I had written this nearly three months ago. Now, in July, I accidentally deleted it while trying to copy and paste the entire blog to send to my siblings. Already, that piece was written from memory. Now, I’m attempting to recall and rewrite it from another part of my memory. The perils of being forgetful! But, as they say, it doesn’t matter.

This section was meant to recount some unforgettable memories from my past train journeys. I’ll try to organize my thoughts, though they may become random now and then. After all, they are random thoughts, aren’t they?

One vivid memory is of a trip to Chennai and Maharajapuram, a quaint hamlet near Thiruvaiyaru. As my brother and I were happily settled in the train, enjoying the journey, a bombshell dropped: our school principal, who had a reputation for threatening to break our knees, entered our carriage and sat in our bay. Both of us shrank into balls like porcupines. Despite reassurances that he was just an "uncle" here, we kept our mouths shut, and the entire journey felt spoiled. I’ll write more about this later.

When we moved from Delhi to Chennai, we had a lot of luggage and had to board the train at Old Delhi Station, where it stopped only for a few minutes. Suddenly, I realized my youngest sister, just a year old, was missing. I cried out, and as we frantically searched, we found her peacefully sleeping in a corner of the neighboring bay. She was so tiny that we had missed her.

During the same trip, my usually bold mother took my elder younger sister to the platform to wash her face. She had rubbed her face with a lot of soap when the train whistle blew. We all started shouting, but my mother calmly dumped my sister back into the compartment and climbed in just as the train started moving. She then gave her a wash in the washbasin in the compartment.

When I got the bank job, I was sent to Cochin for three months. To my surprise, we were eligible for first-class travel—a distant dream for us. We had often looked longingly at those compartments, but I couldn’t get tickets initially; I was waitlisted. As I gloomily prepared to board a second-class compartment, the ticket examiner called me over and allocated a seat in the first-class compartment. All my friends were overjoyed, and so was I. At that time, I didn’t even know the seat could be folded into a bed. Feeling like royalty without riches, I traveled in style.

The first time I traveled in an air-conditioned class was during a family trip to Delhi. We were going to Bombay to visit my elder younger sister, who had recently married and settled there. We traveled by chair car. My eldest son was only a year and a half old, and I had to keep him in my lap. One night, exhausted, I asked my wife to hold our son, put a newspaper on the floor, and lie down. I might have been lying between some other passengers’ legs, but who cared when sleep was needed?

On another trip, when my parents were not with us, we traveled to Madurai and then took a train to Tiruchi. My younger son was about one year old. As we were settling into our seats, the ticket examiner took a liking to my son, carried him in his arms, and told us to take our time. When we finally settled down, both my son and the examiner were missing. With a thumping heart, we searched frantically. Eventually, the examiner returned with our son, reassuring us that he had taken him for a walk in the fresh air. What a relief!

During a return trip from a training course in Mumbai, I discovered that my return ticket was for an air-conditioned compartment. Something felt drastically different. There was a closet for clothes and a cute little stepladder to climb up. I realized I was in a First-Class Air-Conditioned coach. I was eligible for this class, but since there was no direct train to my destination with this facility, they had booked me on another train, requiring me to change trains.

And then came the worst experience after the best. On our way to Chennai, we had to board a train at Bhopal. One compartment was reserved for passengers getting on at this station, but the train did not stop for long, and many passengers disembarked. It was total confusion. Even with reserved tickets, we struggled to board. Our seats were occupied, and one gentleman offered to help. He took our baggage and guided us into the train. We thought he was a good soul, but it turned out his family had illegally occupied our seats. Nevertheless, with some compassion, we squeezed in. It was only after six or seven hours that they got off at a station, and we finally breathed a sigh of relief.

To end on a positive note, during our Kulu-Manali trip, I had booked return tickets in First-Class Air-Conditioned compartments. We were all so tired after a hectic trip that we crashed into the compartment, locked the door, and slept peacefully. It was a refreshing rest.

Last year, on January 1st, we traveled with both our sons and their families to Tanjore to visit the Family Deity and see the Tanjore Temple and Cauvery River, inspired by "Ponniyin Selvan." I had booked tickets for a day train with a First-Class Air-Conditioned compartment and was fortunate to have it almost entirely to ourselves. The kids had a blast, moving around, climbing into the top berth, and enjoying themselves. As we crossed the Kollidam River, I told the kids it was a branch of the Cauvery, and they were excited, shouting "onni nadhi." On the return trip from Tiruchi, we traveled in Executive Class on the ultra-modern Tejas Express with electronically operated doors, charging ports, and examiners with iPads. We’ve come a long way. The food was horrible, but it took just around four hours to reach Chennai, and the kids' trip was made memorable.

P.S. To be honest, this rewrite has come out better than the original I had written!

Continued in 131. Chuk-Chuk Book-Book - Part 4