Dedications

One day I tried to exchange intellectual thoughts with a fellow commuter in a first class Bombay local train. Now all the best in articulation or linguistic ability, one can never explain to anyone what it means to travel in a local train in Bombay. It is like trying to explain resurrection and the person would be a ‘Doubting Thomas’ till he doesn’t experience and feel the resurrected. After he experiences it he would never want be resurrected, for that matter would not want to live thereafter. The emphasis of a ‘first class’ travel was to just to flaunt my status symbol as if I am travelling in a Merc, to cover the stupidity that I pay more and travel like cargo. Even cargo is transported better, just that in Bombay travel by train ensures you are perishable cargo as you are perished when you reach your destination. So with the fellow commuter we were packed like cargo sticking to each other just a little bit far from what you would get close to having sex. Sometimes I feel gays originated in Bombay local trains in Bombay, as life in Bombay anyway kills you, leaving you with no strength for sex, so virtually experience it when you travel, so what if it is with the same sex.

Now back to the intellectual sharing of thoughts, with my fellow commuter.
I boasted (as always I do of India), that we would be a soon super power. To which he replied he would rather wish for uninterrupted power to light up his house.

To encourage him I told him we have a huge foreign exchange surplus from where we were once, to levels of selling our gold reserves for survival. He pointed out that he would prefer basic water reserves, which he has to now get up early morning and store as water supply too was not uninterrupted, and many a times rare.

I pointed out we are a country known for food self sufficency, to which he questioned me of starvation deaths in Maharashtra.

I told him of how an Indian company has made the world’s cheapest car the Nano and soon he could drive in his own car, he said he would prefer a boat. I was confused, and thought he was getting too greedy or choosy for comfort. I asked him what he meant, and he gave me a dead pan faced honest reply, enquiring if the Nano will ride over floods in the monsoons.

I told him about the Indians that have landed into the Forbes list of Billionaires, and he asked he how does it make sense when two of them are brothers, and don’t see eye to eye. Anyways Indians don’t see eye to eye with each other being a divided and derogatorily labeled as Ghattis for Maharashtrians, Madrasi for the most of South, Bihari for the most of North, Pavwallahs for Goans.

I told him of how India has launched a space craft to the moon. This got him amazed and I felt I was successful in convincing him, and he replied we can send a space craft to the moon, but in a small island like Bombay we don’t have direct connectivity from East to West of the island, as most of our transport system is designed from South to North.

I told him that the Congress is back in power, so cheer up. See out stock market zoomed the next day after result. To which he pointed out that the Congress did not win. I realized then that I was trying to make an ‘intellectual conversation’ with a dumb ass, and seeing my disbelief he explained further. The Congress did not win; it was just that the others lost. That was even more confusing to which he tried to explain even further with an anecdote of how any normal person can win a race in a Paralympics. So Congress was just the lesser evil that the other evils. What are the choices you can vote for? Without being in power the Shiv Sena and MNS could create riots and law and order situation problem in Bombay, so how do you vote for them. When MNS is a division of a family how can they keep a city together or united? They divided Bombay in lines of the Maharashtrians v/s the rest and now they successfully divided the Maharashtrians against each other. So soon riots would be not be Maharashtrians v/s North Indians, it would North Maharashtra v/s South Maharashtra, or Maharashtrians from Kalanagar and Maharashtrians from Shivaji Park within Bombay. So Bombay was made Mumbai with a promise to be made Shangai, and now we can call it Shamehai.

How would you vote for the communist who policies don’t match today’s realities, or for a Samajwadi Party, who plans to make a party with failed or failing cine stars. Wanting to know if he atleast did vote, to which he showed me his finger inked, and he commented this time we are going to get the finger from the palm that is a party symbol.

I pretended to get busy and connect my head set to my mobile and make an urgent call, when discretely I turned on the radio to listen to music, to retreat from the loosing debate, and the radio blared ‘Jai Ho’

# posted by Sunny Fernandes @ 2:35 AM