An experience of lifetime

Frankly speaking, the following blogpost mite be boring for you fellas but then again, I could not control myself from writing this one either, so bear with it ☺

Well, staying at home is a refreshing change for hostellers which when comes after a period of six months is rather more so. But planning an extended stay is, trust me, not that easy.

Ok, when I had to postpone my journey for a week because of some out of the blue circumstances, a tatkal ticket was the only option as it seemed of getting a reservation. Only then I came to know that getting a tatkal ticket is possible even a week ahead of your journey. What one needs is to bribe the person that issues tickets inside the railway reservation counter through some travel agent. Thats power of contacts plus money for you.

The catch was that such ticket could only be made from Delhi to Bangalore and not Jhansi, as I preferred. Anyway, I decided to board it from Jhansi as it cuts my journey time short. Alas, we’ll see later how sensible it was.

1 o’clock, was the time Rajdhani express crosses Jhansi and keeping with the same I booked a Lucknow-Jhansi intercity which supposedly reaches at 10:30 so that I have a good 2-2.5 hours backup. I was all relaxed and contend, packing my stuff on that morning, when Verma Uncle came to see dad and asked me about my return travel plans. On hearing the same he told me that the intercity train I was planning to board was quite unreliable and I should rather not trust it.

What he advised me, instead, was to take a so-called Shatabdi bus service from Kanpur, which would take no more than 4.5 hrs to reach Jhansi from Kanpur. He also told he that the last Shatabdi bus departed around 7 o’ clock from Kanpur.

Trusting Verma Uncle and his (experienced!!) advice I decided the follow what he told. I gallantly reached Kanpur bus stand at 5:30 and at around 6 o’clock I was there at Shatabdi Bus service’s booking office. Destiny as they call it, this person at the office tells me that the bus that leaves on 6:30 will only reach at 1:30 since the roads were pathetic (left for me, to be discovered). I was literally stunned and taken aback, for a second I did not know what to do, a distance of around 300 kms was still pending and I was standing on the outskirts of Kanpur having no idea of what transport I m going to take for Jhansi. I called up our torchbearer, Verma Uncle to throw some light on the situation. He told me that I can take any UP roadways bus and I had enough time to make it. After 15 minutes a Jhansi depot bus shows up, i hurriedly jumped into the same, only to find that it was of the breed of most thakeli buses. Fifteen minutes later the conductor showed up from nowhere amongst in the typical rural junta the aroma of which smelled only nicotine and booze, only to give another twist to my fairy tale. He told me that the bus would only go till Orai, which was on the way to Jhansi and assured me that I would easily get a bus to Jhansi from there. He tells me that this bus would take three hours to Orai and from Orai,Jhansi was another 3 hours. I looked at my watch,it was already 6:30 .Another six hours would mean 12:30 considering no time gap between connecting buses and then another thirty mins to move to the railway station from the bus station. All this makes the best-case expected time to reach Jhansi exactly 1o’clock.I knew I was hard-pressed on time now and confess that I was stressed to the core. The stress just got aggravated as I figured out that this bus would stop at every rural stoppage and at full speed it would never cross the 20 km/hr mark. My tension was mounting throughout the journey and reached its peak when the bus reached only at 10 o’clock at Orai, the bus station which paid homage to my first visit there by giving me the utmost deserted look as if it did not want me there ☺. Now the next bus to Jhansi was in an hour and it was no way I could make it with that bus in time. I looked around for taxis, etc bus the place was so deserted and dimly lit, it wore a look that told me every second, ashish, you can’t reach now, you have made a blunder. I consulted with some fellow passengers who suggested to stay at Orai for the night and decide the next day about the further course of action, since they believed that whole Orai was dead by this time and there was no way now that I could reach in time. But something inside told me that I can’t give up on this, there must be someway out of the situation. I just stood there on the road to Jhansi with my luggage, like wishfully hoping for a Ferrari to stop by, offer me a lift and drive at some 100 km/hr and make me reach on time ☺. It was around 10:30 now and that hardly gave around 2-2.5 hrs for me to reach Jhansi station that now looked impossible. A truck driver in the meanwhile came by but told he would take at least 3 hrs to reach since they had to take dinner on the way. I was still standing stranded there, I had lost hope but something inside me told that I should stay. As my mind was now pressurizing my heart and its I began to realized that I would have to stay back at Orai and all my plans were spoiled now. Just when I was about to take a rickshaw to search for a hotel to stay at, a guy came from nowhere and asked “kahan jaayenge saab”,to which I irritatingly replied “tere rickshaw se nahi pahuch paayenge Jhansi”. Actually this guy was driver of a Marshall, which was parked little away and he was sleeping in it. After some negotiation he agreed at 1000 Rs, yes the economics demand and supply rule played its full part here and only condition I had was that I will pay him only if I reach Jhansi station before 1 o’clock. He was reluctant at first but then this guy agreed. Very same moment this middle aged uncle walks from nowhere and asks me to kindly drop him around midway. I agreed and we were about to start.

Just then, my phone rings, it was our Verma Uncle who called in from nowhere and advised me not to take full taxis from Orai since the place was not safe. He also told me about an earlier incident there when a person previously known to the driver accompanied the customer asking him to drop him on the way. I was stunned but then again by this time we had started. One good thing was that I had also met the actual owner of that Marshall before we took off but then Verma Uncle’s explanation of those incidents was doing Merry-go-rounds inside my brain. I prayed to god silently with my eyes closed for a minute, I think I must mention here that I don’t visit temples by choice since I believe in having more of a direct connect with god and praying sincerely rather that zeroing on some temple and praying inside that. So here I was, in the middle of a deserted highway with only dim lights ,trucks ,buses, our driver ,that uncle and that Marshall with this guy driving at more than 70 km/hr consistently on a pathetic road with poor visibility because of dim fog. One thing I was doing was that I was continuously conversing with that uncle and driver about the places they belong, the work they do and other stuff. Meanwhile out of nowhere I also bluffed that my dad was SP, Lucknow circle just to feel safe.

Good thing that this driver did with the speed was that he rekindled within me the hope of reaching on time and I knew if he continued at the same speed I had chances of reaching the Jhansi railway station in time.

Well for one more twist, there was a traffic jam, at around 12:30 which played spoil sport for some 10 minutes on the way, but the driver amazingly dropped me at 1 o clock sharp only to find that my train was delayed by some 30 mins, I cold afford a smile now, yes I could.

When I was waiting for my train, I met this guy,Gaurav Arora with whom in 20 minutes I became good friends, we exchanged mail ids and phone numbers and he even gave me the novel he was reading. My train came and all I was looking for, now, was to have a good night’s sleep after the almost perfect (☺) travel till Jhansi.

Unforeseen, as the nature of the day was, reinforced itself when I found that my reserved seat had been allotted to some other person as I did not turn up at Delhi, yes my travel agent had forgotten to mention it to the ticket issuer that I’ll be boarding from Jhansi. I spoke to him for some time but he said he could not help and railway’s rules were to wait only 200 kms for a passenger and Jhansi was around 300 kms from Delhi. I somehow after a lot of struggle, which actually was the flavor of the day found a place I could share with another RAC passenger which was actually a store where food inventory was kept .The Rajdhani waiters had arranged for mattress and quilt, I had tipped them 20 Rupees for that .I could somehow manage to play hide and seek with my sleep in the night.

The next morning came with a big smile, as I now found Shashank on the way, got a new seat allotted from the TTE and can scribble my story as a blog only because I was successful to catch the train and the story had a happy ending.

Biggest moral of the story for me is to plan your journeys carefully and stick to them. Also at the end of it all destiny is the biggest emperor. Had it not been for that guy who suddenly out of nowhere came with a Marshall, I would certainly not be writing this stuff now. Rather I would be exploring hotel options and replanning my return trip from Orai.

Want to thank you people for going through such a terribly long post, but if you could scribble some words as comments it would be very encouraging for a novice like me ☺

Beauty,its lethal!!

Ok folks, here I go blah blah over my new post….and let me tell u that the following thoughts are both, a apart of my personal experience as well as my understanding of life around me (I love to peep, you can say)

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases;

it will never Pass into nothingness;

but still will keep

-John Keats

BEAUTY, its lethal!!!

We all know that. But have we thought how different is life of our so-called beautiful peers vis-à-vis the ‘not so beautiful’ ones.

Be it your friends, teachers, bosses or colleagues everyone likes to be around the outwardly beautiful people. The beautiful people, in essence lead a different life . If u try and draw a gorgeous woman’s nostalgia to her teens, and even before that u are most likely to be amazingly floored by the sheer number of guys that the woman, if expresses fully, drooled over her. The number would again be only as good as the woman’s awareness coz our most young Indian ‘ashiqs’ hesitate to express themselves. On the contrary if u happen to know the childhood of our not so beautiful friends chance are that u can count such instance on your fingertips. Lets accept it, beautiful people live a different life. Point I am driving home is that we all want to be close in some form to our beautiful counterparts, which is a behavior that is consistent throughout our lives. There is some strong connection between our eyes and our mind wherein the eyes do not allow mind to take any call without their consultation.

But why is it that outward beauty is so damn attractive that we fall for it no matter what. It’s like beauty controlling the universe. Then again, when everything falls in place and we settle down with a beautiful person (making our mind and heart contended J) we come across some science, which declares that love is actually a chemical phenomenon that looses sheen after a year. So the so-called beautiful person u married no longer looks beautiful coz the love is gone.

The question that perturbs me is that y has God bestowed his blessings on some people being so eyeful while others not.

Why is this differentiation, god?

Cultural Divide or simply Backwards??

We all love our country so much, even with all its problems and weaknesses we are proud of it, just like we feel for our spouses ☺. But then again in a country with a population of more than a hundred and ten crores and very few good higher education institutes the fate mostly seems gloomy for further generations, more so with a larger chunk of population getting education each year.

Is it because we are culturally so education oriented or are we simply backwards?

I sincerely feel that the government, private organizations and other SME’s should create enough jobs to let the people studying feel free w.r.t. getting a job. What results in an unwanted pressure for students in their early careers can probably be hence made a little relaxed to let them pursue things in life where there interests lie rather than vesting it entirely in studies in order to lead a socially acceptable life thereafter.

To support this, the officials could even make sports as an attraction by making them appeal more glamorous, for which a strong way to lay foundation is by providing the current players with the entire infrastructure, facilities they deserve and grooming the potential they have. I am sure if India can stretch its Olympic medal list further, it would go a long way in setting sports as a viable career for the future generations though their parents’ lenses.
Awareness can also be propagated through all the big names in art, music, direction, drama by opening good nation wide schools to learn the same which are endorsed and carefully followed by them.

All these things would take time to implement but I am sure that if India can manage to somehow curb its problems we are capable of producing and grooming any level of talent in any field and with a sense of direction and broader thinking lines we can reach where we ought to.

I hope someday a middle class parent would say proudly that my son ,Aarav,all of 24 is a full time squash player, plays for the state team and others round him would envy him rather than looking down at him.

LONELINESS....

DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this post are entirely personal, any reference to it would get u entirely nostalgic!!

I was just wondering what the difference is between a contented, satisfied person and a lonely successful person and it didn’t took me long to figure out that its that “someone” that makes your life complete which makes all the difference. In this modern cosmopolitan atmosphere we come across so many people, socially, personally and professionally. But its just a handful of them that we strike instant chemistry with and perhaps only one or two that come close. Its really hard to imagine life in full circle in which people come, go ; even success comes and shines low after sometime but we as human beings with an incessant thirst of ”more” always crave and ignore things as they come and being a hypocrite ,preach otherwise. Many of us would have found “the one” in our early phases of life but showing our true human being characteristics ignored them in a thirst for something else seeming more cherishable that time or maybe even hoping to find a better” one” later. But trust me on this, success, money, happiness don’t form a cluster of togetherness every time. There are times when u are professionally rewarded (success), have a fatter bank balance but essentially miss happiness more so because u miss “the one” .The one that u perhaps had some time back, the one that u ignored bcoz of your irresistible temptation for other things and one that is now gone and gone forever. It feels terribly disappointing and frustrated when u have everything u ever wanted but the person whom u wanted it to share with. Moral of the story is “When u find your true companion, which I call “the one” just stand by him/her, have trust & work hard in your life .You’ll some day realize that when you achieve success that may be measurably less that what u may have otherwise got, it would be rather more qualitatively cheerful and satisfying .Therefore in essence, success for me is a combination of health, money and relationship all having equal weightages and priorities.

“To ignore them takes a fool - plz don’t do that to yourselves.”