Sierra Leone and a train story

'Sierra Leone' - was the answer to the question - "Where is Freetown?" Reading a copy of Granta, I found a page with a mention of Freetown and asked husband where it was. The answer came quite naturally from the mouth of a co-passenger on Mangalore - Chennai Mail. That sealed our connection with the co-passenger for the rest of the 12 hour journey. I don't remember the last time I bought/accepted anything from a co-passenger. We had tea and dinner together, helping each other buy cups of tea, asking each other what time we wanted to have dinner, what time we wanted the lights off so that the berths could be converted into neatly laid out beds with the warm, crisp and cosy blankets of IRCTC's Rose Bedrolls, of course not to forget the popular question - "what station is this?"This is very often the connecting question amongst most passengers. Despite taking notice of the stations passing by, we still ask/provide self-answers to this question (by thinking aloud). It is such a proud moment for many a train traveller. All this felt like a leaf from the pages of nostalgia for we hardly have time to talk to 'real' people. This one was a pleasant respite from the usual time-deprived, scurrying flight travel - right from the point when even our journey's ticket was joyfully the punched variety with a tiny grey font and thick paper as opposed to the printout of an e-ticket. 

As a child, I have travelled along with my grandfather who is a pensioner from the Southern Railways - one of the many joys of being with my grandad. Like every other railway employee, he was proud of his office too. The result - train rides, and more train rides for almost every travel plan. We made frequent short train trips from Kottayam, our native home to neighbouring districts like Thrissur, Ernakulam, Kollam, sometimes even Thiruvananthapuram to visit relatives. These were quite informative train rides - grandad used to rattle away names of stations with such ease - he knew them like the back of his hand. This is one of the reasons I still remember the fact that the station Angamaly shall always be told as Angamaly for Kalady. Kalady, the land of Adi Shankaracharya is located in less than 10 kilometres from Angamaly, and passengers who want to go to Kalady alight at the Angamaly station. Random quizzes by grandpa on what station would follow next, kept me on my toes, peeping out of the grilled-railway window seats with rapt attention for those broad yellow boards in every station that the train zipped past. To watch the fish plates forming the alphabets X, Y and Z was delightfully engaging. A pack of cards that I carried along with a Sony Walkman were good company too, of course the mercilessly oily “pazhampori” (banana fritters), and “parupu vadas” along with the tea and coffee from the “chai” and “kaapi” vendors calling their hearts out so that they could be heard amidst the sound of the train. The sound of the current train vs. the sound of passing trains almost blended with the music of A.R. Rahman playing through the earphones of the Walkman. A collection of his songs were reserved for train journeys. 

Those were the times when people of all classes didn't have problems in striking uninhibited conversations with the short-term neighbors - sometimes even by walking past the shaky vestibules on a moving train to make friends from the next compartment. No matter how economical flight trips get, train journeys are closer to the heart. The weather is directly experienced without any computerized weather updates - droplets of rain falling from the grills of the window. This is perhaps why the window seat remains the apple of the eye for every travel enthusiast. The fact that people on-board travel to multiple destinations, throws open a scope for discussing all things under the sun within the confines of the compartment; unlike a flight trip which has a boringly elitist set-up, of course with no stations to pause at, all - for 'saving some time.'

 

Hard copy of the train ticket which is a rare find these days

Dip tea bought from one of the stations