Most of the people would have visited Chennai and would have used electric train probably. Here let me put something what I saw when I made a journey in that and sorry if the contents are boring. I boarded an electric train from Chennai Fort which is the very next station to Chennai Beach, the terminus in one side and I was making my trip to Chengalpattu , the last station in the other side. I know it’s a 90 min journey and mostly I will sleep during that period. But unfortunately I had more than 10 hours of sleep the before night and it was very hard for me to make me sleep again during the day.
In hurry I boarded into a vendor compartment which is specially made ones for people to carry goods with them. It is normal that people may board into vendor compartments during the 20 sec stop in the stations. The hurry which people showed in getting into the train was not in them in getting the seat. Most occupied the floor. People started talking about their family stories may be they know each other for years. Even a lady with a small child in hand neglected the seat and sat on the floor. I was puzzled and was wondering what may be the possible reason to do so.
Another lady who sat near me took a bunch of answer scripts from the bag and started correcting it. Her son sat next to her was totaling the papers corrected by his mother. One took some food stuffs out from the bag and started sharing with the co passengers. They behaved more like a family members and I didn’t realize the travel itself. When I turned back another lady started cutting vegetables for her house with a knife and some other co passenger was helping her in the process. It seemed as though they will start cooking if LPG is allowed in trains.
People came and went, stations passed one after other and they never cared about journey itself. In the gossip group as the train moved after Tambaram station the strength started reducing. A physically challenged man boarded the train and I was taken aback when he too neglected the seat that I felt guilty of sitting on floor but my ego didn’t allow me to do so. I later thought that he could not sit in the chair but again I was wrong. He opened a bag which was full of watch circuits. He started assembling it one by one. In the other bag he had the plastic body for fitting the circuits. He then installed the battery and set the time to the current time. I asked him for the price of the watch and he replied it was Rs 30. I had a watch in my hand and he too knew that I won’t buy it. I then realized the pain behind Rs 30 watch and felt how we bargain for it when we are spending thousands of money without care but fight for five rupees bargain.
The chat group strength came down to zero and I got down at Chengalpattu. The journey was a small moment in life but it taught me more. The main thing by the handicapped man was his confidence in working with his disability and not wasting time during his 30 min journey and keeping him engaged. Then the gossip group which showed me that comfort alone can’t give happiness and there are many more things in life which makes us to leave our comforts also .
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