The Metropolitan Transit Authority boasts that it moves over 5 million people a day, but how many people does it really move? Last week it served that purpose for Young Min, 24, who packed up stuff from a Korean homestead in Flushing, Queens, and moved it all to a one-bedroom on the Upper West Side — using only the subway. While easy on his wallet, the move turned out to be hard on his friendships: To help him get all of his belongings from one place to the other, Min enlisted two friends from his language school. Together they moved his air conditioner, collapsible double-rod closet, dishes (including serving platters and utensils), laptop, linen, quilts, books, clothes, and assorted framed pictures, a soup cauldron, Korean medicine, condiments, and a 40-pound bag of rice onto the 7 train, then to Times Square, through the Times Square Station to the 1 train, and finally to the new place on West 64th. (Mid-trip, the air conditioner broke through the trunk holding it.) The next day, when he called for help moving his bed, again on the subway, his friends didn’t return his calls and one even skipped their Kaplan class in order to avoid getting roped into another move. Min says he left assorted items at the homestead including a TV and a wooden dresser. “I do want my TV but it’s too hard,” he told Intel. “I don’t want to go back. I can’t ask anyone else to help. They told everyone how hard it was and so there’s no one else to ask.”
