Learning Space & Man Management in a Local Train

It’s a strange paradox to expect any kind of humour in a local train. Anybody who has lived in Mumbai will agree with me. Those who have even lived in other metros (where we have local trains) can’t compare themselves with the plight of a local train traveller in Mumbai. As they say… Mumbai is Mumbai in all practical senses. If you happen to get into a Mumbai local train during the office hours brackets (8.00 am to 10.00 am and 5.30 pm to 8.00 pm), you will appreciate that it’s a genuine adventure. All those who get a lot of kick watching ‘Fear Factor’ kind of shows will certainly have a second thought. Once into a local train, you may seriously contemplate any of the following options depending upon the time you have already spent travelling in Mumbai :

1. You may request Death, if it’s your first day or may be even if it’s the 1^st week of your adventure in Mumbai. You hate everything – Mumbai, Local Trains & Platforms, Your office timings, Your Job, the people in train, the deodorant they use (if at all they use any), you even start hating very intrinsic properties of a human body – why God created Sweat, if at all he created it why should it be flowing so profusely in a Local Train compartment, if at all it has to flow why so much from a man standing next to me!!… why … why whyyy??… your prayers end with …. भगवान् या तो मुझे बिठा दे… या फिर उठा ले!

2. From 2^nd week onwards you may be praying to God for a window seat… and you will more sooner than later realize that Window seats, facing the direction of the movement of train command a lot of premium. You may find it strange but its worth it … the additional gush of Mumbai air that you get in such a position by virtue of the movement of train is really worth it!

3. With a bit of maturity forcibly creeping in, you will realize that its far more easier to do a ‘तपस्या’, Sitting naked, on one of the arrow-pointed snow-covered peaks somewhere in Himalayas (think bout your butts here!) and expecting one of the Gods to appear and bless you with the three-vardaans THAN expecting a window seat that too as per the set-up mentioned at point no 2 above, during both the morning & evening rush hours.

4. By the end of 1 – 1 and a half month you are more than happy for a space to stand comfortably, if its around the gates, its icing on the cake because of all those calculations of the so called ‘fresh’ air.

5. By the end of a quarter, you are glad to get a place to stand in between the rows of seats and aim for the space that’s exactly under the Fan. People sitting will smilingly oblige you by allowing you to get some space to stand among their jumbled-up, crisscrossed knees. They act quite benevolent as Mr Chidambaram does while announcing subsidy on Rasoi Gas during Annual Budgets. Both probably have a sense of doing Charity for the mankind as a whole!

You will invariably find yourself fitting into any of the five options mentioned above. Once fit then there are so many more adventures. You further pray to God not for your own self but for the men who will be surrounding you during this 1-hour ordeal from Malad to Church Gate. You wish, that all the pores on their skin remain closed during the journey if its asking for the heaven then you wish let God give them enough money to afford a decent deodorant or in worst case you wish - may you yourself catch ‘झुखाम’ during that hour of journey and choke your nose to save yourself from the suffering. At times, while watching Discovery or Nat Geo I used to wonder God has not given Man anything to mark his territory – as we see a dog doing susu on every pole in his colony or may be a tiger scratching the trees marking his territorial supremacy. Travelling in a local train made me realise God is not that unkind as I initially used to think. People are more than successful in establishing & holding their territory by virtue of sweat, while travelling. They rotate every 12-15 minutes to circulate the heat & odour and successfully hold their territories. Obviously, the direction of their armpits gets a tad more space. The prayers continue till the end of the journey…..

Its not only you who are on an adventure trail… suddenly you will find almost everybody else is enjoying this journey and is part of the adventure. There are groups in almost all the facing-rows of all the compartments… and they will go to any length to hold the tightly fixed seating plan of the group. In case you are able to grab a seat by your extra-ordinary efforts, you will certainly feel like a refugee in the set-up, they will humiliate you enough just by their gazes & expressions that you may even feel like getting down at the next station itself. Almost all such groups have their favourite topics for discussion. Most often you’ll get a feeling that all the Finance & Economic Policies of the country should be formulated in consultation with these passengers. You may often come across selectors of Indian Cricket team… then there are Cricket Coaches who are analysing the kind of shots played by Sachin, Sehwag, Gambhir & company in the match against Pakistan last evening. Its here that you’ll get to know why Ishant Sharma didn’t bowl a slow Yorker to Younis Khan or may be what was going on in Irfan Pathan’s mind when he dropped that catch of Shoaib Malik at mid-on… you find a lot of mind readers here! Trains particularly originating and terminating at Virar have a Bhajan-Mandli each in almost all the 2^nd Class compartments. Amazingly, they match the rhythm of their Bhajans with the rhythm of a train movement and you start to feel the bhajans emanating from the running wheels of train.

On an average, each Grip (holder) has about 7-8 hands during rush hours. Very often you don’t recognise your own hand when you feel like scratching it…. Then you look at the color & print of the shirt you are wearing and then try and find a hand with similar shade/ print on the Grip. If you cant find it on one you try looking for it on the next one close to you ….. travelling in local trains kind of inspires you to stretch your limits, many a times you will find your hand on such a far off Grip that you never thought was practically possible!

Shoes are probably the ones who bear the most brunt of this adventure on a daily basis. Most of the times you refuse to accept them as the same shoes you were wearing while boarding the train. Thanks to innumerable Boot-Polish wallas on almost all the stations that reunite you with your loving shoes. May God bless them all!

Then you will find some Gujju Bhai enticing your nostrils by popping open a Bhaakarwaadi or a Chivda farsan packet with one hand while holding the holder with another. You forget the smell and concentrate on his attempt to take that handful of chivda from the packet to his own gaping mouth… I bet if you keep yours open, there are fair chances that this handful of chivda may end up there!… it’s almost impossible to achieve this feat in a place which has the highest density of human population in the world at a given point of time.

Among all this & more you will find many entrepreneurs devising altogether new ways to pass this one & a half hour, standing on one leg. Some smarties will start loudly reading out many a posters that are stuck all over the walls & ceiling of the coach – शराब छुद्वाइये सात दिनों में, राइ पिल्स क्लीनिक, अंग्रेज़ी बोलिए ४५ दिनों में, पर्सनल लोन के लीये कॉल करें श्री प्रदीप ९८३४२…., फॉर अ रेलाक्सिंग मसाज कॉल उषा ओं ……, गर्मी को कहो बस पियो हल्दीराम का कूल खस, बाबा ढोलक्नाथ का सत्संग – १० सितम्बर को चलो घाटकोपर, प्रेम-सबंधों, मन चाहे विवाह, नौकरी की समस्याओं, पति या पत्नी को वशीभूत करने के लीये मिलें प्रख्यात ज्योतिष पंडित हरी प्रसाद से… etc etc…. they make your time also fly-by rather easily, making you forget the sufferings for the time being!

Local trains mirror our country! With a great variety of people boarding the local trains. At times they are an actual exhibition of democracy in India – every hand may not be having the work, every person might not be getting two meals in a day but almost every set of ears in the train has a set of earphones, listening to local FM stations and humming the songs parallel… oblivious of the fact that some poor guys have not put on the earphones! You get to hear latest Ringtones & SMS alert tones in such situations। Some tones immediately grab your attention – (in increasing pitch) ज़ोर से आया… ज़ोर से आया… ज़ोर से आया… ये लो SMS आया और may be – ऐ जल्दी फ़ोन उठा नहीं तो पास वाला उठा लेगा…

At times, standing helpless, I thank God for blessing Man with so many special abilities – Reading anything in all the awkward positions that the limited space offers, is certainly a skill which people have developed over generations. After all reducing a normal 14” x 22” newspaper to a size as small as 7” x 11” and holding & reading the whole of it is an art-form. Moreover, you are not the only one to be reading the Newspaper or the book, like it or not, almost everybody who’s touching you somewhere is actually keeping pace while you are finishing the pages. Suddenly somebody will beg you – “बॉस… अभी पेज मत पलटना, मेरा ख़तम नहीं हुआ”. Very soon you realize that you are actually serving the nation – spreading awareness & literacy।

All in all its a great learning experience for everyone. I am sure most of you have learnt something while travelling. Please offer your experiences in the 'comments' section below!

A Fantasy called 'Lower Berth'

I don't know how many of us are able to observe or remember this but a 'Lower Berth' in any of the coaches of trains run by Indian Railways is a fantasy of every traveller. During my initial years of growing up, I used to idolise my Chachaji (who has been with Indian Railways ever since I can remember) not for his position, designation or profile but ONLY for the fact that he was working with Railways. I still have very fond memories of travelling with my mom & dad to Gwalior (my grand-parents' place) during summer vacations. I can remember how my Dad used to feel specially proud if we had 1 or 2 Lower Berths among our reserved berths. How all other Uncles & Aunties on facing berths used to envy us... and I remember how my Chachji used to say "I get only the lower berths reserved... if I don't get lower berths, I keep on preponing/ postponing the ticket till I get Lower berths"... and I used to feel like growing up immediately and joining Indian Railways... to get lower berths at will!!... I thought it was only our family who was so very fond of lower berths... but... as time passed by and I started booking railway tickets for myself or others, I realised that a Lower Berth commanded a lot of respect even among other (read almost all) travellers... I remember how the Booking Clerk at the Railway reservation window used to oblige... चलो एक लोअर बर्थ दे देता हूँ ... even Railways itself considers lower berth exclusive... the official railway-reservation website has options like "Book the ticket only if 1 or all the berths are lower berths"... the person who is not ticking this option some way carries a guilty feeling that he is going against the law of the nature???... travelling all these years, I find there is no decline in the affinity towards the lower berth... people will come up with all sorts of excuses to grab a lower berth... some of the interesting ones that I have come across are -I get down at every station or I like to have tea/ coffee at every station even during night... somebody said let me have the lower berth coz मेरा स्टेशन बहुत सुबह सुबह आएगा and when I reasoned that my station is same as yours... he justified ...कोई बात नहीं मैं आपको उठा दूँगा ???... another interesting excuse thrown in recently was - मुझे नीचे सोने दीजिये मेरी लम्बाई बहुत ज़्यादा है ... when I argued that length of both the berths is same whether its an upper berth or a lower berth (in II AC), I got a better 'shot' - "If I sleep on the upper berth, my hanging legs will hit everybody passing thru the gangway!"... I finally had to get convinced... another of strange excuses was from an old bureaucrat. The brevity of the reason left me speechless... बेटा मैं रिटायर्ड IAS हूँ... क्या मैं नीचे सो जाऊं .... (I am still figuring out the relation between the two!!)... a very common and interesting one is मुझे रात में बार-बार सु सु के लीये जाना पड़ता है... देख लो फिर आप को ही बार बार डिस्टर्ब होगा (अरे भैय्या ...पर आपकी सु सु से मुझे डिस्टर्ब क्यों??) ... these things yet again remind me how privileged my Chachaji was - how he used to 'donate' one of his lower berths to other 'under-privileged' travellers -by exchanging a lower berth reserved in the name of his 5-6 years old son with an upper berth of a 55-60 years old aunty - who in turn used to look at him blessingly ... the way beggars look at you, being obliged, on traffic signals in return for that 1 or 2 rupees coin... they some how control the rush of sentences like भगवान आपका भला करे ... आपके बाल बच्चे सलामत रहे etc... With a lower berth in your possession you feel and look exceptionally confident... remember ONLY a person having a lower berth can give a corner to sit to some short distance travellers who don't have a reservation... this genuinely feels like a king.. as if आप अपनी रियासत में से ज़मीन का एक छोटा सा टुकडा एक गरीब-मजलूम को बसने के लिये दे रहे हैं... I have always considered this as one of the supreme powers that one can have in this material world... sometimes I seriously fear that the world (of travellers) will finally get divided between the Haves and Have-nots i.e.; those who have a Lower Berth and those who don't have any ... I firmly believe that this 'Lower Berth' will continue to fascinate one and all as long as there are trains and people are travelling by them!

Monsoons... One of the things I thank God for!

Monsoons - the season I love. Its probably the only season, I thank God for. There are ample reasons to love (& hate) the season... but I love the season even for the reasons others hate it!

~ I love the season for hot pakoras and kadak chai in my balcony

~ I love the season for roasted corn-cobs (the famous Indian Bhuttas!)

~ I love the season for getting wet, with all the clothes on!

~ I love the season for local trains getting cancelled in Mumbai

~ I love the season for the winds on Marine Drive & the umbrellas getting 'Ulta' - making it awkward for all the 'Ladies & Gentlemen' having 'fun'!

~ I love the season for flooding of streets & reaching office with pants folded upwards

~ I love the season for all the mud-spots on one's back & bum. Remember its only here when you are completely responsible for your own mud-spots. The variety & number of spots is a testimony to how much & where all the person has traveled!

~ I love the season for standing at my window, observing the shapes, images & colours in the droplets which are continuously forming & dripping from the tip of the 'Peepal' leaves stemming from the wall of the flat opposite.

~ I love the season for the hot & steamy undergarments (they don't get dry & you have to invariably iron them next morning!)

~ I love the season for driving past the bystanders, splashing them with everything on the road & then watching their expressions by turning back!

~ I love the season for helping everyone get creative in the office with many age-old and some original & exclusive excuses - Like मेरी गाडी के सैलेंसर में पानी भर गया है, मेरा बच्चा फिसल गया, मेरी बीवी कल बारिश में भीग गई थी तो आज मुझे जुखाम हो गया है, सारे जूते गीले हो गए हैं ... और ... और.. सर इत्ने रोमांटिक मौसम में कोई ऑफिस आता है क्या?.... etc etc etc.... the list is endless.

~ I love the season for unscheduled Power-Cuts - for the respite from TV Channels & FM radio stations for some minutes!

~ I love the season for long drives and particularly long train journeys amidst a lot of greenery, water-falls, mist, washed roads, steaming hot food at road-side dhabas & vada-paavs at Igatpuri & Karjat Railway Stations.

I think these are enough reasons to love the season, however you can still add your own to the list. Hit on the 'comments' and submit.