Dindigul to the South?

Since I was in such a well publicized town, I did look out the window although until we arrived at the “bus stand,” I can’t remember anything which would distinguish the cityscape from any other town. But then there was the bus stand. This was a corral of several acres surrounded by food stands. The bullpen in the middle was a collection of busses pulling forward and backing up and blocking another bus and getting honked at by several other busses that want to block other busses that planned on parking. I got waved at by the conductor, grabbed my briefcase and pack and jumped to the ground. The only thing I lacked was the direction to my next bus. One reason people, who speak only one language, stay home is because they don’t speak Tamil or Hindi or the 1500 other languages of India. No problem. As a rule someone always speaks English. This was the exception to the rule. Every bus’s home port and destination was written in Tamil. It was hot. I was still feeling less than I would have liked to. And I’m at sea as to which of the twenty-five to fifty busses to take. First thing I did was get in the shade and drop my pack. I looked around as if I know what I’m doing and after repeating Kodai Road a couple of dozen times to nice people, who have no idea what I’m saying, one guy grunts and points. I trundle over to ask if this is my bus and it indeed is! So within a half hour I am on the road again. No bumps to speak of and I arrive in Kodai Road. I’m still unsteady from that downhill trip. I grabbed my pack and jumped off the bus. The people yelled at me and I turned round to see the conductor holding up my briefcase, which among other things held this computer. Then the down the road I walk through shops and traffic and people who look like they are wondering what I’m doing here. I’m looking for a train station with a train called the Howdah Express that just might come roaring through this evening and where I can lay my body down to the cradle-rock of a sleeper car, rather than the jerk and swerve of a bus. I could see the track. Where there is a track, there is a station and somebody to sell me a ticket north.
One ticket seller spoke good English. The train didn’t stop here until tomorrow. I asked about a hotel. He said they didn’t have hotels, just hills. Remember I had just been sick. What is he suggesting? My mind wasn’t functioning. I’m not going to sleep under a tree. His advice was to go south to Madurai. “I want to go North!” If I went to Madurai I could catch the Howdah Express there. Memories of Diwali were still fresh and I didn’t want to do it but the thought of sleeping under an acacia tree didn’t appeal either so I bought a ticket to somewhere I didn’t want to go.
I really did feel rough so just drank some water and stayed in the shade. I found a doctor to talk to, who was on his way to Madurai and catching the same train. We spent an hour visiting and then the train came. I followed him along the platform, thinking we have another hour sitting together talking about the passing scenery. Then I saw something wasn’t as I had expected. People sat on the car steps with their feet sticking out. There were several of us who tried to pick our way past them but when looking into the carriage, you could see people sitting on every square foot of the floor. Nobody moved! About that time the doctor looked around at me and I could see a lot of white in his eye. He waved me on to a more distant car and pulled himself into the wad of people who blocked the car door. Minutes had gone by as I trundled along looking at feet sticking out the car doorways. How long would the train stop? I moved fast and all I saw was feet, feet, and sometime a head sticking out the car entrances. I was moving fast while those around me began to run. They did not carry a full pack and a brief case and they were a foot shorter and many inches less around than I and they ran not boarding. The train was going to leave without my boarding and I was going to go looking for an acacia tree.
I don’t know how I got on the train. Partly I smiled and talked to everyone as if this were a high school reunion and there has got to be just a little space left for me in the backseat of that ’52 Ford. And too when you weigh between 250 and 300 pounds with luggage, probably the possibility of being stepped on carries some authority. I did get on.
And then I looked into the carriage. The inside of the car was paved and painted with people. Not happy people. And I was about as welcome as an over-weight one horned Indian rhinoceros. I have never felt so big! But I wiggled and joked my way about ten or twelve feet into the car. I set down on my pack and a grandmother pushed it back toward me. Her grandchild was underneath. Somebody waved to me to stow my briefcase in the overhead….and there wasn’t much room there either but if it fell, the computer wouldn’t be damaged. Surely it would land safely on someone. I was standing when the train started up and the sickness was wearing off, and we were gently moving in the right direction, and I was on the train. Damn, I felt almost human!
So I grab onto the overhead luggage bin and lean my head on my arms and when I stop giving a prayer of thanksgiving, I open my eyes and I’m looking straight down into the grandchild’s eyes. I was probably the first Alaskan, who was on a journey around the world that the three-year old, had ever seen. And furthermore, I was the biggest person with the most luggage of anyone in the car.
I reached in my pocket, took out a rupee, and holding it in my left hand, I began polishing it with my right index finger. I had the attention of the grandchild and about twenty other people. I transferred the rupee into my right hand, turned a little to my left and lowered my hand to the level of grandmother and child both of whom sat on the floor. Then I slowly opened my hand and the money was gone. The kid had watched and so had the other twenty people. Everybody including Grandma, except the child, smiled. I decided at that point that they wouldn’t push me out one of the open windows after all. I relaxed and hung onto the overhead baggage, closed my eyes, and wondered if the inventor of the steam locomotive had been canonized yet. I know the inventor of the bus is roasting in hell.

We came to a stop in the Madurai station. But that was all because then a very Indian thing happened. Since this was not the end of the line for this train, people wanted to board. Since this was a district center, people wanted to get off. At times like this, you watch and keep quiet. Let the other people yell. I couldn’t move but it looked like I would watch a fight break out about five feet to the starboard from where I stood. I thought about that burnt-out car in Bombay. I thought about my former wife’s anxiety about crowds and I wondered if the train would pull out of the station with an ongoing riot in this car. That’s what the police are for.
I had seen them in several stations. The ones that looked like officers could usually speak a little English and when they shouted and walked like they were going somewhere and brandished that wooden cane they carry, people did listen. They must have been out the door prodding people with those sticks. We had been jammed together not moving for nearly fifteen minutes by now. It seems that the train doesn’t leave with a riot in progress after all.
All I could do is stand and watch two guys read each other off and finally an old lady began poking me in the ribs and waving me out of the way. Where “out of the way” was I wasn’t sure but I pretended. She wiggled passed me and I followed her like a wallet. By the time I got to the door, the guards were punching someone else and I was able to walk across the platform. P.S. the difference between the two guys never went past venting anger. That’s probably an Indian thing as well. Too many possibilities to start a fight. Let’s just yell and let it go at that.
So through the station and out in the taxi approach and into the afternoon and across four lanes of traffic, for once, I knew where I was going…almost. I looked down one lane and couldn’t see the Pearl Hotel but found it at the next corner. Not bad. It had only moved one block since I had been in Kodaikanal. They did have a room and it was comfortable and clean and after supper, I lay in bed planning on getting up early so as to be at the station by eight a.m. to get an “emergency” ticket in second class AC two tier for the following night to Kolkata. The bed felt good. The overhead fan whispered and I fell asleep.

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