AnS - Part 1

It was peak time. The 8:23 am local from Virar to Churchgate was brimming over the top. Andheri station for one was at bursting point. People rushing helter-skelter - students, bankers, hawkers, government servants, secretaries, fisherwomen, professionals - After death, it had to be the Mumbai locals - the greatest leveler.

They met in a crowded first class compartment.

Amanpreet was a 23 year old, working in a media planning firm. After graduating with a degree in Mass Communication, this had been his first job and he was hoping, not his last. What’s the deal with the client being always right anyway? Those servile buggers at his firm would send the earth circling around Jupiter if it brought so much as the shadow of a smile to the powers-that-be. But then again he thought, it was difficult to make that shift he so desired. He noticed how deftly the fellow selling key-chains in the adjoining ladies compartment packed up his jing-bang in a matter of 5 seconds and thought morosely that the guy at least had the satisfaction of knowing that he had mastered his work.

Sayanee was 25 summers down, and as she described herself - an Engineer and a lover of the English language, perhaps not in that order. She was working in the IT industry and quite enjoying herself. Her clients were fun-loving people and there was some chance she would get to go to the States before the year was up. The current financial crisis had made things a little bleak for the industry, even the company she worked for, but her department was well-diversified; with on-site ranging from Dublin to Delhi. Well, as long as she got a good salary and loads of opportunities to travel, was there really another purpose to life? Naah.

Mumbhai. Yes, selling key-chains is somewhat of an art here. Dotting the rather over-crowded landscape in a ladies compartment, these tough kids carry what looks like a cumbersome and precariously balanced jumble of key-chains, earrings, hair-clips and other such fast-moving-ultra-mass-consumer-goods, but come a station, and before you can utter even one expletive at the person standing unhelpfully in front of you, they have the whole thing packed and the notes pocketed.

Mumbhai. While there’s many a slip between the cup and the lip, there isn’t any other damn place in the world that will give you the chance to drink again and again and again.