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 These
college girls are always the same.., yemma (Tamil slang to call a
women) don’t stand on the way.., Please adjust , four of us can
sit.., please call the lady who is selling the jasmine flower , A
beggar singing Malrundhum Malaradha , song from Pasamalar, a Tamil
movie of yesteryears. These are few inescapable scenes of a journey
in the Chennai suburban train , especially the ladies compartment.
Women of all age groups flood the compartment at
every point of time during the day. Gandhiji’s vision is in fact
close to reality now. A woman courageously travels all by herself in
the ladies compartment during early hours of the day and even till
around 11 pm in the night.
A journey in the ladies special train with the
last five compartments reserved for ladies is an experience worth
remembering. This train starts from Tambaram at 8.45 am everyday.
There are various groups of working women in each compartment
engaged in some activity or the other (not the usual gossiping –
which women are known for!!!).The way passengers reserve seats for
their friends and request strangers to vacate (in a polite way of
course,) is something which can not fall out of notice.
This particular group takes the third compartment
from the last and gives its full fledged kutcheri before the
passengers reach their destination. Starting from Ganapathy bhajan
till Mangalam this is indeed a pleasure for people with even minimal
music knowledge like me. They are not bothered if the other
passengers are happy or irritated, they keep on singing. One
passenger, who I presume must be the head of the music group says,
“This is a stress buster for us. Having a hectic day ahead, I wait
for my music companion to kick start my day with full josh”
If this is one type, the other is in total
contrast. From chain business canvassing to installment sarees, from
school admissions to scouting for a new house or even exchange of
horoscopes, every deal takes place in this short 45 minute duration.
One lady was busy explaining how a particular slimming capsule
worked wonders for her.
Mostly middle aged, these ladies admire the teen
aged girl sitting beside them or standing on the footboard. Advice
is for free. After all, it is the only thing which is in abundant
supply and zilch demand.
A few days of travel in this particular ladies’
special train was indeed entertaining and educative for me. I could
observe each group of ladies busy with its routine in-train
activities. These sights initially were a bit annoying, but now to
my surprise, I have my own group of a few girls drawn from various
colleges discussing or critically analyzing movies and the previous
day’s TV soap operas!!
SOWJANYA S.
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