36 The Train
When the train arrives we get on board and begin the long, slow journey through the plains of central India. The train stops at each station on the way as it carries the villagers from town to home. I find an empty carriage but it soon fills up with women and children, who, once the train is underway, settle down and open their cloth-tied bundles of food – home cooking to sustain them on their way. The children, who clamber about in the luggage space overhead, are wearing torn and unwashed T-shirts, cast-offs from another world and passed down through many a brother or sister; the fading emblems are a pale reminder of the possibility of a more prosperous way of life.
The seats on these trains are made of slatted wood hard and unyielding: utility and economy were obviously the yardsticks employed when thinking of design, and during the afternoon they become more and more uncomfortable as the hours wear on. After the women and children depart, the carriage fills with men instead. One of them lights a beedie, takes a deep draft, and immediately starts choking, revealing the unhealthy state of his lungs. His friend sits slovenly in the seat opposite reading a newspaper and ignoring the other’s distress. At the next station many tribal women descend carrying large bundles of wood on their heads, and as we move off they can be seen heading across the plains in single file, walking to villages hidden in the interior.
We pass over a long bridge, a marvel of engineering, but the river below has been reduced to a trickle of water, and no rain is expected now until the summer, some six months away. On the riverbed a ploughman and ox-team are working up the soil, though what they can grow there I know not. The monotony of the country-side is broken occasionally by low rolling hills, each one seemingly topped by a gleaming white shrine, and the track running through the shallow valley is lined with evergreen neem, acacia, and palm trees of one sort or another; there are also teak trees whose large almost transparent leaves have turned a rich golden brown.
The scene inside the train as well as outside is ever changing as people reach their destination while others are just beginning their trip. They take a seat and idle away their time reading, solving cheap plastic puzzles, and sometimes conversing. In any case it seems most remain oblivious to the world around them, engrossed as they are in the little worlds of their own construction. At one time we are joined by a man, short and stout, who reads a journal published by religious fanatics; every so often he looks up suspiciously and defiantly at any who try to see what it is he is reading. After a long article he rolls the magazine up and stuffs it into his pocket. From another pocket he produces a pouch and carefully prepares some betel, which he chews for a time before spitting out the juice onto the surrounding countryside. Later he falls asleep, half leaning on the passenger next to him, and somehow he looks quite innocent and meek, like a child.
It’s a long afternoon with many stations and many comings and goings. As the sun sets and the light of day fades we approach the city, slowly moving towards our long-awaited destination. There are many tracks and trains converging on this centre, some stand stationary as they await the clearance of a line; some ponderously continue their journey, we come close to one for a time, and there are some greetings back and forth before our paths part once more.
The railway line here as elsewhere is used as the common toilet by those who live in the shanty towns which cluster around any major station. The houses themselves, some more substantial than others, brim with life, both inside and outside, and naked children play together while an elder sister keeps watch. The water from the ghetto doesn’t drain away properly, but gathers in a hollow, and this stagnant water must be a breeding ground for mosquitoes and other insects, and for the spread of disease. Pigs, dogs and other animals come to drink from it, or rummage through the disorderly rubbish heaps that pile up alongside the roads. Beyond the slums lies a high-rise development block, gaily painted in bright colours, and one wonders whether those who live there ever draw back the curtains or notice the squalor of life below.