Stupendous Man

Thanks to Jedi and Karan, I am very inspired to pen my own memories of taking those bus rides back in life – this post is about those memories of India, while my next will be those of here.

As we trotted along the rickety 2 lane highway connecting Hubli and Dharwad, a couple of things always used to catch my interest. The temple at the edge of a lake, the Maruti showroom (believed to be one of the biggest at that time), the Cancer Research Hospital, and lastly, the most interesting, the Dental College, where it was well known that all the beautiful girls in the town studied there.

The last one being more important as I would always fantasize a scene where I would sit at the window, and the bus reached the dental hospital, where a beautiful girl step stepping inside the bus, would discover the only empty seat besides me, carefully adjusting her dupatta (if wearing salwar kameez), and sit down besides me, maintaining that one centimeter distance between me and her. She would give me a faint smile as she sat down, and I returned it with a big one, and then through rest of the journey, she would look back, asides, looking through the window of passenger seating on the other side of the bus, but never again in my direction. As my stop approached, I would excuse myself and get up to move out. It would be tricky – she wouldn’t get up to lose her seat, and there was just not too much space for me to move out. So she would turn sideways, still sitting, and as I gradually made my way out, she would slide in quickly to that window seat that I had occupied. I would smile again for the favor, and she would give that faint smile again, this time a little more comfortable. As I would get down from the bus, I would see now that she was looking out of the window, at no one in particular, to nothing in general. As the bus would pass by, she and I would suddenly lock eyes, perhaps one last time, or perhaps may be not, and smile again. The beginnings of a great romance I would pat myself, and move on.

Except that the reality was most of the time I traveled in a dingy bus-tempo service, with a capacity of 20 filled to 40, half of travelers stinking of sweat, mud, fish, manikchand, pan parag and other assorted smell, several of them fighting over whose seat it was, the conductor howling at the top of his voice to people standing in the back, to move more backwards (“adjust madri swalpa!”) so that he could squeeze more living beings into that extra one inch space he saw in the front, and while he himself would dangle by the door of the tempo throughout the journey. I almost never got the window seat, heck a seat, but that still wouldn’t deter me from watching over the window. The dental college still being the favorite stop where I would hope someone’s (make that many) jaws would be broken and would need to visit the hospital, and as they climbed down, some beautiful girls would climb up the tempo. It did happen, however, many times, women entering the bus meant the men would have to squeeze between themselves even more so that “women” could get standing space and appropriate distance of at least half a feet was still maintained. (It was not a pleasant feeling of feeling many men’s several anatomical parts all at once, and sometimes I really wished that girls from that college didn’t travel at all – an onlooker might have called it a gay orchestra in the back of the tempo.)

Sometimes, at odd times like 1 or 2 in the afternoon, the buses would be emptier and I would get an empty seat. At those times, few people traveled, and the tempo would zoom by several stops – the wind in the air, even on the hottest days was liberating. However 1 or 2 was not the right time as the dental college would be in session. Nonetheless, over a period of time, I had preferred seats than going at appropriate times so not to miss dental college. I traveled a lot by those tempos, but it would always surprise me that it was almost impossible to run into the same tempo again. They were that many, that frequent.

Then sometimes I used to take back the bus from Dharwad to Hubli from my aunt’s place. I was reminded several times by my aunt, innumerable times by her in laws, and more times by her husband that: It was my uncle and his friends who had complained, fought, played politics, to the municipality and had that bus service started from their area, direct to Hubli, when they were in college. Every time I used to take that bus at 6.00 am in the morning, I would always be reminded of this important trivia before I left.

In fact, the very first time I went to college, the very first day, was traveling in that bus from Dharwad to Hubli – the bus stopped right outside my college. My uncle would often complain though that though the bus service started, neither the bus, nor the bus driver had changed in the last 15 years. And the bus, though a red huge matchbox, all rickety from wear and tear showed its age – broken windows, broken seats, and cleaned probably once a year. 4 years later too, that bus, still hadn’t changed, nor had its driver.

Yet, I used to like traveling in that bus – starting from our area meant, the bus would be empty and I would get the seat of my choice (not that it had great choice of seats). But I would sit at the window, feeling the cool breeze at 6.00 am as we headed to Hubli. Sometimes I would fall asleep in the cool breeze, but I would always wake up at the dental college stop (Yes, even this bus stopped there) – and mornings were luckier as there were would be hoards of pretty girls, giggling and gossiping, all ready to get to their college. Admittedly, the journey from dental college to my college used to be boring (since all the pretty girls would get down there), and I would be left picking from basammas, gaurammas, laxmi, chandrakala, shankuntala, vijayashanti and the likes.

This bus service had schedule to travel several times a day between my aunt’s area and Hubli – however my other favorite would be abnormally late 11.00 pm in the night. Many a times the driver wouldn’t show up, but if he did, a late night drive in an empty bus through an empty highway was the best thing I could have asked for. Those nights, I never missed the temple at lake – it looked beautiful – a single neon light shined over it in the darkness all around – it was just enough to see the temple, and enough like to make out water nearby. It used to be a sight I used to wait for – and then when I got down, the walk back to the hostel would be scary and enjoyable at the same time.

Ifs funny when I look back at myself, traveling in those buses was the last thing I wanted to do back then. With the passing of time however, I have realized they have been a part of that memory too. I sometimes still wish I could go back and do those buses and tempo rides again, and ask for an extended stop at the dental college. I never did one thing all that while when I took those buses, which I think, I should have done.

I could have got down at the dental college and taken the next tempo / bus with the girls.

PS: Have you got memories of buses and tempos that you traveled? Please tag yourself and write on it.