Skip to main content

Wanderer

I must confess that I have a fascination for travelling. More often than not, I get excited by prospects of traveling - not just by seeing new places at the destination, but also by the journey with train journeys being my favourite. It gives me immense pleasure to see towns and cities pass by, observe people at different places, to just get a feel of places as they come and go by! As a child I used to know many trivial details about the routes I was travelling on and nearby routes and trust me, it was extremely interesting, and it keeps me interested even today!


Recently, while travelling in Delhi, I suddenly decided to take a longer route to my destination, which required to travel on metro train in all three different lines, with 2-3 stations in each line. I had no deadlines, no pressures to reach somewhere. And it was wonderful. Passing through CP, Chandini Chowk, Old Delhi - the places about which we have been hearing since childhood.

One way of looking at it can be kind of a chore. The other way is enjoying the subtleties of a seemingly boring task. at times, it seems quite surprising that there are such trivial things in this world which can fascinate us and leave us mesmerized- it can be anything ranging from sound of a river to the way the parallel railway tracks seem to meet at the horizon, but never actually meeting to things like croaking of an insect

I have a strong fascination for roaming randomly, without a particular destination in mind. There have been times when I just took out my bike and started roaming. But this has sadly, been quite limited. Maybe, I can explore few more places in near future, or just enjoy the ride without worrying about the places. One of the wishes I have (seemingly unreasonable) is to start travelling without a particular destination in mind, deciding upon destinations on impulse and just keep on exploring - not something like Forrest Gump who kept on running for 3 years, but maybe, just for few days.

I once saw in a movie - "If you want to see real India, travel in second class compartment of train, travel in buses, observe the people". Going by this parameter, I have seen a very minuscule part of India, and may see some more in next few months, but in long run I wish to explore these subtleties and differences.

Comments

  1. Interesting.

    Would like to hear about one of these trip experiences.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Shop @ Amazon

Popular posts from this blog

Survival

Dark clouds were looming at the horizon. In few minutes they would have traveled few miles in westward direction and came closer. This is not usually the scene at noon in the hottest month of the year. Dark clouds meant something ominous. Probably sign of an impending storm or maybe a cyclone approaching. Sea is a capricious lady. Bay of Bengal was no different. It was infamous for cyclones, and Orissa was often at the receiving end of nature’s fury. Ramdas was few miles into the sea. So were his brethrens of the fishermen community. There were around a hundred boats in the sea that day. No one anticipated the storm. So no one even thought of staying back at the shore and miss out on their livelihood of the day. Ramdas was alone in his boat. He owned the boat. His son helped him with his job. They managed to get enough as to earn a square meal a day. They had a good rapport with others of fishing community. But of late that relationship was breaking down. No reasons for that. Nor wa...

All for a Car

"Boss, I want a car" "What? "Yes. I want a car" The boss thought for a moment. Ravi was asking for a car. Maybe he needed one. He could give him one for an hour or so. The boss was the owner of the agency, which dealt in dealing with distribution of FMCG products of a big company and was a person who had a soft corner for his employees, something which is rare in such type of work. Ravi was a small time computer operator earning Rs 5000 a month at the agency. The job involved sitting in front of a computer in an air conditioned room and punching orders and preparing the bills on the company software. But the demand for a car was a bit shocking. No employee ever asked him for a car. "Why do you need a car?" "Boss. I am getting married" "Good. Congratulations" "Thank you boss." "So do you ..." "Sir, I have told my to be father in law that I earn 35000 a month and have my own car. I'll be engaged soon. He ...

Child Labor

He was 10 years old. When asked he said that he was 15 years old. He didn’t know why. It was just that his master told him to do so. His name was Raju. When he was born, he was named as Shivkumar, but that name did not suit his master. So his name was changed. His master owned a small juice shop in some big institute, with around 500 people. Most of these students were his customers. They visited him regularly for juice, cold drinks, eatables, cigarettes etc. This was a popular hangout, chiefly because of large credit extended by Sharmaji Raju had 3 other siblings -Two sisters of age 13 and 11 respectively and a brother of 7 years. The eldest sister worked in a small carpet making unit. She has been employed since 3 years and worked for 12 hours a day without taking and day off. Probably, in a year or two she will be married to someone from a nearby village. Probably her family would get few thousand rupees in bargain! The younger sister was employed full time with a sort of well to ...

The Forest

The Toyota Qualis and the Chvrolet Tavera stopped after a long journey. It was almost 9 in the night and it was pitch-dark. Night times in a forest are always pitch-dark. Adding to that it was a good `thirteen days since the last full moon day. Adding to this, the cloudy weather made visibility close to zero. Later in the night the forest would be engulfed in a fog making it nearly impossible to see. The only noise audible was that of silence, few random insects and that of a train going at a distance. After a long journey they all were quite weary and all they wanted was some rest so that the next day morning they can head for tiger and rhino spotting among many other species of flora and fauna in the wildlife sanctuary. Right now it was time for some parathas, maggi and booze. All fifteen of them headed for the cottage which they had booked, sat near the fire place relishing food, chit chatting about college life, universe and everything. But chit chatting wasn’t what they came ...

The Detour

The 7 year old girl walked from school to her home. This was the first time she was walking alone on that route. On any other day, her mother would have gone to pick her up from school, but not that day. She was not aware that schools were declaring holiday an hour and a half earlier due to trouble in the town owing to some agitations and protests. Only few parents could be intimated about this. A friend’s mother accompanied her to the lane leading to her apartment, from where it was just a minute’s walk. But that day, for some unknown reason she decided to roam about a bit and take the longer route. It is not always that she gets to roam about, and no one would know about it. After all she wouldn’t tell her mamma about that. The road was almost deserted. It was usually the case around the noon time in this part of the country. She walked ahead leisurely, singing and dancing all along as if she owned the road. But this was short lived. In couple of minutes, the scene changed....