Sunday, January 30, 2005
rewind 50 days
It started with 12 people crammed into a jeep.
With the pink sun vanishing fast over the horizon, the vehicle accelerated away from Sonali, a shack lined frontier town, and into a vast hinterland. India had arrived.
Customs men, dubious officialdom, emerge from behind roadside trees to check papers. Commission is always welcome; welcome to commission. Out the window small towns fly by, streets constricted by roadside food stalls selling dinner by hurricane lanterns to a seemingly infinite audience.
Soon the small towns become a bigger town and the jeep dumps its cargo at a railway station. Inside the platforms, waiting rooms, staircases and booking halls, every inch is covered with people. Sleeping souls. Stationary in a place whose purpose is movement. Here yesterday. Here today. Here tomorrow. Anonymous people matched with anonymous luggage. Trains pull in and then depart, but still the boxes, tires and bales remain platform side, going nowhere it seems and owned by no one. Not even the cow, wandering carefree among the sleeping station dwellers.
Finally, a wink to familiarity. Kit Kats. Five rupees. And Polos. Still with the hole in the middle.
The ticket booth seems to sell just blank faces and directions to window 43. Somehow the system works: an inspector appears, ready for battle with arms full of computer printouts. Passenger names, date of births, inside shoe measurements. Eventually an onward ticket. Sleeper bunks. Middle and lower.
But why does the train stand, full of expectant passengers in complete darkness? People waiting patiently for departure, or maybe just for someone to turn the lights on. Still in darkness the opposite bunk is filled with a kind university professor on his way home from a week's lectures.
"Your stop will come at 4.45am. This train isn't usually late. You do have a chain to lock your bags with?"
Sleep, then Varanasi. Someone took all the people in London and squeezed them tightly into somewhere smaller than Brighton. And then told them all to stand on the street at the same time.
But not yet, not at 5am. Arrival brings the same anonymous souls sleeping under buzzing lights in the railway station, this time in a different city and on a different platform. In town, everywhere else is quiet. The only greeting provided by battalions of rickshaw wallahs and 2 huge bulbous rats, encircling the queue for a telephone kiosk.
Daylight arrives. The curtains drawn back and the stage lights switched to full. India showing at a theatre right here. For 2 months only. Take your seats and sit back.
Cause here it is, hurtling towards you at full pace. Cows, samosas, taxis, monkeys, your good name, so many people, so much more. Bigger, brasher and more bestial than Bollywood.
We take breakfast, sidelined on the rooftop terrace. Tired and weary we watch a pigeon wallah beginning his morning rituals. Standing on top of an adjacent roof, he lets out a long piercing shriek, waking his flock of birds from their sleep. swirling a long rope round and round he screams as they encircle him. "Coo-coo, coo-coo, coo-coo." Over and over again.
We are aliens in an alien world. The greatest show on earth has begun.
With the pink sun vanishing fast over the horizon, the vehicle accelerated away from Sonali, a shack lined frontier town, and into a vast hinterland. India had arrived.
Customs men, dubious officialdom, emerge from behind roadside trees to check papers. Commission is always welcome; welcome to commission. Out the window small towns fly by, streets constricted by roadside food stalls selling dinner by hurricane lanterns to a seemingly infinite audience.
Soon the small towns become a bigger town and the jeep dumps its cargo at a railway station. Inside the platforms, waiting rooms, staircases and booking halls, every inch is covered with people. Sleeping souls. Stationary in a place whose purpose is movement. Here yesterday. Here today. Here tomorrow. Anonymous people matched with anonymous luggage. Trains pull in and then depart, but still the boxes, tires and bales remain platform side, going nowhere it seems and owned by no one. Not even the cow, wandering carefree among the sleeping station dwellers.
Finally, a wink to familiarity. Kit Kats. Five rupees. And Polos. Still with the hole in the middle.
The ticket booth seems to sell just blank faces and directions to window 43. Somehow the system works: an inspector appears, ready for battle with arms full of computer printouts. Passenger names, date of births, inside shoe measurements. Eventually an onward ticket. Sleeper bunks. Middle and lower.
But why does the train stand, full of expectant passengers in complete darkness? People waiting patiently for departure, or maybe just for someone to turn the lights on. Still in darkness the opposite bunk is filled with a kind university professor on his way home from a week's lectures.
"Your stop will come at 4.45am. This train isn't usually late. You do have a chain to lock your bags with?"
Sleep, then Varanasi. Someone took all the people in London and squeezed them tightly into somewhere smaller than Brighton. And then told them all to stand on the street at the same time.
But not yet, not at 5am. Arrival brings the same anonymous souls sleeping under buzzing lights in the railway station, this time in a different city and on a different platform. In town, everywhere else is quiet. The only greeting provided by battalions of rickshaw wallahs and 2 huge bulbous rats, encircling the queue for a telephone kiosk.
Daylight arrives. The curtains drawn back and the stage lights switched to full. India showing at a theatre right here. For 2 months only. Take your seats and sit back.
Cause here it is, hurtling towards you at full pace. Cows, samosas, taxis, monkeys, your good name, so many people, so much more. Bigger, brasher and more bestial than Bollywood.
We take breakfast, sidelined on the rooftop terrace. Tired and weary we watch a pigeon wallah beginning his morning rituals. Standing on top of an adjacent roof, he lets out a long piercing shriek, waking his flock of birds from their sleep. swirling a long rope round and round he screams as they encircle him. "Coo-coo, coo-coo, coo-coo." Over and over again.
We are aliens in an alien world. The greatest show on earth has begun.
// posted by courtney and pete @ 05:17 
Comments:
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Can't take much more of this nostalgia...Teary after Pete's entry, totally choked by Courtney's. Any others out there having similar reactions? Or is this the sole perogative of menopausal mothers?! Janet, where are you?
Still would have called her Courtney.
Love from Canada, eh!
Still would have called her Courtney.
Love from Canada, eh!
# posted by 
: 2:26 pm
: 2:26 pm
I'm having the same problems here, Mar! Can't find the tissue box thru the tears!! But then again, I always cry when you do! Must be a DNA thing
Shari
Shari
# posted by : 2:52 pm
: 2:52 pm
I'm with you both on this - to think I was worried to begin with. They make it come alive, I feel I have almost been there!
Janet
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Janet
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