Like getting on a crowded train backwards

Japanese commuter trains are a thing of beauty. They are so regimented. They run regularly and like clockwork. They stop in exact places on the platform to allow commuters, who have been standing in orderly queues, to push and barge and cram their way into already overpacked carriages. Have you ever seen those cat videos on Facebook, where cats twist and distort their bodies to fit into impossible spaces, well, cats learnt that skill by watching Japanese commuters.

But I’ve noticed one trick that really stands out. 

People walk backwards to get on crowded trains. 

To start with, I couldn’t work out what they were doing. Why get on a train backwards?

But I realised it is the ones getting on backwards that do the most damage. They will push and shove, scatter the other commuters like skittles, but never once do they look around and see the carnage they have caused behind them. It is as if entering backwards absolves them of all responsibility, allowing them to maintain the image of politeness. It’s like they are burying their head in sand, like blocking their own ears when stealing a bell, fiddling while Rome burns or the new idiom I am trying to coin, Like getting on a crowded train backwards. So come on, start using it. Let’s get this new idiom in the Oxford Dictionary. (Other dictionaries are available.)

P.S. I don't have a picture of a train so here's one of Fuji.