Searching for a seat; not Osho

Electric poles stand the hill side, like Autobots, rusted from the Deccan humidity. My train paces along, moving to and fro the excess number of women in my compartment. Traveling alone to Pune, for the first time, I am overwhelmed by pretty much everything. The train, the passing landscapes and the jostling women, who regularly take this three hour journey from Mumbai to spend their weekends home in another city. They have taken up the luggage rack above us, like in all other boogies, and are now arguing over booked seats. I sit amused and a bit afraid of being challenged for the half smirk that is pulling on my lips. The aggressive woman upstairs has splayed herself on the rack, shooting arrows of warning to those attempting to climb up for a seat.

While the others put away their guns and bring down their flags, another contingent of colonists approach unaffected by her glares or her size. The haggling ensues. I can see that the new leader is winning. Her comebacks are quick and sharp and she's wearing a nice salwar kameez, instantly putting her in the other passengers good books.

At last hippo gives up and moves a foot away, allowing the skinniest girl in our compartment to perch half her bum there. Three hours — half a bum seat. I would have opted to stand.

To break the monotony of the Indian train scene, the window outside suddenly breaks into a bright flush of yellow, as field upon fields of wild mogras take up my frame of sight. I realize I am getting stares for looking out the window with my mouth half open.Excuse me, but I don't often come across fields of mogras while traveling from Mazgaon to CST!

We finally reached Pune, just as I finished my two vada paos, the first I've had in six months.
It might sound a bit dramatic of me to talk this way about a train journey to Pune, which almost every student has made at one point or the other. But it's a first time for me. Sans the Osho slippers or Kayani biscuits, I'll now head back for Goa, a little more ticketed.