horrendous chesty cough, it was painful trying to gasp cold air to breathe.
Two hours into the journey they had the window open, I wrapped my coat around me with my hood up and a scarf over my face. The dad tapped on my shoulder and asked if I minded if they smoke out of the window. Honestly I was a bit shocked, they have young children with them and it's illegal to smoke on a train, I'm pretty sure. I was gasping after a coughing fit, I just said I was freezing and I have a horrendous cough and am asthmatic, yes I do mind. The only way I could move was to drag all my stuff through a crowded carriage- there were people standing in the aisles, that busy. Whilst trying not to cough on people or be too far from my water to stay off a too bad fit. He huffed and puffed a bit and gave me a horrible look, it was awful both he and the mum kept giving me nasty looks as they opened the window or went past me to loo. A bit intimidating!
But now I'm thinking was I mean? Is smoking that addictive that you can't go 2 hours without smoking? I have no experience, have always had asthma so never tried and I have no friends who smoke. I s it that desperate a need? On the next train someone sat next to me who had been smoking, I could smell it and I had to move as it triggered a proper fit, bent over and gasping. I know that if I had said yes ok smoke, it would have really hurt me having a coughing fit but I don't know enough about addiction to know how valid my refusal was!