The Final Destination (Aakhri Manzil)

Basheer wiped out the beads of sweat over his forehead as he waited for the bus to leave the stand. The supporting nuts had come off from backrest of the seat in front of him so every time he moved his legs, he'd get a dirty glare from the woman in front. This seat hadn't been worth the pushing and shoving but then this was the only bus headed out at this unearthly hour. He soon dozed off against the grills on the window but not for long as he was woken up by the conductor,"Aakhri manzil wale bhaiya, 35 rupees." Basheer searched around for 5 coins and pushed the soiled notes along with the coins. He looked out to see the familiar void outside just like in his life. Quite a moniker he had earned himself at the bus stand. He wasnt surprised. Ever since he had moved into the city for a job, the concrete world of dreams had come crashing on him. While he did land up a job with Tejpreet, his village neighbour's second cousin, the pay was too meagre to get him a decent place and have savings to send home. Even sleeping on the street was an expensive affair with local goons extracting rent from the homeless. Once while travelling to a nearby town for goods delivery, he came across the biggest plus of overnight travel. Forgiving the few odd bumps and lurches, his sleep was pretty much undisturbed. That day onwards, he would catch whichever bus was standing at the station, and ask a ticket for the last stop. The weekday bus to Solarpur around ten in the night was his favourite as very few people got on and he was allowed to stretch his legs. Also the conductor Ram Singh was a delight despite his old age and the unearthly hour. His tales of the freedom struggle made Basheer wish he had been born half a century ago. The irony pinched him - Indians were more united against all differences before 1947 than after 60 years of freedom where trivial issues under the mask of politics had been exaggerated. He had always wanted to join the army and bring back the pride of the Khan family which lay misplaced after they were displaced post independent India. The bus lurched to a halt as people got off to take a leak , stretch their legs and catch a cup of tea. Basheer stretched his legs across the seat for the few minutes that he could.

Jaffrey came back to the house with one box of barfis (sweets) in his hand. "Who did you leave out?", asked Tejpreet, owner of Lucky stores, a 8 foot by 7 foot shop specialising in ladies churidars in central market area. "Bunty's. You'll have to give it when he comes to the shop next Monday. Noone knows where he stays." No one indeed knew where Tejpreet's seniormost salesman lived in the city. He was always the first one to the shop; way before the cleaners had swept by the streets and closed the shop when the homeless dozed off on their cardboard beds on the spacious pavements. Bunty had never taken a leave in the entire 2 years he had worked at Mr. Tejpreets place nor had he ever talked about his family, let alone crib about them. "Oh well! I ll give it to him when we open up after Diwali." Suddenly, a few shrieks later, Tejpreet and his family were in front of the TV as the headlines screamed "Terror Strikes! Bomb on Bus kills Ten"

Lingo Aint For the Dingo

Just dug this article up from archives. This is my article for the first Writers' Circle Publication "Pentagram" in 2005.

Now back to the point

LINGO AINT FOR THE DINGO
Decoding the Language of Youth

How many times have you gone back home and seen flustered faces as you unconsciously go on about “chaat” in speech, and “funda” in life? English and French may fight it out to unite the world under one language with most speakers, while the Chinese try not to do that by going early to sleep. The most defining factor in differentiating and integrating the youth of today is LINGO! Just as it may make you feel at home in Antarctica, it can make you feel alien in your home country. Enriched by the spices and nuances of parochial groups, Lingo has been always been the coolest thing around for ages. Every generation comes on with something that defines it. If the Hippies were in the 70’s and the GenX in the naughties, lingo has been a defining factor of a person’s lifestyle. Lingo has always been the easiest way to incorporate that. It is testimonial to where we are and with whom we are. Often the definition of coolness, has hung on the precinct of how lingo friendly one is.

Wassup may lead to heads staring up at the void space, imported “maal” doesn’t need to be bought from duty free, “chaat” is not necessarily the spicy scrumptious stuff your sweaty roadside vendor serves with flies intact, bad can mean good, “it” can be a human and so on till a point where irony doesn’t have anything ironic. For a marooned army, getting “supplies” is the next best thing to going to Heaven, while for students “supplies” are the next best thing to getting marooned. One may blame it on the intricacies of English, but it isn’t so, for all languages have had their share. Lingo is the driving force among youth for the very reason it gives them an opportunity to identify themselves among peers and stamp with authority their presence.

2days peeps hav wndrful sense of getin da msg a’x’. Wat da jerries blew k’s on, 2days peepz do it 4 free. Cryptic msgs undecipherable 2 othrs. 143 wudnt make sense 2 u, but on vday, every1 knws it. Where is eng goin 2?

Afraid, not being an exponent of this craze to banish the vowels to Netherland, nor let Shakespeare scream ‘Murder’, I haven’t done full justice to slang. Lingo has also been influenced by current affairs. A dull person can be a muggle, and taking the blue pill is cool (no, it isn’t a doctor’s prescription).

Critics cry as they write out epitaphs for vowels, grammar, apostrophes, colons and other soon becoming redundant grammar usage. But the opposite side says, it’s the way of the world, if a language cannot change with society, it will die out. Latin turns in its grave on this point. What surprises linguists is the faster rate at which this change is coming about, also affected by globalization as local words fit into the English dictionary. The war remains until sides change as a new jump in generations take place.

Though a consensus is always required, should it be that slang be left out of written word or let it be a part of history

Over A Cup Of Tea ...

It seemed ages since this corner had seen life. Years back, this very spot epitomized the city's social fibre. Karim Chacha's tea stall or how that plywood board read out in colored chalk "Karim Tea Stoll". No big bucks would give you the same ambience as this stall set at the most dramatic location, on an old bridge that served its purpose as a crossing over a dry riverbed littered with sea of garbage. Karim chacha was a great man in his small way. With his navel showing vests, that seldom covered his potbelly, he was the most amiable personality in the business. People would just walk to him and pour out their woes. He remained a patient listener to the harshest of speakers. His stall was a neutral zone, where the rich in their Austins would sip his "Masala" tea sitting next to the truck drivers driving by from Punjab on their way to deliver goods to the industrial guzzlers at the other end. No other place enjoys this intermixing of social classes except for the city jails for some godforsaken reason. I still remember the brown leather covered transistor, whose crackles would have hordes listen to the cricket commentary over cups of tea and crisp "samosas" as Kapil's devils would take on the world. Not to forget, the wisecracks his baritone voice would echo bringing Mona Lisa to bare her teeth.

In this colored environment, I would come after my journalism classes, to hear the city speak out with total frankness, with no fear of suppression and also watch the variety of Ambassadors that crawled through the bridge for no other make had won over the Indian man like Ambassador- the car of the common man. I knew I had become a regular, when Karim chacha would beckon me to come and drink tea as I walked past everyday. A businessman, no doubt, but the love he put into it, made you feel so much at home, especially for a young man like me who had come into this strange city with big hopes and no one to call family. Karim Chacha did remove the quandary over the last case, so did the other regulars who all felt we were a huge family bound by tea – Karim Chacha's tea. It was in cold dreary monsoons that his pipping hot "Masala" tea revitalized you beating green tea hands down. Inflation hit the city, and prices just soared, but Karim Chacha still sold his tea at one rupee. The tea stall was a social club in itself. It was here, uplifters of democracy sat deciding when to hold the next strike, to help the common man, ensuring no pay that day. Irony and politics seem to complement each other. It was here, Religion and caste knew no barrier as people celebrated Diwali, Eid and Christmas with the same revelry. It was here, the first crackers were burst when we lifted the World Cup and it was here, that the heaviest collection box for the Bhopal victims was sent from, though there is a rumor that I would love to believe that Karim chacha filled all his earnings that week into the box. He was that sort of a man. To help even in utmost adversity. To do so with a dowry ridden daughter at home, it is not an easy job to be giving away money for charity. Charity often has been considered a luxury by middle classes, but it is people like Karim Chacha who make us realize that there still is a human element to it. Karim Chacha's father had left this small tea stall to him, since everything else was lost when the country divided into 2 bits. His father never reached the border, and secretly, I am happy about that fact.

Soon, I was shifted to a leading daily's office in the city centre and my meetings with Karim chacha became a page in my diary. Years later, I heard of a freak accident as a motorcyclist skidded over the tarmac ending up in two casualties. Needless to say why I feel a void as my air conditioned chauffeur driven Mercedes crawls over the bridge.

New York Nagaram VI

1st August 2008

Having missed a Bon Jovi concert, I wasn’t going to miss the next one and while Miley Cyrus might not be my cuppa tea , Sheryl Crow sure was. The plan was all set. We’d get up by 5:30 AM (#$#$%) to catch Sheryl Crow and then head over for CTW. Having rolled up our sleeves to hide the company insignia :P , we reached Rockefeller Plaza at cracking dawn to find we weren’t the only ones. We were easily a block away from the stage blocked by a semi stand in between the crowds. While we all joke about how we Indians love our ISTs, fashionable late seems to be in vogue everywhere. With the NBC centre being right there, we got cameras stuffed at our faces a couple of times but the wait was getting tiresome and the other two would have slept off there if they had a chance . Passing time reading the hundreds of posters folks brought, Sowmya and Shravani finally decided to give up since it was already 8 and there was no sight of Sheryl Crow. We had one false alarm when an NBC reporter turned up and the crowds went ballistic. On grabbing some breakfast, bagels and orange juice, we heard the crowds roar and Ms. Sheryl Crow finally made an entry right where we had been standing! So close yet so far. The crowds too had doubled by the time we came back and Cops blocked entry to prevent overcrowding. Catching faint throes of Sheryl’s voice, we moved on hoping we weren’t late to get to our CTW at Highbridge Park.

After having been on the smooth 4,5,6 line, we soon found ourselves transported into one of the older routes of the metro with the train actually visibly vibrating as it picked up pace especially once It came out into the open air. Legions of white t shirts landed at this out of sorts station and soon huddled around at the park as we got divided into three major groups which were further sub divided into 4 groups and started our weeding campaign. The weeds looked so healthy; it was tough to figure which was the weed and which wasn’t. After ruthlessly murdering few (understatement) innocent bystanders, my gang consisting of (Dr.) Swati (now why do we call you doc??), Sue, Sowmya got a hang of it and did manage to kill the evil weeds and avoiding its henchmen: the poison ivy. A lucky few like Rubaina, Sahil did manage to brush their clothes with poison ivy and then get infected whilst washing their clothes. The rashes must have been torture for them, but equally gruesome to look at for the rest of us. Back to happy stories. The ball barrow was lot more fun as we pushed it up and down the lane picking up weeds and dumping them into the compost heap racing against one another. Suddenly the place had turned really hot and humid and everyone’s enthusiasm started dying with every passing hour. Lunch seemed a distant future and well… America still needs to learn about packed vegan lunches. Not doing a good job at it. Soon we were back to leveling the road and the grass lawns at the edges though the way we were at it, it was one of those moments that would have inspired Elvis to sing “A lil less conversation, a lil more action”.

While people started heading out, a few of us stayed back to go trekking on the hill on the opposite side of the park. A motley crew consisting of Rubaina, Karthik, Manu, Raagini, Patil, Shravani, Arun, Sowmya and I started randomly climbing up the hillside egged on by a physically challenged young man on his Stephen Hawking’s type motorized wheel chair. What started off as a random trek soon turned into a scavenger hunt for baseballs. As it turns out the top of the hill is home to a ball park and all lost baseballs end up in the wilderness that we were scouting around. A la “A mad mad mad mad world”, we scrambled around clinging to edges, brushing past thickets to catch as many balls as we could. Maybe more of Crystal Maze without the time limit J and the balding Richard O’Brien. With a majestic haul of 14 baseballs and 1 softball (Ruby doo’s prized scalp) , the buccaneers split up as a few of us headed back to prepare for next day’s early morning trip to Pocanos in Pennsylvania for a cycle trekking weekend.

New York Nagaram V

This one goes out to the NAPAs of 2009 to inspire me to relive the moments and get down to continuing on my trip blog. Who’d have thought documenting two months of the best time of your life takes more than a year to write down. So Back from Washington, the New York NAPAs are already in awe of the Bangalore ones who seem to be catching the sights and sounds of New York and around as if there is no tomorrow. We finally get around getting our CHASE debit cards which made life so much easier especially since America has this fetish for .69 and .87s and numerous other decimals on their items and they actually give back all the change. Soon you understand why Americans love their plastic, it just easier to use than calculating change and figuring all those nickels and dimes and quarters. With the amount of walking that we had started doing, I figured I didn’t have to get up early to use the gym. Mornings were soon becoming routine. After having literally been the ants of an optimization program having tried all the routes possible to reach Grand Central, everyone had got used to choosing the shortest path and you could be sure to bump into someone on your way to work. There is this whole new kick to life when you are suited and booted walking down Wall Street with a FT / WSJ in your hand and people wondering is this some super brilliant brown guy earning millions of dollars. Wishful thinking because none of the Americans thought aloud about it. With money in my bank account, I could finally get down to wonders of online shopping and started visiting the International Spy Shop, The Tech Geek and numerous other places to find some weird boy toy to satisfy my craving for those oddball spy gadgets. Watches that could record conversations from a distance, sunglasses that allowed you to see behind you, and all those Inspector Gadget, Q contraptions you were brought up on.

Another routine we had set upon ourselves was to find out new cuisines to try out. The falafel dudes outside office removed any traces of home sickness I could have though they never managed to replace the awesome falafels we get back in the Gulf. One day we decided to try out Taz’s pizza and having checked them on the site, we went on our search for real cheap pizzas. We walked by Taz twice before realizing that they looked nothing like the pictures on their site but the pizzas were still good enough and cheap. I soon learnt to bookmark another great site www.menupages.com for NYC dining. While Subway and Chipotle were regular fall backs, we’d get adventurous and try out cuisines that spared a thought to vegetarians including Chinese (yes!!) , Thai, Mexican, Ethopian etc. Though the best lunch sessions were when we introduced the non Indians to Indian cuisine and saw how they struggled with our daily staples. A note to general public: Dosas don’t come under the fork and knife category.

With project work, assignments and stuff, emphasis started shifting towards weekend trips while random roaming around marked the week especially since we had covered most of the landmarks that NYC guidebook would provide. This is certified by the fact that we peered through to a souvenir book to confirm we weren’t missing out on anything. I was soon becoming the in house Google search expert on NYC events, deals , and places to check out but NYC - a city that never sleeps turns into a city that never rests in the summer as the NYC calendar is brimming with activity.While we did manage to lose out on the Jon Bon Jovi concert a day before we landed, I was already on the lookout for the next one. Miley Cyrus and Paula Abdul didnt seem to have the star attraction to have me wake up at 6 in the morning. Nor did we get out early enough to catch the open air movie screenings at Bryant Park though there also was the other reason that none of the movies were appealing enough.

Kanye West phenomenon was hitting the city. There were actual ads of pills that would give you a Kanye West complexion and a surgical treatment to look like him / Sound like him and god knows do what else like him. The other addiction we all had caught onto meanwhile had to be bubble tea (Bubble tea, also called Boba tea or simply Boba, is a tea beverage with tapioca balls. source: Wikipedia) Mango, Lychee and numerous other mix and match flavours are available and it had become a daily ritual to sip it during the after lunch session of training.

Addictions are fast forming and the most fruitful one was the urge to head out on trips on weekends and the same we would do this weekend.

New York Nagaram : IV

The new season of NYN begins. Last season we saw, NAPAs reaching NYC and settling in (dramatic effect and tone) , getting used to the fact that you can drink from the tap, and u cant wash your back. Lot more excitement awaits our young and innocent wanderers as they come of age in the city that never sleeps. Sounds like a recap of Desperate Housewives or one of those dramebaaz serials but then its been a while since I got down chronicling our quest in the west. With the weekend in, it was time to set our grand plan into motion- to stay out of NYC on 

weekends. While a majority wanted to visit Atlantic City in the first shot, a few other pious souls decided that the political centre of the world was of greater interest. Hence the plan for Washington DC was hatched. Having collected all our gyaan about Chinese travel buses (cheapest way to DC and back , only $35) , we thought we were all set to go. 

Shravani collected the details and tickets from Chinatown along with a bit of splurging with Ipsita on the high end Chinese stores, while I was busy at Central Park with our NAPA socio meet which did see a handful of people turn up. While Mayank and Antoine decided to let their photography skills go wild, a few of us ended up playing kickball. 

Kickball- shouldnt that be the American name for football? considering we have throwball and handball. Turns out to be baseball with all the baseball rules in place except that the pitcher rolls the ball and the hitter kicks the ball. After ruffling a few picnic baskets, waking up a few tanners, our MVP was no doubt Kate Fidler from London who managed to score the most number of home runs that day. After gossiping around, bunch of us decided to head back with Krypton proving to us that the Japanese stereotype with a camera slung  around their neck and clicking away wasnt necessarily false. Back at the hotel, we had a few additions and deletions into our Washington party and we ended up with one less ticket. Ipsita was our last moment add on and she wasnt too sure if shed get a ticket at the last moment. But the Chinese have always been optimists and this year was specifically the year of one of those optimistic animals, so we decided to hedge her risk. Two parties would head out for Chinatown, one other the leadership of Shravani who had seen the place before. The other under the leadership of Ipsita who would turn back incase the first party couldnt arrange a ticket.

 The race across the maze called China Town wasnt exactly a pleasant nasal experience but you learn to make do. Garbage bags had been neatly arranged along the deserted roads and you were barely disturbed except for the odd rat scurrying around for dinner. Turns out our bus was a free for all. The ticket was valid for one year and you got into any bus you wanted, no reservations. While we caught onto the seats for the others, the Chinese lady with a vocab of probably 5 english words kept on urging us to let go of the other seats since it was getting close to the departure time. The second entourage was lost in the streets of Chinatown and was making their way when our bus driver decided to be a little earlier than time and revved his 

engine. The moment we spotted the gang, he took off. On several repeated requests to stop for them, he just grinned and moved the vehicle at 10 -15 miles per hour- teasingly slow for the gang to run for it but not slow enough for them to catch up. Everyone in the bus was trying to get the message across to the driver but he just grinned. After making the second group run around the block, he stopped back at the original spot! Sheer evil I say but am sure thatd teach all of us a lesson to be punctual. The rest of the journey was relatively calm as we stopped at Baltimore for a few minutes and headed on to Washington DC. Here's where game plan went for a six. 

The site had said the ride was approx 5 hours which is why I had wanted to take the last bus at 11 so we'd reach at around 4 and the dawn would crack by 5. Unfortunately, the driver worshipped Schumacher and 2:30 in the morning, we were in Washington DC! Bunch of 8 girls and 2 boys, many of whom had never been out on a trip on their own in an alien land and that too deep in the middle of night. To make it even more exciting, it was Saturday night, close to end of party time and the roads were filled with skidding cars, wayward walking party animals who were too sloshed to realise if their clothes were on them or not. Inching away from nocturnal animals, we were totally lost at what to do. I figured if we inched towards National Mall, itd have 

to be a safer place but with no map in hand, it could be a ploy gone bad. On seeing a five star hotel on our road, I asked the doorkeeper for a map which he obliged and my confidence levels were soaring again. Meanwhile Sowmya decided to ask him if she could freshen up. He said he would if she agreed to marry him. She gave him a non committal yes and all of us were in the lobby while the girls freshened up and I made sense of the map. Soon a copper came by to freshen herself up and was shocked at the huge queue to use the loo and started chatting up with the guard. Soon party animals staying at the hotel were turning in and the guard wasnt too sure if he could have us around. So we moved on looking for greener pastures. Bumped into a cop who was thinking aloud that we were too early to be tourists but was pleased when we told him were from NY. His previous posting had been there and he missed the life of NYC. As we trudged on and contemplated sleeping on the nice roads and the wide avenues of Washington DC, for once we saw a welcome sign - McDonalds. Though closed, their tables and chairs were stacked up outside and couple of homeless people had already made it their home for the night. Making space for ourselves, we decided to stick around till 4 AM letting people catch up with their forty winks and allow daylight to catch up with us. Gauri took out her stash of goodies from India and all fear was forgotten. 

After trying real hard to wake everyone up at 4 AM with ample help from Annie, we all set along towards National Mall. A city by night always has a whole new character to it compared to its mornings and that is what we were experiencing in Washington Dc at that moment. First stop was Newseum - as the name states a museum of facts and news with a wide noticeboard take had front pages of a lot of papers on the East Coast. Not sure if it was exhaustive but one of them did mention good old Goldman Sachs on a pretty irrelevant news article. As we headed towards Capitol Hill, the dawn was cracking and with no locals around, we felt like we owned the place except probably the secret service agents who hid from our sight and were recording our every move. Eagle One: Spotted ten brown people, should be Indians- big bags check, water bottles check, taking pics of drinking at the water fountain check, posing still for a video shot check etc etc. After posing and disposing of various pics around the Capitol Hill, we decided to stretch our limbs on the lawns as green as green could be. A few rolling competitions later, we were on our way to the other end of National Mall were numerous other monuments awaited us. It didnt take me long to realise Washington DC felt so picture perfect as if it had been made for the camera, untouched by man. We were walking around too early for breakfast but the Washington Memorial already had a huge queue of tourists awaiting a chance to look at the WDC skyline. Deciding to skip that, we walked on to catch the White House with its heightened security measures, the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Memorial, Korean War Memorial, WWII Memorial, and a lot more. Lunch was from the Chinese carts with spring rolls (read: Kerala samosas) and pizza slices. 

I loved the Korean War Memorial with a number of soldier statues that were littered through the greens and a simple phrase near it "Freedom is not free." We did spot the Indian flag during a ceremony commemorating WWII victims and you soon realise the importance of the phrase: "You value something more when you dont have it" and the same people who considered Republic day as another holiday suddenly were brimming with national pride. More on that later in the months to come. Though continuing on our desi spirit, we did hide the last two letters of INDIANA for a photo op much to the curiosity of fellow tourists at the WWII memorial. While we went on to catch some lemon ice lollies, Sowmya, Shra and I lost the rest of the group for a few moments before catching up with them at the Lincoln's footsteps. The summer heat had caught some of the group offguard so we decided to sit by River Potomac (Potomac.. Potomac.. Potomac.. Sounds fun to say that) and then the weathergod rolled his dice and a jolt of lightning and thunder had us scurrying towards shade. In such times you actually appreciate the beauty of the place as you realise that for large amount of paces, only open greens welcomed you. After rushing through the shortest path to the Smithsonian territory packed with numerous museums, we were caught in the middle of nowhere with heavy showers and just the jutting roof of a small cafeteria protecting us and twenty other people. 

Deciding the safest option was a museum, we landed up at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum which no doubt was filled with the history of space travel and aeroplanes. A wonderful sight no doubt to the starry eyed boys of the group i.e. Patil and I. I touched a rock from the moon! Ya! I touched a rock from the moon (pause. moonwalk step. oooooowwwww. pause) The place is filled with gadgets of the skies above and its not textbooks but places like these that have the potential to inspire kids to dream big in such domains. If I become a minister in my life, don't be surprised if some of those social welfare funds are taken towards upkeep of the museums and free entry for kids. As we trudged back to Chinatown, we took a short detour at the train station L'enfant. Trains didnt seem to be running that day so I did take liberty of sleeping on the tracks for the camera, something Id never ever try in India for the simple fact- you dont know whats been on it. Meanwhile the femme fatale brigade had called it a day, so we had to skip the place I wanted to visit the most: The International Spy Museum. Its a lovely place to go to and if you have a couple of friends along, do play the role playing game they have in there. I shall brush aside this topic for the imminent disappointment it gives of having missed out on the singlemost reason why I wanted to go to Washington. 

The Washington Wizards were in town and for once, I was looking up to people stretching my neck like never before. While our return journey also required us to get on a free for fall bus, there was a long queue plus wait for the bus. So while everyone else waited, I decided to continue on my sightseeing tour of Washington DC especially Chinatown. Having passed hooters, an Indian guy spotted me and gave me the menu of Mahek hotel. Figuring how starved everyone would be, decided to catch some desi food there. A Far Eastern girl was there on her first date with some white guy and forgive me for eavesdropping, she was teaching him Indian food and how nen was a type of bread and eloo gubi was potatoes and cauliflower .  Having taken their order, the waiter was pleased to see a desi customer and even more happier when I decided to respond in hindi. Grabbing couple of snack items, I made it just in time for the bus and we were headed back to New York City, with what would become one of the many adventures we would take in the coming weekends. Oh! Before I forget, this trip also led to my introduction to Raagini's aunt (who owns a Dunkin Donuts- brilliant donuts aunty, thanks a lot) as the guy who researched on public toilets in Washington DC so that the girls didnt have an issue. A precursor to this event is Mr. Nishant Gupta explaining to us how we could see WDC on the internet and neednt go all the way there. His persistence didnt rub on us thankfully. The saga continues... 

The Iron Horse

The sound of pitter-patter of rain
Lessened by the thunder of the rushing train.
As it plunged into a lovely scenery
Full of hills and lot’s of greenery.
Then it slowed down
Stopping at a station with a frown.
Another sweep of people rushed out.
Other people tried to get in
Like seawater going back into the river mouth.
The Iron Horse galloped through hills and plains
Trying to outrun the torrential rains.
Hoot! That was the engine’s call
Each time it reached a station big or small.
Finally, it’s destination it reached,
Into the station with a screech.

-- Wrote this when I was 13 years old. Mrs. Ishita Khanna had asked us to write poems after class on the Vocation by Rabindranath Tagore.