Around the world in 14 hours ..

.. or at least it felt that way. On a lazy Wednesday afternoon, a time I'd rather be spending lazing around in the bed, has been taken over by the scorching heat which is forcing me to stay off the boiling mattress. Might as well complete the second half of the train journey lest I forget for want of an ageing memory which is not getting any sharper with passing time.

From the last post you must have realised that train journeys usually come about as unwanted reminders of how irritating some people might get, but what is about to ensue now is what drove me to keep this post as second. If I hit you with this one first, the Gujju family chronicles would have lost their place. Now am no playwright, but as a convenience to the author, I will try to quote as much as possible and provide a list of the main characters at the start. Feel free to reference the list whenever you're lost in the post.

O.G.P. - played by "oh ji prahji" *balle balle*

J.M.D. - played by "jai mata di", the *shiv shiv shiv shiv* auntyji

J.S. - played by "Jai Saurashtra", the continuously beetle-tobacco chewing maniac

Hum - played by the U.P. couple, who could not refer to themselves as "main" (me)

I know a compartment in the train usually has 8 berths, but trust me with the Gujju family hogging 2, and the above 5 (3+2), we just had one big unhappy party! The scene opens with O-ji-prahji seating himself next to me, and running his fingers through his moustache and beard, like a dacoit happy with his prize catch after looting a helpless village. The fingers go left and right, round and round, up and down, before he finally gives up, having annoyed everyone around with the final hook of the finger dishing out a yucky dumpling from out of his nose. I look the other way, hoping to imagine him away and having a beautiful maiden seated next to me. Alas, the burp that explodes from his mouth dashes all such hopes!

While OGP has been busy with his displays of indecency, the couple seated in front of me have managed to drag out everyone's luggage from under the berths to make sure their trolley bag was "accessible". The husband tries desperately to use his scrawny frame to manage a heave so that JS' bag can be shoved into the fray of suitcases as well. He fails. Now weirdly enough, this bloke is a sly fox, and instead of asking for help, he tries to get a workaround and starts eyeing in my direction. The eyes meet, his moves down, to my feet, trying desperately to catch a glimpse if any space is available. Oh no you're not! I cross my feet, the soles facing his eager eyes. The territory has been marked. The jungle instinct is raring. The hyena dare not harbour into the lion's den. The bloke realises the ferocity in my eyes and backs off.

JS could not be less bothered about his stuff, which is why I wondered if the UP bloke was being sensible in sticking it out for his luggage. As if the continuous rattle from JS' phone playing old forgotten Hindi songs which would make a few friends of mine VERY happy given the games they play, he gets a phone call. The ringtone is not set to default Nokia. What plays is a mix of a whelp yelling after being hit, and a donkey making orgasmic sounds. It as become a funny habit amongst people to let the ringtone play. Ok, we get it, you have music playing. He stares, bobs the head a little to the right, a little to the left, makes a face, squints his eyes as if staring at the number from a far off place, twitches his moustache, and clicks, "hello" - finally!

The telephonic conversation that goes on from here, makes time stand still, and all hope vanish, for JS could not have murdered words as much as he did during those 5 minutes of talking. He wanted a cake which had "Muckkey Moooooooz" on it, and the "philabhar" was to be "pn .. apppppl". The reason given for the cake's shape was that the boy who wanted it was a "phan" of the "kooomik shomik mein aate hain na - chitra witra". After 4-5 repititions of the same words, with futility, JS agreed on texting him the name of the cake, the flavour and the name of the boy. You would think the ordeal ends here, wouldn't you ? Having explored all possible ways he could have messed up the procedure to order a cake, this same bloke gets a phone call after an hour with the person on the other side yelling "It is not his birthday, its Manoj's birthday!!" The following words cannot be mentioned due to censor board guidelines, but they took the effect of the bloke forgetting which of his sons' birthday it was. The humanity !

We pull into Delhi Cantt. railway station, and JMD makes her entry. She's accompanied by her son, who's walking with a stick, limping. The son tells behenji to hurry up, and she starts panicking rocking from side to side in a STANDING TRAIN !! The train has stopped for only 10 minutes, and the suitcase needs to be slid in, hugs given, kiss on the forehead and 4 rounds of goodbyes yet to be done with. The son looks at his watch tenaciously, sweating a little apparently from all the running to make the aunty catch the train. Now in this reunion, or rather farewell, our great OGP has to butt in. He stands up, half his shirt tucked into his jeans, and the other half dangling. An embroidered jeans with a yellow dragon running from the back pocket to the lower end of the right calf. Right in between the mom and son, he grabs the son by the shoulder and starts shoving in a polite manner. The reason given by our wise sage is, "If you do not get off now, you won't ever be able to let go! Let go of the feelings and never look back!" We all are in shock - what in Gawd's oh so sweet name is this crazy dumbass talking about?! He continues to press him backwards, the mother, in the typical "Mother India" melodrama is dragged, trailing OGP. All of us just sit there, agape, at the hilarity of what is happening.

The bloke gets off and as sardarji brings aunty back to her seat, she starts sobbing, to which he gives her a lecture, the details of which I cannot reproduce, because I shut my senses off for the utter nonsense that was playing in front of us - there is only so much that my conscious brain could take! By the time I regained consciousness, everyone had snuggled into their blankets, and food had arrived. Dinner, was a "pleasure" with the grand Gujju family, but as always, I guess Punjabis make sure they have the lasting effect of being the most obnoxious. OGP wants chicken. The train ain't got enough chicken. He should have mentioned it when asked before. OGP picks up a fight. In his usual Big Brotherly fashion he takes the attendant aside, slips in a 10er and asks for "arrangements" to be made. A 10er ?! Are you kidding me ?! The attendant is infuriated, tells him the money isn't necessary, and gets him his goddamn chicken. Now am no newbie, but I am a 100% sure that the cover on top of that chicken was moved, and nothing other than spit could have formed the garnish on that piece of meat! He chomps, as happy as a pig can be. He burps. The attendant is called upon again, and this time the complaint is "chicken khane mein mazaa nahi aaya, veggie khane lao". The bloke never returned, and we had to listen to OGP harp on rudeness and unprofessional behaviour for another half hour!

The aunty meanwhile, had decided to call up her son and tell him how there were flesh eaters in her compartment - yes, she was actually whining on the phone that she was stuck with non-vegetarians. For heaven's sake lady get a grip on your numb skull ! She sits up, crosses her legs, which have already started smelling of goo. The stench fills the compartment, each of us looking at the other's face, contemplating who shall be the one to break the news to aunty that she is a stink bomb right now. In the end, I guess, curiosity gets the better of OGP, and he breaks the news to aunty. Normally you'd expect the person to blush and lower their feet slowly, feeling slightly ashamed, which would cause qualms in your tummy, thinking you might have been a little rude and intolerant. But no, aunty has a surprise for us, she simply denies its her feet that appear to have been dabbling in pigeon poop. And she starts happily chomping again, loudly talking on the phone. You expect an old lady to be courteous in the least, even if she's lost sanity, but this one's a hoot. She goes on to tell her son on the phone, the guy sitting opposite to her, JS, is munching on beetle nut and disgusts her to the core. She even mentions that because of him, she has been reading the Hanuman Chalisa to drive away his filth! The UP couple is mentioned as a pick right out of the saas-bahu serials, and the audacity of her ridiculousness came to its peak when she gave them just another year together, after which according to her, either the husband will go deaf listening to the high-pitched voice, or the wife will leave him for his resistible, nope not irresistible, but RESISTIBLE looks! Well you're not expecting me to disclose what she mentioned about me are you ?! If you are, am sorry buddy, but that ain't happening !

Story time. Dinner done. Awkward moments settled. It was time all differences be forgotten and we reconvene as one big happy family. OGP had this uncanny knack of becoming grampa all of a sudden, only difference being, instead of the horror stories I was expecting, all he gave were unrealistic accounts of his travels. Apparently, he threw a guy off the train for causing trouble with the catering and creating much fuss about it - ironical ! ;) Well he says the train was stalled for 45 minutes, I wonder how that must have happened, considering the chain was never pulled and the bloke was pushed off a moving train. I guess the most annoying aspect of my journey came when asked what my business in Ahmedabad was. Despite desperate attempts at trying to remember names, I just could not and in the eventuality of losing face, I had to mention my university. It invited far reaching interest, much to my dissatisfaction, while I answered nonsense queries, and entertained foolish requests. One of the moms there wanted me to give her son a call and counsel him on choosing an MBA over Medicine, including tips on how to crack the CAT, and then also wanted me to mail him a consolidated list of the pros and cons for each II* (word has been omitted for obvious reasons :) ) and also against the leading B-schools in the US! She must have been nuts to think I was going to do any of that.

We slept. We woke up. From 8 in the morning till 10:12 when the train pulled into Ahmedabad junction, aunty had recited to me a million and 5 times that both her sons were in the Army, one was shot in Maniour, the other was posted as a captain in Kashmir, and he quit, was now working with Idea, at a very good post, and Idea is an MNC, and recession hit only small firms, and that I should reassure her that her son won't lose his job - who am I, the friggin' MD of Idea Cellular ?! Sheesh ! We pulled to a halt and I ran for it, ran for my life!

Disclaimer: This post has been written over broken periods so ignore any discontinuities, weird ramblings, because I do not have the strength to proofread anymore !