If you are a person, who wants to improve patience, resist short temper, and learn to adjust to different kinds of people/situations then Indian Railways is the best place where you can enhance these skills. Boarding from the station to the destination, it’s a tale full of learnings and experience. Me being a constant traveler, prefer train over any public transport. During every journey, I meet with a random co-traveler who unknowingly teaches me a lot and just crosses by.
It was morning 7:30 AM when amma woke me up like an alarm clock, The train was at 9:15 AM and according to my parents, I was already late. But I was pretty confident about the Indian Railways they will never stress a procrastinator like me by coming on time. As usual, the train was late by 15 mins which turned out to be 25 mins later when I was all ready to move to the station, realizing the time difference, oh I wished should have slept a little more. That’s why I prefer a night or evening journey over an early morning journey, but how can my parents stay calm by understanding and agreeing to this preference of mine?
Waving a final goodbye to Acha (father) both of us were sad even though we know deep inside that I will be returning after 2 days of my exams, but still, it seemed to be like 2 years. Beside me was a grandmother whose son made her sit beside me and asked me “Please keep an eye on her. It’s the first time she is traveling alone.” I was not that confident to look after someone but still, I nodded and could see confidence in both the son’s and mother’s faces which in turn gave me strength. Rarely do I travel with a headset in my ears and exploring outside the window. This time grandma was my partner, she was proud of her 3 sons and was happy with her family, she shared how her sons studied hard and are placed in government jobs happily married, sounding like a status of prestige. On and on she shared her joyful family moments when the TT came in for checking the tickets, nowadays it’s just your name you mention and that proves you have a ticket booked. Everyone got their tickets checked and now it was Grandma’s turn, everyone looked at her, she was looking at me, I said “Amma please tell your name to sir.” She exclaimed with a sigh, “Beta I forgot my name!” and gave her phone to me. I was shocked a person who was able to tell even minute incidents of her family a few minutes back forgot her name! After a few seconds of thoughtful pause, she shouted, “Kamla, I am Kamla.” And her ticket also got cleared, she said I got panic when suddenly questioned, I said don’t worry, it’s just usual checking and happens, “Don’t worry Amma.”
A long journey with a new friend was fun, not sure If I could meet Kamlamma again or not, but her innocence would always stay in my heart.