Nostalgia revisited : 2nd class

I missed the train. How could one miss a train standing on the right platform at the right time with a confirmed reservation… perhaps if one doesn’t have the physical ticket in his hand? Thanks to the ticketing agent who in a very planned manner reached the station five minutes after the train had comfortably ambled past me. Sometimes I curse my anger, which at times, doesn’t come at the right time. This was one such time and I saw the guy with a non-apologetic grin. Why didn’t I feel like bashing him?

I had stood there fuming. I hated being given a raw deal, and well, who doesn’t. So it had happened and here I was standing at the platform watching the big yellow X mark behind the last compartment of the train getting smaller and smaller and slowly disappearing into oblivion as I saw my chance to reach Ahmedabad early withering away.

I hadn’t been to Ahmedabad city since I’d left about 14 years back. 14 years was a long time. I could hear the song “14 years” by Guns n Roses starting in my mind and I knew it was sure to stay till the end of the blog. Well, a missed comfy AC chair car had gone and left me the option of taking the next train where my only way to grab a berth was to bribe my way into the 2nd class compartment of the next train.

As I entered the compartment, I suddenly felt a tang of nostalgia. I had been to this place before, perhaps many times. Just that as I stood looking at the 2nd class compartment, it seemed much smaller. I could easily manage to get on the top berth without climbing those iron squares where as a kid I used to hang around like a monkey. I wondered as I sat, about the past which I had forgot many times over. When was the last time I traveled 2nd class? Not on the job for sure, I would snub even the thought of train travel in a non-AC compartment below my dignity. Not during my MBA or Engineering either, dad wont hear of it. AC compartments are much much safer, he would say and would make sure I take the prescribed safer and more comfortable route. But as I sat I remembered ,as a kid, so many of my journeys through this magnificent 2nd class. And why magnificent? Wasn’t it great the chatter of so many people. So many vendors of tea, coffee and other sweet meats crossing you and all of them looking exactly the same with a similar tone and pitch of voice soliciting for a sale. Where was I all these years and why didn’t I miss this before, I thought.

And just then, the guy on the topmost berth asked me to switch off the light and I moved those thick joy-stick like buttons which as I kid, loved to switch on and off just to hear the noise of and would then in vain, try to balance those buttons in between to confuse them whether to switch on or remain switched off. When there was silence, the noise of the fans would make me feel homely and relaxed. It was dark and I couldn’t see the tracks. When sitting near the window, I remembered, my eyes would always follow the tracks, and they seem to be competing with the speeding train, running along as long as my eyes were fixed on them and then quietly opting out as soon as the eyes were lifted. I wanted to do it right now as I helplessly groped for them in the dark.

It was getting a little chilly as the old lady sitting next to me bought another packet of peanuts from the vendor and split open the plastic to spill some on her saree which soon were hen pecked disappearing into her mouth. At times , I feel the ones which fell from the packet were much tasty, more cherished. They were like Gods own children which were special and kept by Him away from the crowd and to be considered worthy of seeking and pampering.

The train jerked slightly and the bottle hanging on the grayish hooks brushed my head as if to remind me that I was forgetting them on those ancient hooks. I felt like a story teller writing about these little things as if they were alive and reading this blog. I wouldn’t have been surprised if another jerk would have made me touch those omnipresent steel bottle stands which were staidly fixed nest to the stamped seat numbers.

I wondered if I had ever noticed so many things as a kid. And as an adult I again wonder if I could recollect so many wonderful times I had spent traveling through this mode of a common Indian. It made me feel so good and proud of not thinking of my supposedly high-flying job which had made me forget the commonality I had once shared and for the time being again cherish the beauty of being a common Indian.