First things of everything are special. We might not remember our first train journey, but most of us do remember our first aero plane journey. And we do tell about it fondly and proudly and perhaps interestingly, or so we try. But first bus voyage? Is it even something worth mentioning during quotidian banter? Leave alone the interesting part! How the hell it can possibly be special for anyone?
I’ve partly negative, but mostly affirmative answer to each of these. Let’s begin from the beginning.
Now this might be astounding to some people, but this was my first [or probably second-third] experience in the bus. I’ve only travelled in bus during school trips –from RDSO to Gomti Nagar or LDA, which was at max 15 KM[only Lucknowites and my schoolmates would would ever know what I meant :-P]- or while going to Kanpur from Lucknow –which is 80 KM and bus takes 2 hours maximum to reach there. Apart from it, I’ve never travelled in bus. But I’d heard a lot about “bus-sickness” and how people tend to get puky and all. Interestingly, I didn’t have any of these. I was just getting irritated and frustrated with each passing second. Not because of the bus or distance or something like this. But because of the kind of people coming and going and sitting next to me. This might sound a little harsh to some of you, but I just can’t tolerate village people. Please don’t judge me! And particularly the kind of smell they carry with themselves. It’s terrible! And it’s not just about the smell, but their entire outlook, thinking, behavior, way of talking and everything else. This doesn’t mean I haven’t seen a village or lived there. I’ve done all that. More than any normal urban male. But as much I as I hate them, my destiny keep on bringing me more and more close to them 😦
Second kinds of people I don’t like are Maddus. I loathe them. And here, during my training in Saharanpur, I’ve again to live with a maddu. How ironical is that! Oh, by the way… by Maddu I mean typical south Indians. And this maddu, with whom I’m stuck is, can’t even speak English… leave alone Hindi!
But as they say [Maroon 5, precisely] – It’s not always rainbows and butterflies it’s compromise that moves us along. Almost entire of my past 21 years, I’ve been doing exactly that. Guess it’s time for someone higher up to listen there and let others follow this quipping instead of me. I’d really be thankful to Him.
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I heard this song for the first time almost a year ago… most probably at VC with Her. Incidentally I found it again on LAN sometime during last month –in a folder named ‘all time college classics’- and ever since this song is stuck in my head. I don’t know why, but I can really relate to this song deeply… although nothing of this sort has ever happened to me before. Go and find out for yourself from here, the song is ‘Living next door to Alice’ by Smokie.
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I’m not too well presently, this change is weather has taken it’s toll on my throat. It’s aching like hell. 😦 And now it’s been two days of consecutive bunk at my training. I just don’t feel like going there anymore. I don’t know what am I gonna show to people when I come back in July! Right now, my life is pretty smooth except for the sulking loneliness. The phone again has gone into aestivation. [No, not ‘hibernation’ coz thats winter time inactivity :-D] I’m also discovering -for the very first time- the advantages of having a camera phone with music 24×7 with me. The bad part is that the phone is not mine, and I think I’m gonna miss it when I’ll return it back to it’s rightful owner 😦
Cellar Door 