There were hopes for great stories and anecdotes till the first ink was plotted. I was harboring the same hope for a long time to explore the North-East India. Without much planning, all the things fell in place all of a sudden and I was packing things for the trip on a Friday morning. (26/June/2009). I had planned for a one-way of rail route to optimize the cost for the trip. My first leg of journey was to be in train to Kolkata.
I was amazed to see that my ticket to Kolkata had been a waitlisted one which I had thought was a confirmed one while booking. This reminded me another incident that happened during college. My good friend Sandeep asked me to book a ticket to Chennai to leave for semester exam preparations. We were all set with books and all. We boarded the bus annoyed to see the seats occupied by two other gentlemen. We tried explaining that the seat belonged to us. Unfortunately the seat numbers on both the tickets were the same which was rare. Our anger now turned towards the bus company. We went down and reached the supervisor and asked him for an explanation. He was baffled. Finally we were embarrassed to know that the tickets were booked for the next day. It was a disaster.
Upon reaching Hyderabad station, I was happy to see the ticket confirmed. The family who was sharing the cabin was friendly. The 24-hours journey was not as difficult as I had expected. There was a surprise waiting for us in one of the Orissa stations. The compartments were cleaned with lot more dedication which I rarely see in the railways. The cleaning generally happens as a ritual at the start and end of a journey to mark something for a train. That day was different. There were efforts put in to make the journey pleasurable, ledgers filled in stations, repellants and refreshers sprayed at an optimum amount not to knock you off and feedbacks sought. Was it the magical spell of the newly sworn in Railways minister or was some minister travelling with us? God knows.
But the joy was short-lived one. The train halted at Jaleshwar due to an engine failure, which was expected in a long journey. Ok. Now things are on course. The train would be delayed by 3 hours. People got out and sat on parallel tracks. Tea cups flew and crows too.
The train was delayed by two hours. I had a special place for Kolkata. This was the first capital of British India. It is known for its richness in art, literature and literacy. Most of the Indian English writers are of the Bengali origin. My room-mate and few close friends are from Bengal.
I took a taxi to Mayukhda’s place where I was to spend the night. I caught a taxi. After few pleasantries, the taxi driver was talking about the meaning of life, social equality and lot of other complex equations which I usually indulge in when I don’t get sleep. Was it in the air of Bengal? I was surprised.
I wanted to absorb the Kolkatan thing as much as I can before I leave for Guwahati. Apart from Hilsa, football game in a market place, old building and the kali statue getting readied for Durga Puja, Kolkata was not ready to reveal her.
