"crowded" train

Ah!! Its been a while since I posted anything. There'll be a few more frequent posts in the next few days as I'm frankly catching up with my own thoughts. Every morning when I travel to work I think of funnier things to post, but couldn't get them through, anyway better late than never.

Here's a funny incident the other morning. Basically I travel – in what I think – is the most crowded train in the world. Obviously a lot of exaggeration and a bit of Murphy at play here but its true. The crowd catches up with you. You are there perfectly well in time awaiting your train, a few minutes later, just a few seconds before the train arrives, the platform fills in with tonnes of people. All part of the same “crowd”. We all do it don't we. Nikunj and I don't go to Feltham for a movie on a Friday night because we know we wont get any tickets, rather try Wandsworth.

I enjoy crowd to be honest, particularly on these cold mornings, its much more warmer. Some humans (like me) are poikilothermic, we need external heat sources to maintain our body temperature than others aka more woollens. And on the other brighter side you are exposed to the fragrance of a unlikely-uncoherent mixture of the dolce & gabbanas, the armanis, the c&ks, the guccis etc fantastic perfumes that people wear. And on the slightly grayer side the natural aroma of the homo-sapien himself who thinks of saving one of the planets most valuable natural resource – water – by NOT showering.

On such a slightly busy morning trains, Just as I made my way through the gates, the closing door signals started beeping and a young lady squeezed in before they actually closed. The travel time in the busy train from where we boarded to where we had to alight was less than 10 minutes. The jam inside the closed doors was worth having a glance at. There are these sleepy ones for whom only larger dozes of caffeine would suffice. There was this other lady doing tidying of eyelashes (this was on her seat mind you, plenty of room there). There are many other blank faces. There are people like me who keep looking at everyone else. Its a funny scene (to me at least). I fundamentally do not understand this thirst of “reading” of the people commuting to work. They pickup the latest freely available Metro from the stations which frankly has nothing but a cover story and a bunch of non-sense. I've also tried my hand at sudokus for while and then given up. Jodie tells me she's won quite a few gifts from them (encouragement to people who do it). No matter how stuffed you are in a train, these people “HAVE TO READ THE PAPER”. Doesn't matter if its getting in the face of the person next to you. Poor neighbours are staring at inverted adverts as the guy who's holding the paper is reading the lower half of the cover story and has folded the paper.

Back to our lady who's squeezed in. A few minutes of the journey and her blackberry comes to life with the most annoying ring-tone in the world. Its the very common “trrrrriiiiiiinnnggg”. It gets louder and louder. Guys making all such annoying ring-tones should think twice before releasing them (in public interest). In a lot of dis-comfort she manages to take the call - “hi honey!” “in a train...can't talk now” “will call you when I reach Victoria!”. The next thing she's doing is typing a text to the same bloke I believe - “train's stuffed with people.. lot of crowd! what a mess!”.

Bless her soul, not her fault if she lives in a country who's population is less than Mumbai, and infrastructure is feeling the pinch everywhere. And at the end of the day, who is this crowd that we hate so much? You and me.

In all fairness, looking at the brighter side of things make you think and smile even when you are alone. And thats all life's all about.

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