This is a piece I had written in 2009 which my friends feel should be put up on the official blog. It's so evident that I was an amateur then but I loved my narration!
This is how things went exactly on a 3 day visit to Tirupati. We were six of us - Myself, Pallavi, Abhijeet, Ananth, Murthy and Ullas, my BE mates. The train was scheduled at 1.15 in the noon and we had planned to meet up by 1 atleast. The train tickets were arranged. As its a overly flooded train, we had to go early and put our ass on the seats well in advance.
It happened so that I got 101 things to be done and was stuck up in this Bangalore traffic and was home till 12 in the noon, unpacked. I rushed back, did some packing which didn't consist of my night dress, goggles and things I needed the most while travelling. No breakfast, nothing, mom had packed rice flakes for the journey as I couldn't eat and I finally left home at 12.25 pm and got into a rick. Guys, I tell you, never fix anything on a Saturday in a place like Bangalore, I mean the traffic is oh so horrible only on this particular day. I was getting constant calls from my friends who had already boarded the train and were tracking where I was.
It was 1.10 pm and I was still near corporation hoping for some miracle to happen. After all the mess I finally reached station at 1.20 pm to see the train leaving off the station. My hands and legs were shivering, didn't exactly know what to do. Then Murthy suggested me to chase the train to cantonment, the very next station. It would hardly take 10 mins for a train to reach the next station and imagine me chasing the train on road in that traffic would take at least 20 mins. I was yelling at the auto driver, loafer he was wantingly going slow and I warned him that I wasn't ready to miss the train again in cantonment. So he took me in the nearest and shortest possible roads. My phone was never so busy, all the friends in the train were yelling at Pallu, poor she, she got all the blasting.
Finally I was near the cantonment station facing the last traffic signal and I saw the train arrive at cantonment station. I had left all hopes of catching the train even there. The rick bill was close to 122 bucks and I had 130 bucks ready with me so that I could save time and not really bothering to take the change back. I paid and started running into the station and in all this mess, my water bottle fell. I really didn't bother to pick it up as I was running. Some guy followed picking my bottle up for me. He went on saying- 'madam nim bottle togoli, train stop aagide'. Mixture of tension, anxiety, fun swirling in my head. I saw the train, but it was on the other side of the platform. Either I had to wave the train a goodbye or take the over-head bridge. I did none and placed my bag pack down, got down the dirty platform, crossed the first railway track, went past the shit and drainage pipe and at last placed the bag inside the train and placed my feet on the step. I made sure I got into some bogie and then go where my friends were seated. Boarding the train from the other side was a mess too because the height matters there without a platform to board. In the mean time that guy followed me with my water bottle and that's when I took it back from him and was finally smiling on myself. My friends were in a bogie behind the engine and I was at the tail of the train. I was in and called Pallu to tell the same. Next station was K.R.Puram, I got off the train immediately and ran towards the front, then again got into some bogie and started moving front from within. In the mean time, my friends had decided to get off the train if I couldn't manage to board even in cantonment and go in a bus wasting 480 bucks all together but I wouldn't have let them do that and I myself would catch a bus alone.
Wondering if this is reality or shooting of a movie. I was with my friends at last, all tagged me with a 'heroine' tag from Jab We Met :) needless to say, I was flattered that in spite of yelling at me, all welcomed me. The journey was great. I went on chatting my experience of missing the train and how I chased it for an hour at least.
We reached Tirupati at 8 pm and then everyone followed to my instructions as I was the only one who was well versed with the place and language as I go there every year. We had dinner and dozed off as we had planned to trek the 7 hills which comprised of 14 km all together and some 5000 and odd steps. So we were up and got ready at 3 am and started off. We reached the hill top at 7 am and by the time we were out of temple it was 12 pm. Had a good darshana, was worth the entire circus.
There were few more temples to visit, got done with all, had been to 'Srikalahasti' too. Two famous temples in South India. Now I feel the legs are talking, completely tired but was awesome to visit such a holy place. Ananth was a stand-up comedian for the entire trip with his poor Telugu speaking skills, he made us laugh like there was no tomorrow and as usual linking me with Murthy and my other flames.
I wanted to share the filmy side of me to have missed the train and the chase and the trip. Enjoy reading and imagine the picture and do leave your comments.
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