I live in Mumbai and swear by the Mumbai locals. So much so I started a tumblog on my adventures in the city’s local trains/ with the city’s locals last year.
While the local trains are intense sessions – densely packed, sometimes with tempers rising and arms flailing, inter-city commutes are more conducive for reflection and sight seeing.
However traveling in trains within India also entails conversing with people from various walks of life, exchanging stories and chai and other pleasantries. It is an understated rule that people will ask you questions. That is how most people pass time on trains barring Millenials I guess. But thanks to the patchy telecom networks between hubs, no one can escape this chit chat.
On my way to the Startup India conference held at Goa on Oct 7th and 8th, I met a mixed bag of people. They were so warm!
One was a middle aged man from Gujarat who was also a marketing manager, heading to Goa for a business meet. The other was a duo – a young boy named Fahad, in his 20s, who was studying M.Com and an old man named ‘Kunjumon Haaji’ who I took to be his grand father. They had just returned from a pilgrimage to Ajmer’s famous ‘Dargah’.
Then there was a young athletic lady who was employing my usual tactic – listening to music in the corner.
The young boy Fahad had this wide welcoming grin on his face. He was attempting to speak to me in his broken Hindi. That meant he was from South India. One word more and I knew he was from Kerala. It takes one to know one I guess. He asked me where I was from. I said ‘Cochin’. He was like ‘What! You are Malayali too!’ (almost with indignation at having been made to struggle for that long). But I had the same difficulty speaking my native tongue as he had with speaking his mother tongue. India and its many tongues I tell you!
He told me about his trip to Ajmer and his old man chipped in, peppering it with elderly warmth. Fahad was a natural conversationalist, pulling people into conversations like a suave Salsa Casanova switching partners. He got Gujju uncle into the loop by asking him about his role with Nice Pharma. Fahad himself had a part time gig marketing pharmaceutical products in Calicut, Kerala. Turns out there is a huge health city in the making and a lot of OTC businesses are setting up shops there. They exchanged emails and promised to be in touch.
Then he turns to me and says that lady there is a referee. I am excited ‘WHAAA! Really!’. And for the first time ever, I prodded her (Yes, I shattered her wall of ‘don’t disturb me’ to hear her story) and asked ‘You are a Referee? How cool is that!’
She was definitely a lady of few words but she obliged. She told us how challenging it was to be a referee. Imagine running the length of a football field for 90 minutes watching every move. She also said that it was thankless – your verdict invariably rubbed one team the wrong way. She narrated the times when she had actually made a mistake – the hurl of abuses from athletes, the guilt at setting back a team and the shame of being incompetent were all incredibly challenging. I was genuinely touched by her open nature even though she seemed reserved. She wasn’t glossing over it, she wasn’t hiding…she was so real.
I believe we need to celebrate people and their journeys. And to do that we need to shatter our ideals of beauty, of being, of aspirations – ones that are invariably more warped for women. One way to do this is to share our story and to listen to theirs as they take us on a heartfelt journey. It doesn’t matter how long or short, how happy or sad, triumphant or turbulent it is. What matters is how we are able to listen. How we are able to share. Wearing our heart.
So I took her email address to stay in touch after.
After she went back into her zone, the 4 of us kept talking about various things. Then Fahad left to do his namaaz. Kunjumon Hajji bought all of us some hot chai and then he proceed to have his dinner. He wasn’t too happy with the dinner on the train so he sprinkled his go-to powder. I took a guess ‘Chemeen? (prawns?)’. He laughed and said, ‘Yes!’. Goes with anything and everything!’.
I was eating an orange I had packed for the trip. K.H offered me some Prawn Powder. I was bewildered and said a big NO. I offered Fahad an orange. K.H offered him the prawn powder. Fahad obliged us both and then made a face to me as K.H went back to having his dinner. Oranges and Prawns weren’t quite the combo. Later I got to know that they weren’t related but were neighbors in a small town near Calicut. KH was single and doted on Fahad as his son. When I was setting up my berth, I heard KH tell Fahad to help me but then he also said ‘Although she seems the type who’s quite used to traveling on her own’. I liked the old man.
Finally we all called it a day and crashed. I had my elevator pitch to think about. The next day Mr. Marketer, Ms. Referee and I woke up at 4:20 a.m as we were scheduled to arrive at 4:30 am. We huddled by the exit and watched the scenic villages of Goa roll by. 4:30 turned to 5 and then 6…and we were just inching our way to Madgao, our destination. People had gone back for the second leg of their sleep cycle. Fahad joined us and we stood by the doorway, chatting away.
Finally we arrived at Madgaon. We exchanged emails and goodbyes. I met my driver Doris who was amazing and ever helpful during my stay in Goa. It is always heartwarming to come across beautiful strangers and I was sure my trip had got a head start.
Bodista 