I walked through the train compartment and peeped over all heads to find my seat number. I found it a while later and was relieved as it was a window seat. I pushed my few luggages underneath the seats and fell heavily on my seat. The window was open and a slight breeze brushed my face. Then I saw, and realized with dread that a group of people had come making a lot of noise, and they were conquering it all, all the seats, even mine and squashing me to the window. Now, there were people beside me, in front of me and over me. They were probably travelling short distance and thus needed no berth. They were all of different shapes and sizes and gushed from nowhere like tumbling pieces of mountain rock. I was suffocating and the heat and sweat of many revolted my tummy. I was nauseating and I realized I would die if my nose was left there taking in all that cocktail of an air. So, I poked my nose out through the window and took in the air outside that was filled with all that an Indian railway track and air was gifted with.
The sky was orange, the sun was hot, the air was humid and the train was packed as I began my journey home one late Sunday afternoon. I stayed like that with my nose sticking out and my body and limbs sandwiched between the train and the very fat Kanchipuram silk sari clad sweaty woman beside me, and a lot of minutes later the train started moving. The woman relaxed a bit as the train started and let out a long sigh and straightened her broad and heavy shoulders cramping me to the maximum. A cry of discomfort escaped my mouth and the woman looked at me with an expression that said “aye! Now where did you come from?” and then it switched to a more helpless and sad face which said “what to do girl, all of us should adjust right?” and she nodded at me as if to make sure I understood and obeyed her. I looked over her gigantic figure to see three other Kanchipuram silk clad over fat women and it doomed on me that I would be squashed no matter how much ever they tried not to. I relaxed and adjusted myself as the line that I was, between the train and the ocean of Kanchipuram silk.
They spoke to each other without a break and the sound of their conversation was capable of even silencing the sound of the train. There were all men opposite us, and I first assumed them to be the respective husbands of the Kanchipuram women, but then later I understood that they were just men that were of the same place as where the women came from and as the women weren’t fit, or they were believed to be unfit, to travel alone, as in without a man accompanying them, these men decided to travel along with the Kanchipuram women, after attending the wedding ceremony which they had been to, to the destination which was common to both sides. As I was stuck there in my seat or rather in a side of my seat I had very little chance for movements. The train was speeding and the wind blew my hair and I was getting tickled as my hair brushed my face and partly blinded my left eye, after a few attempts to try and lift my both arms to tie back my hair failed, I stood up amongst them while all eyes watched me, I pulled all my hair back and tied it up in a pony, I sat back struggling to find that little space for my butt to fit in and I stared back at them but they were fine with it and after a point of time when the eye contact turned weird, at least for me, I shifted my gaze from the old man’s eyes opposite me and looked out of the window. They resumed their conversations once again and I felt relaxed to have got freed from the spotlight. The language that they spoke was familiar but their slang and the funny tone which they had to their speech baffled me and I almost understood nothing of what they were talking, whenever the Kanchipuram silk lady beside me tried to include me into their conversations all I could do was stare back at her with a stupid stretch of my lips which I hoped could deceive them to be my smile, but every time I did that the woman got upset and left me there with that dumb expression and ignored me for quite a while. I did not exactly want to impress them but I did not want to upset them either. They seemed to be nice and friendly and I didn’t want to be rude, but I felt helpless after a while, as neither did I feel like laughing nor did I feel like talking to them. I found it too stressful to follow their conversation and I wanted to be left alone, but it was hard to do that when so many happy faced people persuaded you to join them. Thus I ignored the view outside and I let myself be entertained with their smiles and laughter and the music of their speech. It was only after an hour or so that they let themselves fall into their afternoon sunny humid sweaty uncomfortable slumber.
I plugged in my earphones and listened to my favorite songs while the sky with the sun moved closer to mark the end of the day. The sky was turning more orange and the sun was just providing light. The farmlands that we soared past had kids playing and dogs chasing around, the cows were taken home by their men and the birds were in a haste to reach their nests. Journey back home every month is a familiar yet thrilling one and I have enjoyed all of them. The route is always the same, the train too is always the same yet the journeys have always presented me with new experiences because the people I travel along are never the same ones.
I was all stiff after sitting in that cramped space for more than two hours and so I decided to stand near the door of the compartment for a while, on the way I also bought a cup coffee from the coffee guy. The door was open; the wind that came in was so forceful that I found it hard to keep my eyes open, the coffee was hot and full in the paper cup, the door was swaying and I held it with my left hand from banging onto me and the coffee cup in my right hand tilted and the hot coffee was all over me. I jumped in shock as the hot coffee reached my skin through my clothes, I looked into the cup to see if there was anything left and there was half of it still in there. I ignored my coffee stained clothes and sipped the remaining coffee as per my original plan. Thankfully no major stations arrived for more than half an hour and I could be there, enjoying the windy beginning of that another beautiful evening.
As I reached my seat I found that my co-passengers had all woken up and had piled up their entire luggage on one of the lower berths. When one of the men saw me he smiled at me and said something indicating the luggage. I couldn’t really make out what he said so I nodded my head with a smile. The train was slowing down and was about to reach their station. The men took most of their bags and before moving to the door smiled at me and wagged their heads from side to side, indicating that they were going and that they were happy to have met me, so I did the same to each one of them. The ladies too did the same except for the one who sat beside me who touched my face along with the waging and smiling. They were all finally gone, as the train started moving I saw them walking on the platform hurriedly to reach their homes. Only when they moved out of my sight did I realize that I was smiling.
It was dark enough for the lights to be switched on. I was hungry and the dinner that I had ordered had not yet come. The two men who had entered from the previous station were discussing furiously about their work and every few minutes one of their cell phones rang out aloud. After a while, when I was too involved in the book that I was reading and had forgotten about my hunger, the dinner arrived. I continued reading and when I was done with that one chapter I carved into the food that was wrapped up before me.
My tummy was full and my head was sleepy and all that I cared about now was sleep, my good night’s sleep. I needed my blanket to sleep, my blanket was in my bag and my bag was underneath my seat. So I bent down to fetch it only to find the space underneath my seat empty and dark. My bag was gone. The silk sari lady and party had taken my luggage along with theirs. I was numb with shock that I first didn’t realize what all I would lose with that American Tourister bag. When thoughts in my head settled down a bit the things that I had lost and their importance banged their way into my skull. Everything in it mattered and it was all lost.
I didn’t know what to do so I called up my father and then my mother and then I called up my friends and then I again called up my mother and then for a change called up my father and after a while my father called me and we spoke for a while and he spoke out ideas to retrieve my lost bag and when it all turned out too much for me to handle I felt that lump in my throat and I hung up. After a while I called back my father and together we reached a conclusion. The conclusion was not to worry and travel home, which was 12 hours away, and then later what to be done would be decided. And then it occurred to me, my sleep would be ruined as I have lost my blanket too, I should have kept my blanket in my handbag. Even though the conclusion that we arrived told me not to worry, I found worrying inevitable.
I stared out through the window into the dark night and I was filled with a bad feeling. The kind of bad feeling which makes it difficult for you to leave your eyebrows relaxed. I was too immersed in that bad feeling that I didn’t first realize that somebody was tapping on my shoulder, I looked at the man who was standing there who appeared to be a porter. He was wearing a blood red shirt and black trousers, he was trying to smile but there was a quizzical expression trying to hide the smile. It took me a moment to realize that there was something placed by his feet. I noticed it; I noticed my American Tourister and jumped up in delight. The people around me looked at the porter to see what he has got in him to make me so dramatic. I was so happy that my voice came out in a squeak when I asked him “how? How did you get this?”He told me in his broken Hindi which was better than mine, that three men had come to the previous station and they asked him to deliver this bag to a lady who was in the coach S8 in the seat 47. And when I asked him whether he did it for free he grinned at me implying an obvious no. I was so happy to get my bag back that I stood there for a moment looking at it. I was brought back to reality when the porter cleared his throat, he was waiting for me to make his payment, and his eyes spoke so well for him. I took out my wallet and paid him a sum which I thought was reasonable but he found it too unfair. He told me that he had to travel all the way back and it was only fair if I gave him the taxi fair, he could travel by bus too, I thought, but I was too happy and grateful for having got my stuff back that I paid him what he asked and bid him good bye.
I sat back and examined my stuff and was pleased to find it all safe and back in my hands, before zipping it shut, I took out my blanket. In the excitement I called up everyone who knew about my lost bag and told them the happy news.
As I lay down to sleep I thanked those three men who took all the pains to hand my bag back to me. They didn’t have to do it even though it was their fault, but they did it, and things for me were back on track. I couldn’t stop smiling, I listened to some good music before the bumpy, not so deep sleep that nights in a train offered, evaded me.
