ON THE WAY ......
(This is a sequel to my previous post. For people who havent read my first post do read it to get the real gist of it. My first post is below this one.)

If any biologist wishes to see a working example of Darwin's Theory of, "Survival of the Fittest", then Mumbai local train is the place to be. After our daily athlete has just run a momentous sprint and completed it with a daredevil plunge into the train, the next thing is to possibly get through the dense crowd cluttered at the entrance like the atoms of a solid. Every Mumbaite knows that the struggle required for this achievement is analogous to that of an electric current flowing through glass. Having overcome this infinite resistance, he then rotates his neck 180 degrees in both directions like an owl in search of any possible seating. A sure to fail case and optimism personified !!! The owl may, however, miss an ocassional prey due to oversight, but the discerning Mumbai eye ceases to miss the available 4th person accomadation on a 3 person seat only to find it at the inaccessible corner of the compartment.

It won't be an exaggeration if I say that people who have not travelled by this lifeline of Mumbai, haven't seen Mumbai. Mumbai lives in its trains. Coming back to the journey, the "lucky" one who wishes to occupy the coveted 4th seat, need not say anything, but just the eye contact or an ocassional sway of the hand is enough to get the human compression in place to accomadate him. Where else on earth do you find such an effective application of non-verbal communication. Mrs. Srinivas, I think you need to take a look. (My friends from VJTI should get the last line).

Just as all this is happening, the depressed soul realises that his dreams of an hour and half of sleep in the train which would have provided him with some much needed relief from his late night movie hangover have been shattered. He is left to contend with space enough to ground one foot, his body crushed like a sugarcane between the drums of a sugarcane juice machine and his lone eye with visibility left, amidst the dense human clutter jealously watching the Kumbhakaran (a demon from the religious book Ramayana of Hindus who would continuously sleep for months on end) on the window seat.

By the time he has graduated from the crushed sugarcane to the prized possessor of the 4th seat, its already time to bid adieu and embark on a new expedition - the act of alighting the train ..... Well, I will leave it for the next blog ... keep reading.

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Chetan Bhadricha

Kabhi na rukti, Chalti jaati ,
Yeh Bharat ki shaan ,
Yeh hai Mumbai , Yeh hai Mumbai ,
Yeh hai Mumbai , Meri Jaan