A Farakkan Experience

Innocent souls who believe there is either life or death, ought to know, there is something beyond these two experiences and that is what we call ‘A Farakkan Experience’. A timely run of Farakka Express in Indian railways is synonymous to a golden run of a solo Uday Chopra starrer at box office. To put it in the words of cricket, the strain it causes to your psyche, could beat the  collective strain caused by all the Sharmas (Joginder included) and Nehras together to Indian Psyche. It’s like being subjected to a soliloquy by Rahul Gandhi. Farakka and Express together makes for a solid oxymoron.

 Train Travel sometimes alludes to time travel. Farakka can be considered as the slowest unit of time. If IRCTc is a mental catastrophe then Farakka is its physical incarnation. The stoppages are as frequent as your breath. Snails take it very personally if they are overtaken by Farakka, they have this custom of deliberately slithering over Tata Namak and killing themselves, if this train ever gets ahead of them. Not to mention the little turtles who take their baby steps only by imitating Farakka uncle. If you want your children to value their life, you should take them to the Old Delhi station just for a glimpse of those brave-hearts who finally make it through. However, you must enquire about its arrival because the GPS tracker often loses it’s trail as if the train disappears for some mysterious purpose. Even the honourable Supreme Court is considering a Farakkan trip as a potential replacement for capital punishment but prisoners are crying foul over this .

One of the great things about Farakka is that it teaches us bladder control (to the extent of explosion). Reaching to the toilet, in the words of Rahul Baba, may require Jupiter escape velocity, by which you can easily fly to the toilet or simply fly your toilet. With wait-listed passengers being as scarce as the mosquitoes of Noida, you hardly get to see the colour of the floor , you have to tread very carefully  in order to avoid your foot being put on someone's face. Even if you make it to the toilet, be very cautious because it will make you nauseous . You will have to think twice before touching anything except yours, like it’s a crime scene. You may have to look upward while holding your breath as it could be more graphic than an unedited SAW series.. The longer you take to pee , the graver your sufferings will be. As they say ‘Pleasure and pain goes hand in hand’. The walls have retribution carved all over them.

Farakka the saviour :- Once ISI planned a terrorist attack in Delhi and the suicide bomber  made it  to India through the porous Indo-Nepal border. The moron unfortunately boarded Farakka in Bengal and by the time train reached Kanpur, years of rigorous training , drills and motivation just evaporated. He decided to detonate the bomb in the train itself  but  his bag was smothered under piles of vegetable sacks loaded by local vendors, as he cleared the space, to his surprise, his bag and Chappal both were stolen. He  tried jumping out of the train to kill himself but speed was not enough. Some say he got the ultimate punishment, he had to return to Pakistan.

Passengers on upper berth, who are wary of their priceless shoes getting stolen, either keep it with themselves or put them on the caged shields of the fans, thus adding to the freshness of the air. Then there are people who ask for a little space on your berth and as soon as you doze off, they will slowly make their way as your closest partner and end up making a virtual 69, in what you may call a one night stand.

A group of passengers were sharing their experiences of Farakka. Someone refreshingly started it with a 4 hr delay, the other enthusiast further raised the stake by 6 hrs making it a hefty 10 hrs then a Maulvi Saheb, struggling to get  betel out of his cavity, doubled the whole proposition by making it twenty, but there was an old man completely oblivion to the excitement, gazing at a distant mountain with sun slowly sinking into it .A young boy could not hold his eagerness and asked him “chacha! what keeps you mum, don’t you have something to share ?" The old man smiled at the innocence of the boy and put an end to the whole debate by making it a staggering 48 hr. A stunning silence followed and all the passengers bowed their head in respect. AMEN