The Last Home Coming

I just planned a 3330 kms of chiku-buku for 56 hours! (And I am only hoping it doesn’t turn to be 127 hours :) )

Lucknow-Moradabad-Delhi-Kota-Vadodara-Panvel-Magoan-Mangalore-Kozhikode-Shoranur.

And what’s the icing on the cake this time?

I will be along with a couple of works of fiction. Period.

I have learnt that travelling alone is a unique experience and can be very rewarding, personally. Advantages of travelling alone are plenty:

• It's easier to make friends with the other travellers. Yup, you got me. ;)
• You only have to please yourself. You are not concerned about a zillion other people and their safety and comfort
• Your time and budget. No excel sheets after the journey!
• Your travel will be far more flexible and you take decisions on the spur of the moment
• Opportunity for reflection and contemplation. This is no globe. This is required after two years of fast-paced b-school life :)

You might be thinking what an introverted moron I am. Yes, I am and always will be. And this doesn’t mean that next time you plan a trip you comfortably avoid me. I will bury you alive. :)

From the time I joined for my post-graduation I wanted to take a train from Lucknow to my native. And this is my last chance. I have heard that once you stay in a train for 2-3 days, even after you get out the hangover stays and you feel like you are shaking. :)
I have always loved travelling. That’s one reason why I had a great time during my summer internship. Memorable days!

And trains. You know how much I love them. And moreover this journey is going to be special. The final one after two years of so called academic rigour.

Honestly academic rigour is upto you. Its how much you want to do rather than someone imposing things on you. More about b-school system in another post possibly a month or two later. :)

P.S. I clicked these in my last journey on the Konkan rail-line. The next one should ideally have better ones :)

The Pre-Degree

Once decided on Engineering I opted for Math with Computer Science in 11th grade. My parents asked me to take Math with Biology. Just because they said so I thought I should not go by them. I was stubborn and took Computers.

This decision leaked out and all the babes in my school conspired against me. They all ended taking up Math with Biology. Well the Computer class had 7 girls and 29 Boys. It all started on that day – Dearth of women in my life. It is still present in all the ways it can manifest.

Lesson you can learn from my life: Your parents always give you the right advice (mostly it is indirect).

Then I thought of writing a letter to the principal of the school asking if I can move over to the Biology class! My friends were totally against me doing it. They advised me,” dey Kozhi, don’t do something stupid, Computers is the in thing, you are the ultimate programmer who is going to change the way the world is going to code.”

Friends are ultimate people, when they say something they mean it.

I tried putting forward another proposal. Why not, all three of us jump to the Bio class. This proposal was more welcome. But later I understood it is something which is not feasible. The Bio class already had more people than the Comp class and princi is not very happy in admitting more people. Moreover all 3 of us had opted for Engineering Entrance Coaching at P C Thomas Classes.

P C Thomas Classes is The place in Thrissur where everyone gets educated and illuminated. Let me explain.

Kerala is a place where no industry can survive. I don’t know how V-Guard and Milka Wonder Cake managed it. But there is one industry which can survive in Kerala – Education.

It is basically that Demand-Supply funda of economics. Demand - Everyone is educated and everyone wants to get a degree. Supply-Number of colleges and the seats they can offer is few. The tunnel connecting this demand and supply is obviously the KMEEE (Kerala Medical Engineering Entrance Examination)

Dr P C Thomas was a smart dude. I was told he is a doctor, “the kind that helps people”. (Hope you have watched this and if you haven’t, I would recommend it.) He (henceforth referred as PC) lit the demand-supply gap tunnel with his Entrance Coaching Classes – The P C Thomas Classes.

I don’t know the authenticity of this, but I have heard rumors that he is the person in Kerala paying the biggest amount as Income Tax. And one more rumor. Because of his strict rules, many students cursed him. This is believed by many to have resulted in his daughter being mentally retarded.

For me, the Sunday classes were a kind of picnic and pilgrimage. For I am very positive-minded. R and I had to catch the first bus to Cochin North railway station. We used to be at the Chittoor Kshetram (Temple) bus stop at 4:45 am.

Imagine 4:45 am on a Sunday!

And every Sunday!

It used to be a KRSTC bus packed to its limits. We used to squeeze in with our bags filled with lunch and the PC books. The PC books were all very thin, long and made out of recycled paper. The businessman he is.

We used to get down at the North bus stop and walk the 5 minutes to the Railway station. Most of the times, this walk was a run. The KSRTC bus used to be late. Somehow we used to reach the railway station and man, how can I forget those long queues for getting that Rs18 ticket to Thrissur. Often, we used to help each other by getting tickets for other PC-classes-going-groups.

We get onto Platform 1 and study the crowd waiting for the legendry train – “Push-Pull”. The Push-Pull is the morning train (with just 6 coaches, in which 1 is ladies) from Cochin to Guruvayur. Thus the Push Pull is crowded mainly with two kinds of people –

• Teenagers on weekly pilgrimage to Thrissur.
• Elderly on monthly pilgrimage to Guruvayur.

The first few weeks we were not successful in securing seats. We stood throughout the journey pushing and pulling. But by the third week we were professionals. Our plan was just amazing. Two guys on one side of the rail and two on the other. The two people on the same side are a strategic distance apart. Thus we used to attack one particular coach (the one next the ladies coach, this is exclusively for identification purposes) from all the four entrances. From then on we never had to stand on Push-Pull.

We knew pretty well that passing the entrances of Push-Pull coaches doesn’t mean we will get a pass in the Kerala Entrance Exams. We were supposed to do some homework every week. As we were a very diligent group, we never used to do it. So in the train, it was kozhi-kirukal (translates to Hen-Scribbling) in the PC workbook (another thin long recycled crap, you have to buy giving Rs10).

The Push-Pull was a very fast train. It used to cover the 76 kms in like 2 hours. The Japanese and the French will be ashamed of this fact. We used to utilize these 2 hours for completing our homework in 3 subjects.

The train gets half empty at Thrissur. Then there is another mission- the autos. There will be limited autos parked at the railway station. The demand for these autos is great. It was a run from the train to the station entrance. You have to say “PC” to the auto-drivers and sometimes you don’t have to do that either. They know where to take you. While getting down pay him 15 if you are 3, 20 if you traveled with 3 other guys\girls. (Ya, ya, I know probability of traveling with 3 girls in an auto is a limit tending to 0).

The PC buildings are I suppose designed by Howard Roark. They are optimized for space, money, light and all the other resources involved. The stairs are made of aluminum. The generators of these buildings are custom made for him. They are painted green, huge and bulky but surprising make no noise.

Once you are inside the class you start sweating as you are involved in the thermodynamic process of increasing the temperature of the class along with 99 other students and 1 prof.

Some teachers at PC classes are dumb while others are unimaginably brilliant. Until I joined college I strongly believed that no man can be more brilliant than Sunny sir. My world was small then.

Four hours of technical torture used to render us terrifically hungry, we used to eat the recycled paper from our notebooks by the end of the 4^th class.

After lunch it was time for IIT special classes. By the time these classes are over (5pm) everyone used to get totally exhausted. We can either take an auto to the railway station or walk. I preferred walking – saves money for that extra Paruppu vada and can explore Thrissur as well.

Right in the middle of platform 1 on Thrissur railway station is a tea vendor. This guy is particularly popular among us PC guys as he sells tea to students at a concession (It was Rs3.50 for students and Rs4 for the rest of the world). We were all fans of his Paruppu vada. We used to hog as if we went without food for 3 days.

Then, its time for you to show your seat snatching skills in the legendry Passenger. Getting a seat becomes inevitable as we are already tired for the day. We do our Mission Impossible thing again.

The Passenger is supposed to come at 5:30 pm, but you can congratulate yourself on being lucky if it shows up in Thrissur by 6:50 pm. This train too has about 6-7 coaches and is terrifically fast. Faster than Push-Pull.

This return journey used to be our jolly time. Gossiping, joking, discussing “stuff”, academic of course.

We normally reach Cochin North by around 9:00-9:30 pm. Then

The walk.
The bus.
The bath.
The food.
The bed.

This was our Sunday.
Every Sunday.
For 2 years.

Sure it was worth it. We learned a lot of things. The MI thing for example.
We are all Engineers now. Two are doing their MBA. Rest are working.

The Madras Mail

It’s not Chennai. It’s Madras. When I hear the word "Chennai" I am blank, there is nothing to relate to. But "Madras" is the name of

• A city . . . the city I loved, and still love.
• The city I love for its hot weather.
• The city where Manju akka next door would feed me bread after peeling out the brown outer layer when I was 3.
• The city where I would wait for Jithu in the evening with my three-wheeled cycle at the KK Nagar CPWD quarters ground, so that we can have a "cycle-race"(when I was 4).
• The city where Murugan anna (autodriver) would allow us to dip our fingers in the funnel while he is filling his fuel tank so that we can feel the jill when the petrol evaporates.
• The city where a long forgotten stranger took care of us when our school bus met with an accident.
• The city where I took a bus from Chromepet to Sanitorium with one 50 paise coin and one 25 paise coin in my trouser pockets.
• The city where she did not allow me to try out her automatic pencil box (which has buttons for opening, closing etc), telling me that already 10 people have pressed the button today and that overusage might destroy it.
• The city I loved walking back home from school skipping the school bus as I was busy playing Volleyball or Chess. And later when my achchan found it, he wouldn't believe that this 13 year old would walk 5-6Kms chewing boomer and accused me of coming back home in N's cycle for some weird reason!
• The city where the smell of perfume from some manufacturing unit in MEPZ (Madras Export Processing Zone) used to fill Durga Nagar and Kamakshi Nagar.
• The city where I have friends who are in touch after I left it for the last 9 years!

I had been in Madras for 11 years. That’s half my life. I grew up in Madras, until middle school.
All these 11 years there, we used to have a sacred yearly ritual- going home, Kerala. Most of the years it used to happen just once, in April.
Achchan used to book the tickets a month earlier. That’s because April is holiday season and trains are normally packed and moreover my achchan belongs to the nationalized bank employee’s clan who normally have the habit of doing things with total perfection. Mostly it was the Mangalore Mail\Madras Mail.
I have a strong relationship with this train. Not only that we used to take this train from Madras to Pattambi (my native place); when I was in college I used to take this train from Mangalore to Pattambi. This train which goes from Madras to Mangalore and back, my father once told me was one of the first trains of Southern Railway. It was numbered 1 (Madras to Mangalore) and 2(Mangalore to Madras). Of course they are now numbered 2601 and 2602. This train was then very important for the people of Kerala for a number of reasons, some of them could be

• The mail used to come in the parcel van of this train.
• This was the train the unemployed youth of Kerala took to go to Madras, to hunt for a job.
• There was no Konkan rail, so the unemployed youth of Kerala who wanted to go to Bombay, had to take this train first and then later take connection trains.
• There were no airports for the unemployed youth of Kerala to go to gulf other than the nearest Madras!

Thus it was a dear train for Kerala. It is dearer to me, as it signified naati puva - GOING HOME.
I used to be very enthusiastic about going to our native. Ammu was not born until I was 9 and my only cousins were in Kochi. Also there were other important people in Kerala who I love and would love to meet - my achchamma (paternal grandmother, no more), my amma's achchamma (who is to hit century in a few years), my cousins, their parents, my amma's cousins, achchan's siblings, their families . . . the list is endless. Thus being very eager to be there, I used to push amma to start packing the suitcases 2 days earlier. I used to love these packing sessions. Once packed and ready on the D day amma will make dinner and achchan would pack it in banana leaves by evening. Achchan made it sure that we were at Madras Central atleast one hour earlier. We used to take an auto to the Tambaram-Sanitorium station. From there we would take the electric train to Central.
I love those electric trains. Their sound, their smell, the low floors, the dark yellow color, the crowd and the pull. But I used to get bored sitting in the train. I would ask "achcha, ini yethre stationa?" (How many more stations?). I used to be amazed, as he would tell me the stations in the correct order. He would have told me that order a 100 times, but I don't remember them. I don't want to remember them either, if I did, there is no element of surprise and I won’t be able to ask him that question again. Once we are there in the station where the Madras Central is nearby (I don’t remember the name now), we have to take a subway to central with hawkers all around. I think there is nothing you won’t get in these "shops". In 2003 when I went to Madras for 2 days, I saw a guy selling FM radios for Rs100 and another selling shorts for Rs20 (of course they come with their semme Quality sir).
This walk through the subway carrying the luggage is a truly perspiring one. Once we are out of the subway, we will be welcomed by another set of hawkers on the road side. I would see the majestic red building with arches wondering if British men could have taken this building as well in one of their ships.
Once I enter the huge entrance I will be busy checking out what people are doing. I have my own ecstasy in seeing people running around with their luggage, under the huge ceilings, as they are late for their trains. I am never late right, achchan.
Since the train starts from the Central, it’s never late. The trains take a reverse into the Central and gently hit a pair of stoppers. Then starts the galata. People running around with luggage, babies crying, hawkers shouting, porters pushing carts of luggage.
I was normally successful in getting the "window seat". But I am not supposed to touch the window grills as they are supposedly not clean. Amma is obsessed with cleanliness. Ammamma is even more obsessed. Ammamma cleans the kitchen floor with a wet cloth a hundred times a day. I am not exaggerating. She actually does it, even if she is not keeping good health. Thus this genetic element of insane urge for cleanliness has come down to me. I shed a significant part of this quality when I entered my college, gradually, the major chunk of this skin shedding happening in second year. Still about 10% of this quality is still in me.

Thus I used to look into the darkness outside, the stars, the moon, the lights from settlements along the rail. When it is time for lunch, I will go with achchan to wash hands and then its amma’s turn. I love the smell of papadam(Paapad or appalam in other languages) packed in banana leaves. Due to the perspiration of the other stuff in the food pack, the papadam would have gone wet, but the smell, there is nothing more delicious than that! After all taste is mostly dependent on smell.

We often have similar malayalee families with whom we share our cabin. I once remember getting very friendly with a family, exchanging sweets, playing games with their kid, etc.

Then its time to sleep, I liked sleeping in upper berths, but no more. And I used to sleep well. The only occasion when I din’t get a proper sleep in train before I joined college was when we travelled in AC. I was sleeping in the upper-berth. I felt terribly cold then. Usually the next morning will he the finest morning of the year for me. The lush green fields of Kerala, the sunrise, the ode clad houses along the rails, the coconut, the rubber, hygienic people, some least used roads along the rail in the Palakad district. I loved fixing my eye on the parallel tracks. This gives a illusion that the rail is moving with us. Once we reach Shornour Junction it is signal that Pattambi is 15 minutes away. We used to get ready to get down by taking our luggage to the door. This is not because to achchan’s urge to do things in the bank way, but because Pattambi is considered a insignificant station for the Madras Mail and the train stops here only for a fraction of a minute.

From the Pattambi railway station it is just a 5 minutes walk to Leela Nivas. Amma will start pestering achchan to take an auto home, although she knows very well that we will have to walk it.