Addled Brain On a Train

Pre-World

Soaked in a pink glow with a texture of white, the place made me forget all my woes. It was a beautiful morning in the big city and I was out for breakfast with my brother. The pleasant setting was enlivened further when the breakfast was served. It looked Instagram-worthy, and tasted good.

The delightful setting also made me forget it was 10:05 am and the time to book a tatkal AC coach seat on the Indian Railways was already gone. Ideally, it is one hour but practically it hardly lasts beyond a minute.

A happy day it was, except now I booked a non-AC tatkal at 11 am, which wasn’t a problem ‘AC’ wise, because I prefer open windows. But...

The Journey Begins

From an idyllic morning in the big city to the next one, on its busy platform, filled with early morning commuters and busy office goers; this was one of my many rendezvous with unwritten rules of Indian train travel. It begins with the fact that most of the long-distance commuters in this country have to travel with a luggage many times their own weights.

Next, all non-AC coaches are welcome for ticket holders and non-ticket holders. Anyone with what we call ‘jugaad’, a little gumption and a gift of being unaware of what self-respect is, can travel free by most trains anywhere in this country.

A lady and her nearly year-old baby were already sitting at my place on the aisle seat, in the first section from the doors. As I was double checking my ticket to see if I made a mistake, the lady told me off, “Yes, it is yours. Don’t make a fuss. The seat is not going anywhere.” She took her time to gather herself and shift just diagonally opposite to the window seat, which was hers. Then, why was she sitting at my place? Well, to teach me that double checking my seat in front of an illegal occupant is rude and I should learn ‘not to make a fuss’ by doing that.

One must never argue why she wasn’t sitting in her own place. It took me till next station to settle in my seat. The lady sat down, folded her knees up, made a cloth tent around her bosom to feed her now wailing baby. She shot me a look that said, ‘Rapist, stay away', all because I decided to check my seat number standing in front of her. 

The Conscience Evoker

By the time the next suburban station came, the coach was overflowing with people, the travellers and the people who came to see them off. They have to get in and stay till the last second or maybe even a little after that, according the rules of the procedure. The two seats next to me got occupied as did the one opposite mine. An old lady, with thickest glasses and blackest teeth sat in front of me. She was travelling with her son and daughter-in-law who sat across the aisle, along with their, about, five-year old kid.

The other side was a spectacle in itself, but more on that later.

Another old woman comes in and nudges the one opposite to move. Upon being asked whether the seat belonged to her, she launched into a tirade. First, she attacked the mother of the baby who had booked two tickets when her baby needn’t have a separate one. Next, she was brutally evocative with the old lady in front of me about not being able to make some space for her. She complained about the society which has failed to show some sort of mercy on its old and how her expectations of it are reducing by the day. “A frail, old, little lady who hardly requires space cannot be given her ‘due’ by simple wriggling of some butts” were here exact words. She completely overlooked the fact that the other lady whose space share she demanded was old herself, perhaps older than her.

She may not have a ticket but what is wrong with the people of the world. Of all the ‘luxuriant sitting cushions’ on offer there, we couldn’t make a little space for her. How sad! This after she had managed to convince the lady to move to the middle seat and sit directly opposite me.

The Competition

Then began the festive dance of the emetic. The lady in the middle seat put her pinkie up her nose. A gentle slip turned into hard drilling. Then she went into a trance. She stretched her eyes, fixed her stare on the train floor. The little finger wiggled everywhere, stretching the limits of her nose and almost pushing her eyeball out of its socket. The finger only came out to catch her grandson from across the aisle, who came over. Just for fun.

This grandson kept swinging his legs as if trying to determine which of the legs were the best to be kicked at. Of course, he settled on me because the old man next to me wasn’t a challenge enough. Then the dung bomb went off, which I was pretty sure was from the lady opposite me. I had to take a stroll.

I saw the neighbouring coach was the AC one; with people sitting poised, one of them reading a newspaper, few of them sleeping and a girl reading. The seat next to her was empty but it wasn’t mine  because of the ambience enjoyment for five extra minutes, the day before.

The Neighbour

Meanwhile, back at my place, my neighbour in a white shirt, white dhoti with a white stick decided to lean his left leg against my right one. The only black thing on him, his glasses, couldn’t help him realize that all his whites pulled up to his thigh were pressed and brushing against me like a domestic pet cleaning its coat. I tried to gently push it away, but it didn’t work. His face hinted nothing. It was like his body telling me to let it be; ‘What’s the big deal!’

The lady opposite me started her own examination of mouth with her index finger. People could see down her throat. How can she be left behind when the drilling machine was at work next door!

The Leaner and the Other Mother

Clearly this wasn’t enough, so a person who decided to travel standing, leaned his back to my seat while standing by the entry/exit passageway. At times, his behind came really close to my nose and no amount of edging and nudging could help me space out of this arrangement.

Across the aisle another mother of two had improvised a little hammock for her baby to stretch in, while one of other kids made a game of going about it. The swing hung from the luggage rack, blocking the window while giving the baby an excellent view of the landscape and the inner happenings. The passengers seated there had to duck and cramp around the swing all the while negotiating the other kid, sometimes letting it jump on and off them. My thoughts, therefore, were fighting hard to determine if this was a better seat or the one across.

Acrobats and the Seller

Enter the child acrobats. A boy and his sister with sketched faces started performing drills in the cramped aisle. Passengers on either side of the aisle were used as leverage for their jumps while our feet were temporary resting places for their props. My thigh was used as a leverage to launch by both the kids, somersaulting, as the public watched with interest. Nothing is outrageous here to any eye. I, too, resigned myself to the ways of this little world.

But the bhel seller enters to spice it up for me, literally and figuratively. As the pungent aroma of the contents spread, he leaned his sack of puffed rice and spices against my left leg.

At one point, the old man’s naked thigh on the right and the edibles on the left were squeezing me in; the leaner's ass rolled over my left shoulder; while the old lady performed her finger-dental check-up straight in front of my nose. I tried to look away on my right only to invite threatening stares from the mother forever feeding her child.

The Doors

I decided to get up and go stand by the door. As I made my way between two sarees squatting by the door, I was given another set of looks, warning me not to stamp on their spread. I couldn’t go to the other door either, because there was a bidi-smoking gentleman with a subset of an atmosphere created there.

I looked at all the faces in one round. They all told me nothing was out of the ordinary and didn’t even require a second look, forget correction.

And as it always is, going to the toilet wasn’t an option because of reasons which I’ll leave to the reader’s imagination. Several hours later, I alighted at my destination not knowing what to make of the experience.

On sharing this experience with one of my friends, he took offence, going all egalitarian on me, "...And guys peeing on ladies mid-flight, that is okay, because it's a plane, isn't it?” “But the poor bother you!”

I had no idea how to respond with my addled brain. 

Sometimes, I dream of the child in that make-shift crib with a milk bottle in its hand, laughing at me from its privileged swing on the train.