(a little something from something I’m working
on, in fits and bits, about me, my life, sort of)
The first class compartment of the
Southern Indian Railways in the early sixties consisted of a whole bogey – that
was how the Brits used to travel, and changes hadn’t begun creeping in quite
yet. The same carriage today, with an increase in the length – if it’s the
first class, is divided into several cubicles which have upper and lower
berths. They are still far more comfy and certainly far roomier than the second
class sleepers, but nothing compared to those bogeys of the sixties.
The two seats were long, stretched lengthwise along the two windows on either
side which had maroon painted bars, a glass drop-down window on the outside,
and a slatted wooden one inside, for privacy. The seats had cushioned
upholstery covered with dark green leather which had leather covered button
things stitched on it all over with I.R. (Indian Railways) embossed on them.
The two seats had a couple of berths on top of them. At one end of the bogey
was the fairly roomy little bathroom (enormous by today’s standards) with a
mirror over a stainless steel wash basin, and an English style (as it was
called) commode – white with a black seat. A nice, comfortable room on wheels
for a family of four to travel in.
The best thing I liked about that bogey was the little reading lamp that was
provided, fixed to the compartment wall at the head of each long seat – which
of course became a bed at night. These days they’ve simply done away with that
feature in the sleepers I usually travel in. In the night, when the other
occupants slept – we used the train to travel often to Calcutta – you could
turn it on without waking anyone, and get engrossed in the convoluted intrigues
in your favourite mystery book, engulfed in a cocoon of velvet, yellow light,
as the train rocked and swayed through the night outside, lulling you in its
snug, steady clickety-clack clickety-clack.
There was no direct line those days from Bellampalli to Hyderabad. The train,
therefore after a four hour leg of the journey reached a junction at a place
called Kazipet, from where we had to switch trains that would take us to
Hyderabad, which took another four to five hours in those days of steam
engines. A few years later that condition was improved somewhat, after the
Singareni Collieries’ officers got after the railways to rectify the situation
(the officers too needed to travel often to Hyderabad where they had their head
office). The bogey we travelled in was thenceforth delinked from the train,
fixed to an engine which pulled it – puff-puffing and choo-chooing – to a
siding to wait for the train that went to Hyderabad to which it would be
attached. Complicated? Yes. Fun? Oh, yes indeedy!
When the bogey was put in the siding, which was away from the main lines of
course, it seemed like a microscopic little world marooned in the darkness,
beaming out its feeble little yellow lights from its windows. The silence, if
you stepped out, was profound. The stars shone like blue saffires in the night
sky. And a midnight picnic was always spread out for us kids while we waited
for the train – which could be a wait of anything between ½ an hour to a couple
of hours – train timings those days being invariably erratic. But did we kids
complain? Never. We loved every minute of it.
Not the boring oldies that accompanied us though – the parents. They complained
and complained to the railways until finally by the time I was in the fifth or
sixth class the main express trains that went to Hyderabad were routed through
our small town to the city. By then diesel engines had also begun replacing
those old steam engines – which of course cut the journey time down
considerably. But somehow, losing that special magic too in the bargain.
When we reached Hyderabad station, we usually went first to the Taj Mahal hotel
– a tacky South Indian hotel – despite its romantic, lofty name – which served
the most delicious south Indian food, to wash off the layers of soot that
covered us by the belching steam engine. That first time too my father must
have taken me there. I don’t remember my first train journey to Hyderabad – to
my boarding school – very well; I was just six years old. What I do remember
vividly though was my first meeting with Sister Adele. My father and I must
have spent a day resting in the hotel, for I remember like it was yesterday
that dusk was falling when we entered the school precincts, my hand held in the
warm comfort of his hand.
You entered the school through an arched wrought iron gate with the name ‘St.
Ann’s High School’ moulded on the arch overhead. There was an expanse of paved
ground inside the gate which led to a stretch of long steps which led to the
church with its great arched doors. Which, when they were open, gave you a
direct glimpse of the big Christ on his cross, his head encircled with thorns,
his pierced chest, nailed outstretched hands and feet, dripping blood, at the
end of the large church room down the aisle, with the pews on either side.
A narrow granite paved path by the church led to the parlour after turning
right, where visitors had to wait to meet someone from the boarding after
giving the nun who manned the little gate that you entered through, the name of
the person you wanted to meet. The nun then proceeded to vigorously ring a
round, thick metallic plate that hung by a thick rope just outside the parlour,
with a short, stout wooden stick – which produced a dull, yet surprisingly
loud, CLANG-CLANG-CLANG. Which, the girl, who had the duty to keep a sharp ear
out for that sound, heard, and came running down the long narrow granite
stretch from the boarding house proper to the parlour, to go back again and
give the message to whoever the visitor was for. My father of course, that
first time, asked for Sister Adele, the boarding mistress.
As the evening deepened, we waited outside the parlour, my hand still in my
father’s hand. And soon enough, from the distance, we saw a nun approaching
with brisk, no-nonsense steps towards us. As she drew closer I saw a white
skinned, kindly face – her skin, I observed, was wrinkled like crushed fine wrapping
paper, the kind that sweets came wrapped in – framed in a white nun’s veil,
with a pair of smiling, bluest of blue eyes that looked down into mine. When
she bent down and said “Hello” to me, I thought she spoke strangely – she was
Italian, I came to know later. Without a second thought, I slipped my hand out
of my father’s grasp, reached out and took hold of the bony white hand she
stretched out to me, and without a backward glance, I walked away with her to
the boarding house.
When we got inside the large hall,
where a large gathering of girls sat at long desks with books opened in front
of them, Sister Adele told them, “This is Rita. What a good girl she is, she
didn’t cry at all!” At that moment I didn’t know why I was supposed to cry. It was
later, when I climbed into the bed allotted to me in the long dormitory, with rows of beds, and realized that my mother
and father would not be there with me, that I cried.
-by Rita Putatunda
