A gratifying shopping trip & lip-smacking snacks later, we decided it was time to head back to the resort.Inspite of constant nagging from hubby dear, we managed to lose time in shopping and loafing around. By the time wisdom dawned upon us and we decided to head back, it was already too late. The city is Mumbai, the hour, 6:30 PM on a Friday and our mode of commute? The local (train)! ....
Boarding the train at the originating station helped us grab a few seats. As the train started to move, we slowly drifted away into a tired drowse - only to be awoken to shouts from somewhere behind us “Aage Badho, aur aage badho bhai” . Shockingly, the entire compartment was crammed within no time!
I noticed an elderly gentleman navigating through the crowd towards us. He wanted to place his bag on the storage area over our seat. On placing the bag, we expected him to move away and find a place to stand in somewhere in the crowd. But no! He never budged! He stood riveted there - between the row seats facing each other,right in front of us! Very soon, there was a request from an elderly aunty to make place for her, since she was unable to stand. She was supposedly ill. That made four of us on a seat meant for 2 adults.Half-an-hour into the journey and another to go, some of us struck a conversation with the elderly gentleman trapped infront of us. Casual inquiries revealed that this was his daily routine. Apparently, he commutes to work the same way - one hour of standing between people! ...I thanked my stars for not having to go through this ordeal.
From the announcements and billboards in the station,earlier,it was clear that most of the trains were either nine or twelve boogied.I furiously noted that the one we were in, had only nine compartments.As is obvious,my first thoughts were - why couldn't they add more compartments,atleast during the peak hours? What kind of life is it, if you had to stand for an hour to commute to your workplace, in an extremely crowded train,day in & day out? And then, return the same way? Later that day, I learnt that though Mumbai is supposed to be the financial capital of the country, it gets very little attention - in terms of improvisation of infrastructure, unfortunately. Sad, really! I digress,though.
Coming back to the local. Those who have commuted by a Mumbai local during peak hours would have known how hard it is to get into or get out of the train. For this reason, we decided it was impossible for us to get down at our destined stop. Hence, feebly resigned to our fate and made up our mind to alight at the last stop.At that point,the gentleman trapped infront of us, who was listening to our discussion intently, pitched in to help. Luckily, he was to alight at the same station.He suggested we should start planning our exit one stop prior to the destination. That was the trick!
As planned, the elderly gentleman started wriggling his way through the crowd, one stop prior.One by one, all of us followed him, forming a line in which the ladies were sandwiched between the men folk. It seemed as if we were preparing ourselves for a bungy jump!As we inched forward, we could sense some sort of excitment building up in the people around us - who by now, know every minute detail of our "mission disembarkment". I noticed a few keen eyes watching our every move,with bated breath!Soon we heard the train slowing down and then screeching to a halt at our destination.We were somewhere close to the exit, but still not out. That is all I remember. Before we knew it, we were all on the platform and were continuing to move with the human current towards the exit of the station. A sense of achievement engulfed us. We made it! Hurray! We survived the Mumbai local!
We thanked the gentleman who helped us and that is when I asked him his name. Prakash, is his name. The whole experience is going to stay with me in the years to come. Prakash is a living example of the Mumbaikar spirit. Inspite of his daily ordeal,he managed to have pleasant disposition towards total strangers on the train and even helped them! Three cheers to that human spirit! On that note, I bid adieu for now. Merry Christmas!
