Get Off Your High Horse Lady….

“Lava . Lava flowing down the streets.. No one can survive that dude!”

What.The.Fuck? I was laughing at these retards sitting in a hurdle, hollering at each other over issues. Issues that ranged from lighting a half-smoked beedi to the Triple Knockout Punch to Japan from Mother Nature.

I was travelling in a local train back home from a colleague’s wedding, in a compartment that had triple the number of people it could carry. And it seemed that the epicenter of everything stupid – from being oblivious of the “Smoking Prohibited” sign in the train compartments to the fact that Tsunamis involve water and not lava (Looking back, this might not be their fault after all. This is what you get when you watch too much of NDTV & Sagarika Ghose). 

A sudden comment from a well-dressed lady that questioned the parentage of the men broke all hell loose. A fight broke out. Not a fistfight. Bengalis never wield fists. Their tongues are better at the art than their maach-bhaat muscles. Two ladies had objected to the loud hollering and the beedi-jalayile-fog in the compartment. Hence the commotion.

Yo dawwg! Local train iz da thang yo!!

Correction – the local trains in Bengal do not carry ladies. Ladies who like chocolate and like their bunnies close by while asleep or ladies who smiley-SMS their boyfriends 10 times/second that is. The women (most of them, I apologize to generalize) here are Mamata-fangirls. And therefore, to say that the ladies have the upper hand in a tongue-wagging, fist-swirling, eye-rolling debate here is a massive under-statement. 

And caught in the crossfire was me. I knew that taking sides was meaningless, as both parties were wrong. Men – to smoke beedis, and the ladies – to use words that would make Army jawans wet their pants.

I was desperately trying to lose myself in my iPod, but to no avail. I started cursing myself for taking a train back home, at a time when offishers and claarks ruled the locomotive routes.

After my initial struggle, I gave in and switched the gadget off. And just stood there. The fight had receded. The ladies were still grumbling. And the jokes kept being pounded on each other till kingdom come.

But there was a subtle difference. Some of the jokes and the meaningless, crude leg-pulling actually were making me laugh, now that I was paying more attention (though forced). And laughing with me were passengers who belonged to every damn class that India held in its bold but scarred economy. The laborers, the hawkers, the peons, the clerks, the office assistants, the team-leaders, the assistant managers, et al. If BJP would have been in my place, “India Shining” would have been baptized “India Smirking” for sure.

And then they came. Random, unexpected incidents. Two guys who had been swearing the most and who I had labeled ‘pigs’ for the first half-hour of travel, gave up their seats to two elderly ladies – and were the most modest, loving examples of men you could imagine. A guy who had smuggled beedis into the compartment gave away his lunch to 2 little kids at a station. An impromptu donation campaign was worked up inside the compartment for a co-passenger some barely knew – who had confessed to his kids’ school fees going unpaid because of fat medical bills back home.

Did they feel Jesus-y for a day? Maybe. Was it just an off day for Satan? Maybe.

I am not justifying the wrongs. All I want to say is – You need to get off your high horse, lady, to appreciate what is good around you.

For I was wrenched off the high pedestal I had placed myself on, by the collar, by these very men who I thought were repulsive and sick. Sure they still were, but that didn’t stop them from having shades of good too, innit?

It only took me an hour’s train ride to realize it. What will it take of you?