The daily train journey

Although this blog is for me to post experiences that I have in the US of A, this week, I am kinda reminiscing about Bombay. I couldnt help but write something about an unique trait of the city of Mumbai, and what better or worse, than the Mumbai Local Trains.

Growing up in Mumbai and living mostly in the suburbs, makes you rely heavily on public transport to reach your college or workplace or the bank. Even if you had a car, you wouldnt want to take it out. It would take forever.

Mumbai is a long stretch of land, surrounded by the Arabian Sea. South Mumbai is the area with the fancy spots, whereas the north was the dungeon. Every morning, scores would leave their dungeons to go to work. And the fastest way to reach their goal, was to take the overcrowded local train network.

The train service, one of the most efficient services provided by the government is outdated technology, but yet functional and very much the life line. Each day, traveling on those trains, is a crash course in time management, people handling, health management, 'saving your mind' management, optimization, survival skills, and more. It could also lead to depression, stress, anxiety, cravings, and easy access to suicidal opportunities.

One of my favorite sights on the train, was that of a tall man hanging on to his newspaper neatly folded into many layers, so that the end product is a 15 * 15 cm square piece that he holds skillfully with a strong grip of his left fingers, whereas the right arm dangles, holding the overhead support. He is surrounded by other commuters on all sides, not at a safe distance, but clinging on to him or sticking to him. The shorter ones probably have their heads sticking out under the arm pits of the taller neighbour. Most of them end up breathing air, which is polluted with a generous dosage of body odour. Well, amidst all the chaos, when the train has started moving and is probably about ten mins away from the next station, calmness is restored. The tall man, focuses his attention to his reading material and reads every line on it. The interesting facet is that on the other side, another person too is reading the back side of same square literature. The untold agreement always amazed me. If the bearer of the newspaper finishes his section and wishes to unscramble the newspaper and then fold it back to a different section to read further, he asks the stranger on the other side, if its ok to do so. The stranger might ask the tall man to hold on as he still has the last bit on aishwariya rai to complete. Why would the newspaper owner be curteous enough to check on the other person? Probably because, on the next train journey, he might be on the other side, reading tidbits off another stranger's newspaper and hoping that the favor would be returned.