A dry, dusty day. The hypnotic rhythm of the train. I was standing at the open door, the landscape whizzing by at some seventy kilometers an hour. It was just past twelve noon, and the train was a few minutes out from Jolarpet. There was nothing much to strike one as such. Just the view of a hill passing by, slower than the rest of the landscape as it was more distant.
But then the hill was rooted there. It was me who was traveling. That brought back memories of Fatima, who loved to see new places but did not like the journey part. Me, I LOVE the journey part! There’s something about being in a train. Maybe being in a train has become part of my life. I certainly had the fortune to be traveling in trains a lot.
I guess whats interesting about seeing something or some place from a moving train is the very transience. You go to a place as in place where you stay..can walk about in..can go back to…it somehow loses its charm. Even the places which have charmed me most- Calcutta being a prime example- have charmed me more by being distant; inaccessible, at least at some times in my life. Eight years since my last visit and the ambience does seem worth experiencing again, the food does seem absolutely great..and oh-the women do seem out of the world.
I said it! They are out of the world at the moment. That’s the key. The moment. Traveling gives you oh so many moments frozen in time and space. The hill that moves slowly away while you are in the train..the beautiful valey that you visited years back that in your memories seem even more beautiful. Places where you want to be, but are there only in your dreams.
And dreams…now that is something perfect. Daydreams usually are in every sense. REM….well, even if it’s a nightmare, the feeling and the fear is very very real, isn’t it.
