Travel time – once again I am on the road. This time from the Dutch Groningen to the Westphalian capital Münster. After hours-long waiting and loitering on various platform in the freezing cold of this March afternoon, I can finally settle down in a compartment of the train which seems at least to have a two-digit temperature.

It is relatively silent in the compartment, a young man opposite me has closed his eyes and is quietly dosing off. Three rows further, two travellers are talking barely audible. Only one more traveler is in this part of the train with us: an elderly man with grey hair and glasses. He is travelling with three large plastic bags and does not make a very trustworthy impression.

Slowly, the train starts to accelerate and once again, my senses are tricking me, as I have the feeling that the station is moving.

The elderly man is noisily busy with one of his multiple plastic bags and digs up all sorts of different thing, spreading them on the neighbouring seat. Aerosol tins, empty bottles, crumpled-up and folded papers as well as many other wondrous things are piling up there. The muddle and rummaging carries of for quite a while without the search leading to any obvious success.

Everything quiets down and only after it starts to smell strangely, I look up again from my book. In front of him on the blue-checkered seat, the man has not put two square wooden boards on which multiple small objects are fixed upon. In his hands, he is holding a small tube, plastic glue by the smell of it. With this, he keeps fussing about the boards, gluing down golden peanuts.

The train stops and the young man opposite me snatches his backpack and leaves. The sign at the station says ‘Meppen’ which already sprays Westphalian charm, looking out of the window.

A brunette man is suddenly standing in the aisle and drives back my attention to the man with the golden peanuts. He is wearing a marine blue jumper with epaulettes and a yellow badge on his chest. A little irritated, he exchanges a few words with the peanut guy only to turn away again. It becomes silent again in the carriage, a man with purple head band is now sitting opposite me and turns the pages of a newspaper.

Then, suddenly, a small fat ticket checker lady swoops down at the man with the plastic bags. Somehow, I must have missed the beginning of their conversation, the lady is obviously very displeased and demands to see a passport straight away. ‘ I do not have it, I lost it’, the answer comes unsurprisingly. By now, also the man with the epaulettes is back. The ticket checker lady gets highly excited that the gentleman does not have a valid ID with him. ‘Well, it was stolen from me!’ A small outcry of triumph can be heard, the ticket lady pounces forward and sways her hips. The ticket-snapping-tool is dangling against the neighboring row of seats. ‘Now, we have two different statements from you, what should I believe no? You do not even have a valid ticket!’, she jells out of control. She is apparently in her element and her eyes are sending out sparks. The man with the epaulettes is asking what the usual procedure is in this case in a low voice and she replies something concerning a criminal charge.

There happen to be officers of the Federal Border Guard onboard which are straight away ordered to the scene of crime.

The train stops again and the purple headband leaves, not without a curious glimpse at the small crowd that has gathered around the golden peanuts.

Shortly after, two uniformed gentleman appear and want to hear the whole story all over again. After having gone through all of his papers again, the elderly man still cannot produce a passport and the two border guards disappear again to check the data received. All the way to Greven station, everything stay quiet, only then the two policemen come back and inform the man what he has to expect now. The list of the criminal offences is long and rather sounds like the one of a dangerous felon.

After mechanically reciting the litany, the officer seats himself opposite me in order to keep an eye on the peanuts and starts reading a newspaper.

He is tall, has the physique of a Klitschko brother and his face has a peculiar shine to it, almost like polished.

The elderly gentleman is only slightly impressed by the fuss about his person and starts to dig deeper into the heap of paper next to him. He gets out another pair of glasses and puts in on top of the one he is already wearing.

He engrosses his mind in letters and advertisements of all kind which he keeps pulling from a large orange plastic bag. By an unknown system, he sorts everything into different piles and ends up filling four seats.

Every now and then, the officer casts an inspecting glance at his charge when he is making nervous movements or is fiddling about with one of those aerosol tins.

Then, there is an announcement that we are about to reach the final destination Münster in a few minutes and now it is me who is gathering all things.

The compartment comes back to life and everywhere you can now hear voices and rummaging. I cut my way through the aisle and cede the guy with the golden peanuts to the officer with the polished face.