My experience with local trains began with my first year of engineering. To reach my college I have to spend five hours of my daily life in local trains, to be more specific- in ladies’ compartments.
Every morning at 8, one has to wait on the platform for the train to arrive as a predator waits for its prey. Clutching one’s bag to your chest, ready to pounce into the ladies’ compartment the moment the train comes to halt. Ladies’ compartment is characterized by the state of profound pandemonium. Then after some shoving and punching, which might put a professional rugby player to shame you are welcomed into the compartment with a diatribe for having stepped on some fat lady’s feet. Though you concede your guilt from the inside, of having caused such an injury, you can’t really help it at the same time can’t admit it on her face lest you want to be slapped. Till here, you have won only half the battle, the next step is to get in between a seat of rows by trampling a few more pairs of so-called ‘pedicured’ feet which belong to forty somethings who hate themselves to be called “aunties”. This is a major problem of Ladies’ compartment- even after traveling for the last 4 years, I have failed to figure out the mode of addressing my co-passengers. It’s neither by their first name (then it becomes an issue of prestige), neither as aunty (do they seem that old?) nor didi (“we are almost the same age!!!!!!!!!”)- I don’t know how?
Now that you have finally got your foot-hold in the compartment (here I must specify that standing on one foot or standing on a toe is also considered as a foothold), you have to attain the impossible- reserve a seat for the last 3 stations (in a 15 stations journey) in an unreserved train compartment. How? Well, for this you need to have “contacts” or “informers” or you should be in good books of an “influential” compatriot. You have to follow your compartment’s rules in making reservations- if you break it, you are handed an indictment- may be life time ban from the compartment.
Let me introduce you to my co-passengers- people who have never traveled in local trains may never have an idea of what wider range of professions exist where only ladies can be employed.
If I have to describe my train buddies- it would be really difficult to put all of them in a single mould. In fact their personas are poles apart, and not all of them belong to a single strata of society. Most of them have a veneer on them, which disables a person to guess about their personal selves at first glance. Why first glance? Even after I have spent nearly 4 years traveling with the same set of ladies- talking to them for nearly 5 hours everyday, I don’t know their names or where they go, what exactly they do. They prefer it that way- no personal questions should be asked unless they prefer to tell you themselves. But what is common in most of them is, their speech is characterized by staccato and most of them have a proclivity towards covetous desires.
Once inside the train, most of them acquire their second personality- they are beautician, doctor, chief minister, caring guardian, expert cook and so many other things at the same time.
Their real professions range from charwoman, to sales-girl, to factory worker, to manager. Some don’t want to name their professions- you can guess why.
After talking to them, (i.e. even if you don’t talk they will make you talk by their piquant nature) what I found common amongst the most is not all but the majority have to face obscene treatments from their husbands who refuse to abstain from gambling and alcohol, and their in-laws despite of the fact that these ladies are the sole bread-winners of their families. Yet what seems surprising to me is even after leading a life of depravity , these tortures and sufferings are the least petulant to them and they become all the more debonair as they enter the train and chatter away like school girls till the end of the journey. All of them have a strong determination teamed with indefatigable energy to redeem their and their families from penury and abysmal living standards to a better standard.
Their daily struggle has enabled them to face whatever situation they are put into with utmost alacrity. Once I forgot my monthly ticket at home and to top it, I couldn’t make my way inside the compartment. So I had to stand on the dashboard. I had noticed from the day one of my train journey that a huge group of ladies (mainly domestic helpers) sit on the dashboard. That part of the train is their property by birth-right and any trespassers are duly put to “punishment”. That day I knew that I have to face a series of slang and so many other abuses half of whose meaning I would not be able to decipher. One of those ladies (seeing me standing there) asked me to sit down. On seeing my troubled face, she asked me ‘what’s the matter?’ I told her that I had forgotten my ticket. She laughed like a clown and said “You know what, I have never bought a ticket in my lifetime. Once a ticket-checker caught me and asked for my ticket, do you know what I told him? I told him- ‘See sahib, yesterday I got married, but last night my groom had run away, I an going to kolkata to find him, by evening if I don’t get him I’ll take you back home as my groom-so either you become my groom or you let me go so that I can search for him.’ After that , that ticket-checker never asked me for my ticket.” Good story, but can I repeat this if I am caught? Next she asked my how many houses do I work in? God help my appearance, anyways the train arrived at my station and I have to get down. I couldn’t give her a number but a smile is all that came to my lips- she probably thought me as an illiterate.
My friends who had spent their college life in hostel tell me that I have missed hostel-life. But can I explain them what I have gained and they have missed.
I can go on and on about my comic experiences on train which is a mirror to exactly how rude the world is, but yet people smile, laugh and try to find happiness in their own way. May be this is why this city is called “the city of joy”.
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