A sauna or a trading room, a kitchen or a massage centre? An akhada or a card playing room, a can of beans or a lifeline? A bazaar or a den of thieves, a newspaper or a bhajan mandli? A discussion forum or a breakfast table? A pain or a panacea??
Ladies and Gentlemen, put your hands together for this multifaceted personality – the strange creature called the Mumbai Local Train or just local for us Mumbaikars. Love it or hate it, you just can’t ignore the Mumbai local.
I was travelling by train today from home to college when suddenly I felt like writing about our local trains.
Various thoughts were running in my head as to how I should go about writing this.
For close to seven years now, I have been going up and down and up and down along with thousands of other co-passengers and have been through all of the above situations described above.
Our trains are more popularly known by a few numbers and alphabets – the 9.10 CST, the 7.57 K, the 5.20 D and you get an idea! So much so that entire groups have been formed based on the time of the train and the destination. And you really start to enjoy their company as you see familiar faces every day. You may not know most of their names but acknowledge their presence with a smile. (Beautifully captured in the closing scenes of A Wednesday!)
I have boarded a train absolutely clueless but when I alighted at my destination, I knew a lot about stock markets and could give you a few excellent tips myself and you which could lead you to believe that I am the Oracle of Ghatkopar. I knew about the latest political manoeuvrings and had Bollywood gossip served fresh and hot! Oh and just drop in a word on yesterday’s cricket match and it’s like lighting a match to an oil tanker. The whole compartment will explode and all the cricket experts will argue furiously that Dhoni should have sent Yuvraj up the order and why Harbhajan should have bowled round the wicket to Kevin Pietersen. Yes! If you don’t mind all the pushing and the shoving and people stomping on your feet, then it would be quite an enjoyable ride. In fact, one of the best ways to prepare for a GD or an interview, would be to take a first class ticket, initiate a conversation, sit back and you will come back an enlightened person!
There are several other unforgettable memories associated with travelling in our trains – the card playing group, the bhajan singling mandli, the vegetable cutting housewives on the way back home, the compartment to compartment salesman (I swear that if you want to learn how to sell, just listen to them make their pitch to the people – it’s fantastic!) and of course the minor altercations due to the inevitable pushing and shoving. I remember the most amusing thing would be people from the other end of the compartment making their wisecrack comments about the fights going on!
I remember the great times we had travelling to college as a group. Discussions, debates, leg-pulling, sometimes just plain nonsense, sometimes serious and sensible. But travelling alone is also equally interesting. However strange it may sound to you, this is the one time when you are alone with your thoughts, pondering about the day that was about to begin or reflecting on the day that was on the way back home. It also gave you some time to catch up with the latest news (if you were bored of the conversation around!) by reading the newspaper or the latest novel. Oh! If you really want to master the art of reading a newspaper, you should catch the morning train while going to work. (The multiple folds of the paper and the unbelievable positioning of the paper in spite of the lack of room).
Earlier when I used to travel, I used to marvel at how people could sleep in the train in such heat and with so much noise around. However, I now am a certified practioner of sleeping in trains. A half hour nap and you end up feeling refreshed! The sleep just comes automatically, which may be due to the rocking motion of the train. And it is equally amazing that people seemingly fast asleep get up without any alarm just as their destination is approaching! (Though there have been several times when I have missed my stop!)
There are problems too – the delays, the crowd, the long ticket lines, breakdown during rains which most people are familiar with and yet we tend to shrug it off.
Because we know that the local train symbolises our city – nonstop, fast paced, efficient and single minded. Selfish on the outside, but always willing to help whenever needed. The only mode of transport that connects our ever growing city and keeps the cosmopolitan culture going. The local does not distinguish between religion, caste, sex. You can find the peon and his boss travelling together, the student and the professor, the doctor and the patient. It is a great leveller and in the biggest democracy in the world – one of its most well known symbols.
Some links
Watch this excellent documentary by BBC on our suburban railway system.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/bombay-railway.shtml
nicely put, I havent been that deeply associated with local trains, but have travelled quite a bit in it, and much more in its elder cousin the Indian Railways...
ReplyDeleteU missed Vada Pav and nimbu paani/kokum just after stepping down of the train :)
also another thng abt railways, the smell of the window railings, its so railway-ish
I started writing a story about 3 people who meet on a train, a beggar, a coolie and a hermaphrodite and then sm suspense thriller type...
Didnt come out tht well though, need to rework, will do sometime, whn i have some time :)
very nicely put...... even i have made these observations whenever i used to travel in local train..... It is fun to observe zillions of people around you.... :)
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