My best thinking and analyzing moments while going home and coming from home are the times I spend in train. I usually travel by sleeper class. No rush of general compartments and less hawkers to disturb you. Just take a window seat. Feel the rushing wind with your face, gaze to the running scenarios, hills, trees, rivers, bridges, grazing cattle, green rice fields, wild flowers and the numerous lights in night time.
The list is never ending. I do not know why but I feel at peace and some kind of superior sense in those moments. All your backlogs and cobwebs of mind will be removed and new ideas start playing. When luck favours, I fish out a nice plot for my next short story during these rides. The characters sometimes get refined with a person I notice in close quarters in the train. How he/she talks, manners, age, personality, food habits etc. It is a funny yet potential way of passing time and amuses me to great extent.
This time while coming from home I noticed a telugu and bengali family in close quarters. Two brothers, a kid and a lady in the telugu family. I had hard time deciding whose wife is the lady, 'coz she talked identically with both the brothers and I cannot understand telugu properly except 2/3 elementary lines. Definitely she was the mother of the kid. The lady in focus was considerably fat. Lets call her Sitamma. A big orange color vermilion bindi in fore head and than a small flatter one below it like the south indian people wear in general. A large gold and black bead mangal sutra in neck with other jewellery.
Till 12 o' clock in the day Sitamma slept. There was something odd with her. May be she was sick. During lunch hour both the men woke her up. After a brief fresh up, she smartly took the role of Annapurna, fishing out various sized tiffin boxes from different bags and distributing food. Let me say, first the kid ate rice, tomato chuttney and curd. Then the men started eating. I was quite amazed with the amount of rice they consumed. First they ate rice and tomato chuttney, than rice and egg curry, than rice and curd, than rice and achar than pappad than sweets and finally apple, Every time it was a plate full of rice. I just thought how they managed being so slim after eating so much. I pictured myself with a swollen stomach gobbling digestives and antacids every time I do some slight disorder in my food habits. Lucky fellows. On the contrary the fat lady ate very little. Two large spoon full of rice, a bit of curd and a pappad. Lunch finished, empty tiffin boxes went inside bags and all of them slept like log of wood. How can someone sleep in train when there is so much to watch!
Now come to the next family. Two daughters and their mother. All of three them were white skinned longhaired bong beauties. Since my understanding of bengali is good, I noticed them for longer period. They were established in Bangalore and coming to Kolkata after a long gap of time. All excited for watching Durga pujo.
The mother was within 50-55 age range. With a starched cotton saree she looked serine and slept most of the time or gazed through the window like me. The elder girl must be above 25. Quite bulky with a poor sense of style. Who will wear green lipstick with a eye paining red colored salwar kammej? Lets call her Pompa. Well the last of them was a quite stylish girl in black jeans and white beaded top. Must be 18/19. Tall, slim, high cheek bones and very slim lips. Every time she laughed the lips curled to one side in a peculiar manner. Her feline characteristics made me name her Kitty.
When I boarded the train Kitty was reading a magazine. She raised her eyes once, looked at me and then merged herself inside the journal. After some time three of them ordered lunch. As always the inquiry before ordering is a long one. Bengalis whenever or wherever they are, always consider all the options available quite sincerely before making any decision whether small or big or trivial or important. Good habit, but sometimes it irritates the person handling them. For this purpose, the inquiry confined to questions like what will they get to eat, when they will get it, price of different items, then some discussion, some mild arguments and whining. Finally after half an hour, they settled for two plates of vegetarian meal and one plate of mutton biriyani for the youngest girl. Pompa was quite unhappy as her mother barred her from eating biriyani. Possibly due to weight issues. She looked livid and fell into complete silence. Kitty was quite happy as her demand is going to be fulfilled. After two hours lunch arrived. By this time Kitty has changed her mind. She settled for the veg meal and Pompa was quite happy with biriyani. Lunch finished. Their mother retired to upper birth. Pompa and Kitty engaged themselves in a luxurious gossip about their numerous number of boy friends. I don't know when I dozed off. But soon it was time to get down at Howrah.
The list is never ending. I do not know why but I feel at peace and some kind of superior sense in those moments. All your backlogs and cobwebs of mind will be removed and new ideas start playing. When luck favours, I fish out a nice plot for my next short story during these rides. The characters sometimes get refined with a person I notice in close quarters in the train. How he/she talks, manners, age, personality, food habits etc. It is a funny yet potential way of passing time and amuses me to great extent.
This time while coming from home I noticed a telugu and bengali family in close quarters. Two brothers, a kid and a lady in the telugu family. I had hard time deciding whose wife is the lady, 'coz she talked identically with both the brothers and I cannot understand telugu properly except 2/3 elementary lines. Definitely she was the mother of the kid. The lady in focus was considerably fat. Lets call her Sitamma. A big orange color vermilion bindi in fore head and than a small flatter one below it like the south indian people wear in general. A large gold and black bead mangal sutra in neck with other jewellery.
Till 12 o' clock in the day Sitamma slept. There was something odd with her. May be she was sick. During lunch hour both the men woke her up. After a brief fresh up, she smartly took the role of Annapurna, fishing out various sized tiffin boxes from different bags and distributing food. Let me say, first the kid ate rice, tomato chuttney and curd. Then the men started eating. I was quite amazed with the amount of rice they consumed. First they ate rice and tomato chuttney, than rice and egg curry, than rice and curd, than rice and achar than pappad than sweets and finally apple, Every time it was a plate full of rice. I just thought how they managed being so slim after eating so much. I pictured myself with a swollen stomach gobbling digestives and antacids every time I do some slight disorder in my food habits. Lucky fellows. On the contrary the fat lady ate very little. Two large spoon full of rice, a bit of curd and a pappad. Lunch finished, empty tiffin boxes went inside bags and all of them slept like log of wood. How can someone sleep in train when there is so much to watch!
Now come to the next family. Two daughters and their mother. All of three them were white skinned longhaired bong beauties. Since my understanding of bengali is good, I noticed them for longer period. They were established in Bangalore and coming to Kolkata after a long gap of time. All excited for watching Durga pujo.
The mother was within 50-55 age range. With a starched cotton saree she looked serine and slept most of the time or gazed through the window like me. The elder girl must be above 25. Quite bulky with a poor sense of style. Who will wear green lipstick with a eye paining red colored salwar kammej? Lets call her Pompa. Well the last of them was a quite stylish girl in black jeans and white beaded top. Must be 18/19. Tall, slim, high cheek bones and very slim lips. Every time she laughed the lips curled to one side in a peculiar manner. Her feline characteristics made me name her Kitty.
When I boarded the train Kitty was reading a magazine. She raised her eyes once, looked at me and then merged herself inside the journal. After some time three of them ordered lunch. As always the inquiry before ordering is a long one. Bengalis whenever or wherever they are, always consider all the options available quite sincerely before making any decision whether small or big or trivial or important. Good habit, but sometimes it irritates the person handling them. For this purpose, the inquiry confined to questions like what will they get to eat, when they will get it, price of different items, then some discussion, some mild arguments and whining. Finally after half an hour, they settled for two plates of vegetarian meal and one plate of mutton biriyani for the youngest girl. Pompa was quite unhappy as her mother barred her from eating biriyani. Possibly due to weight issues. She looked livid and fell into complete silence. Kitty was quite happy as her demand is going to be fulfilled. After two hours lunch arrived. By this time Kitty has changed her mind. She settled for the veg meal and Pompa was quite happy with biriyani. Lunch finished. Their mother retired to upper birth. Pompa and Kitty engaged themselves in a luxurious gossip about their numerous number of boy friends. I don't know when I dozed off. But soon it was time to get down at Howrah.
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