Metro Pleasantries
By: Mukund Shankar
Tags: Thoughts And Feelings, Metro, Travel, Smalltalk, Life

The only thing I was happy about now was that I was going to sit in an air-conditioned Metro on this blazing hot summer afternoon after writing one of the entrance exams for MBA.

The Metro Station was less crowded, one more thing to be happy about as I know how crowded a Metro be and above all that, not finding a seat with people behaving like the metro arriving at the station will be the last Metro they will have can add a little spice in the irritation I have summers.

The train arrived at the station and I already felt relaxed when the door opened, feeling the cool air gushed outside hitting my face full of sweat and clams my soul.

“I thought you will not be writing this exam.” I said while sitting on a chair right in front of me, to my fellow passenger who was one of the students writing the exam in the same room as I did, and also he sat just behind me in the exam room.

“I thought that too.” He said, removing the blue bag from his shoulder and placing it on his lap as he sat.

“I agree I slept, and when I was in a hurry to reach the examination centre, that autowalas, damn him, was negotiating with me.” he said with his eyes widened.

The doors closed and we felt a little push towards the right as the train started moving.

“Why?” I asked him.

“I said to him I’m in a hurry and he was trying to fill one more passenger in his auto.” He said it in a mocking tone for that autowala. “He kept saying, ‘just 5 minutes more, I will add one more passenger and we can leave’”.

“One more passenger! Hey, there is my exam in 15 minutes, I need to reach the centre, do all the formalities and get inside the exam room and he is asking for 5 more minutes.”

He kept telling the incident in a stretch as I was barely able to control my laughter.

The next station is Dwarka Sector 8. There was an announcement on the train.

“If it was going to be more than minutes, I would have asked him to drop me at home.” He finished.

This is Dwarka Sector 8.

“So how did you do in this exam?” he asked me as we both were eyeing the new passengers boarding the train.

“As usual, no need to worry about the reasoning and English area but the aptitude is still on my mind.” I said as I was watching people finding empty seats.

It is always fun to watch people finding, running and, sometimes pushing to get a seat when you already have one.

“If I know aptitude will be such a pain in the butt, I would have studied it in the school.” He said.

“It’s my mother is a maths teacher and her son is afraid of maths. That’s why I never discuss these questions with her and I think she too knows not all subjects are for every student. After all, she was a teacher, she understands students.” I said.

A boy sat on a seat one seat next to my left side as a girl sat just the opposite seat of mine facing me. I looked at them both and asked the boy with the blue bag, whispering,

“They both were in the exam too.” Pointing at them without anyone knowing except him. “Yet how they boarded the train in this station.”

The doors closed and the train started moving again.

“The examination centre was between the two stations, so we can board the train by either side. I asked you to come with me because the station from which we boarded was the last station from this side, so people coming from the other side of the city must leave the train and we can get empty seats very easily, and at this hour, it is usually empty.” He said as I glanced at the girl picking up a book from her bag and flipping pages, probably trying to find the page where she left the book.

“Very clever.” I said with both eyebrows raised.

Next station in Dwarka Sector 9.

“I have another theory, what if the last station has a huge crowd when we arrive at the station?” I asked with a smirk on my face.

“If we board at the train from the second last station arriving at the last station, we will be inside the train when everyone leaves. So it will be much easier to find seats being inside the train.” I explained.

“You have travelled a lot on the metro I think.” He said with a slight smile.

“All because of travelling to the MBA and M.Com exams centre in the edge of the city.” I replied with the same smile.

This is Dwarka Sector 9.

I looked at the boy to the right as I was talking with the blue bag boy, he too was reading a book already.

The gates opened and not many people arrived at the train, as it is understandable on afternoons in Delhi no one dares to leave their house without a proper reason.

The gates closed and the train started moving.

Taking photos inside metro station premises is a punishable offence. The next station is Dwarka sector 10.

“Ohh we were talking about the exams right! Didn’t your parents asked about how you did?” I asked him while turning back to him.

“They did but I just changed the topic. As soon as I entered my home I went to sleep and just as I woke up, I packed my gym bag and left home for the gym, so didn’t give them a chance to ask much about it.” He replied, gazing outside the window in front of him.

Passengers are requested not to sit on the floor or in the space between compartments. This is Dwarka Sector 10.

For a few minutes we didn’t talk, just gazing outside the window as the train started again, looking at buildings, cramped houses built in an unorganized manner, looking down the highway as the train ran on an overbridge.

I became lost in my thoughts for a while and I just snapped out of it. I turned my gaze to both sides to look at how many people were there in my compartment. Does anyone not having a seat in this non-rush hour? As I turned to my right, I glimpsed at the boy with the book and the girl in front of me exchanged tiny eye contact and both of them smiled for just a second.

“How did you know about this university exam?” the blue bag boy asked me.

“I didn’t. My father knows a lot about this stuff and he filled the form for this exam.” I replied. “How did you get to know about this university?” I asked.

“My friend told me about this, who was informed about this exam by his friend. We both filled the application together wondering we both will get the same exam centre.” He replied while taking his phone from his pocket.

“So where is his centre?” I asked.

“Kirti Nagar.”

“He got the closer one.”

The next station is Dwarka Sector 14.

“Which one is your station?” He asked.

“Mine is Vaishali.” I replied with a smile as I knew there will be a reaction on his face.

His eyes became big, raised both his eyebrows, and said,

“WOW! So that means you have travelled the whole blue line.”

“Twice including today.” I said with a smirk on my face.

“I didn’t think there will be this much crowd for this university exam.” He said scrolling his phone.

“Yeah! I never thought this many people knew about this exam.” I replied.

“Which phone is this?” I asked.

This is Dwarka Sector 14. Attention please, the first car in the moving direction is reserved for ladies. Male passengers are requested not to board the coach reserved for ladies. Doing this is a punishable offence.

“This is Samsung’s latest one. Recently released.”

“How much is this?”

“25000.”

This time my eyes widened as he looked at my face and knew exactly what I was going to ask. Before I could ask the question, he answered it.

“I run a little business and I was waiting for this phone so I earned and saved the money. Didn’t ask money from my father.”

The next station is Dwarka.

“You didn’t bring your mobile.” He asked.

“I was going to but my mother is a little paranoid one. She thinks every bad thing will happen to me if I step outside the house.” I replied with a little laughter.

“Paranoid always survives.” He answered immediately.

Any unattended or suspicious articles like a briefcase, bag, toy, thermos or transistor, etc could be a bomb.

This time the girl looked at the boy first and at the moment the boy too stared out of his book and looked up. The human mind sometimes confuses me, it can warn you if someone is staring at you even you don’t pay any attention to it.

They exchanged a smile as the girl kept on smiling while turned her head down to the book.

“It’s best to obey her rather than argue with her in some instances.” I said.

This is Dwaraka Station.

“Where is your house.? Is that near the station or do you have to go further?” I asked after a couple of minutes.

“It’s very near the station. It will hardly take 5 minutes to reach home?” he replied. “what about you?”

“Ahh, I have to take another public transport to reach the house. 20–25 minutes of the extra journey.” I replied.

This is Janakpuri East. Passengers travelling towards the pink line shall change from here.

“My station arrived.” The boy with the blue bag stood up to leave.

“Well, it was nice meeting you. We shall meet soon I think.” I said, offering him a hand.

“We will.” He offered back a hand.

As I shook his hand, I tried to remember his name. Then I remembered, we haven’t exchanged our names with each other.

I tried to call him before he left the train, but I chose not to. I accepted the fate that if we were meant to be friends, we will meet each other again.

And with a warm handshake, he took his leave.

I continued staring outside the window for a few minutes. Then I reached for my bag took out my book and start reading.

This is Vaishali station.

I got off the train as soon as the gates opened. While walking down the stairs I put my book back in the bag and grabbed my wallet to get the metro card.

As I was reaching downward, I saw people gathering around the token machine to swipe their metro cards/ submit their tokens on the machine. As the crowd did, I did the same. After swiping my card on the token machine, I chose to take the overbridge to get across the road. As I was stepping down the stairs to get to the overbridge, I saw the boy from my right side on the train buying something from one of the small station shops, as I noticed the girl who was sitting in front of me was stepping down the stairs. She too stopped at the same shop.

As I got near them, I heard the boy saying,

“You took the MBA entrance exam too in the same centre as I was. I guess you were reading one of my favourite books on the train.” He said to her with a smile.

As I passed them behind and getting near the overbridge, sounds from outside the station were loud, making it hard to hear what is being said inside the stations.

Then again I heard the boy say,

“Sorry, I am ……….”

Title Credits: Iswarya Sekar