All About a Red Bag!

I opened my eyes.

All I could see was the white ceiling very close to my face. Seconds later I realized that I was traveling in a train. I stared at the AC outlet trying to understand why I got up so suddenly from my deep slumber and why exactly was I traveling. I had been enjoying a lovely dream about a romantic adventure on Moon with my girl when the mysterious jolt woke me up and frankly, I preferred the dream over this forced introspection.

“Hi Venu” a voice boomed from two centimeters away scaring the living daylights off me.

It was Joydeep and he was the principle reason for the rude awakening.

By now, I was fully in my senses. I boarded the train the previous day after finishing up a two month training program in Pune. I had to report to my project leader in Bhubaneswar the very next day.

“What do you want?” I asked Joy, “Are we in Bhubaneswar?”. I knew the train had at least twelve more hours.

Joy didn’t say anything. He just wanted me to take a look at a particular lower birth in the compartment.

“Why don’t you just go to sleep? For Chrissakes man! Leave me alone” I told him in a hushed manner. I did not want to wake up the other souls in the compartment.

“I will explain. Just get down.” The seriousness was unmistakable. From my three months association with Joy, I knew at once that there really was something wrong. Joy was always jovial. In fact we were quite impressed by his parents’ decision to name him “Joy-deep”. Very aptly named.

I climbed down and realized that I could have had this conversation in full DTS sound. Most of the occupants of that compartment were wide awake and were staring silently at the lower birth in question. “You’ve woken up everyone in the compartment?” I asked Joy incredulously.

He did not answer my question. “Look at the red bag”.

That red bag, at the moment the object of complete and undivided attention, was a normal Reebok bag packed very tightly.

"Nice bag!" I exclaimed, "So?"

Joy shook his head. "The bag does look pretty nice and I don't intend to refute that fact. But I don't see why anyone should leave the bag on the berth unattended for a period of exactly," he paused and checked his watch, "four and a half hours."

If staring at the red bag with a raised diastolic blood pressure was the main criteria for joining the newly formed “Konark A1 Coach Passengers Welfare Association”, this disturbing sentence automatically got me enrolled into it.

"OK. I get the picture. What do we do now?" I asked him trying to hide my anxiety.

Joy didn't reply. He was too busy staring at the red bag. Manas and Debanjan were not seen at all. I rushed to the compartment door. There they were… standing near the door looking seriously at the ceiling of the compartment.

Suddenly Manas broke the silence, “Let us pull the chain; stop the train; and run as fast as possible in a perpendicular direction.”

That suggestion did not find many takers because it was the middle of the night; it was in the middle of nowhere and we had no idea how dangerous the threat level was.

I silently went to the vestibule and was considering the option of moving to the next bogie when the coach attendant rushed hurriedly into the scene.

"Kya hua?" He asked us suspiciously.

"Well, there's a red bag on berth number 12 there. The owner of that bag is missing." I told him as-a-matter-of-factly.

He was about to enter the compartment AC zone when I spoke these words. He immediately retreated. If I didn't block his way to the next compartment he would have vanished instantly.

"What we are supposed to do?" Manas asked him anxiously. "Kuch to Karona!"

The attendant looked at him crazily, "Mein Kya karoon?. Khammam lo police report idhdham"

(What can I do? Let us notify the railway police when we reach Khammam.)

I decided he was of no use to us. I came back to my berth and realized that the red bag was in the adjacent coupe.

I could feel my heart pounding. Joy was still staring at the bag. The others retracted to the far end of the bogie and we were the only two near that berth.

"That berth is booked till Vijayawada which is about 2 hours from this place." Joy paused, "And logically speaking, the bomb if any should go off before that."

I stared at him. "So standing near the door till we reach Vijayawada is the best option under the present circumstance?"

He didn't reply. He just stood up and walked away. I stayed there trying to guess what was there inside the bag. A few minutes passed and then Debanjan came in. "Practically speaking, they won't try to kill people just like that because there's no point in taking that risk for ordinary people." He told me in a cool manner. I tried to hide my restlessness and asked him, "Do you think it’s the right time to logically analyze the motive?"

He smiled, "I have a valid point." He said. "The point I am driving at is.. the red bag is not for us." He pointed to the next coupe. "Revenue Minister of the State is peacefully sleeping there undisturbed."

A few seconds later we were discussing what to do, in the vestibule of the bogie. "Let's find it out" I said, "let's open the bag."

"Are you mad?" shouted Manas, "What if the bag goes off? It is very dangerous. Don't do it!"

But Debanjan and Joy seemed quite pro to the idea. Finally we decided to investigate the situation. Just then the TTE entered the scene. When we told him about the bag on Berth Number 12, he just laughed. "You are overreacting." He said, "I personally checked his ticket at 7:30 this evening."

"And after that, he is not seen anywhere," Joy told seriously "and his red bag is all the time seen on his berth."

"And I have to sleep right next to it" I added. The TC shook his head.

Debanjan intervened this time. "Let's open the bag."

The TTE took two steps backwards. "I am not authorized to examine the passengers' luggage" he told us and hurriedly vanished into the next compartment.

A few minutes later we were gathered near the bag. My fingers were trembling. I slowly unzipped the bag and carefully looked inside. There were no bombs explicitly seen there. But there was a black parcel tightly packed which if filled with RDX could demolish the compartment in a fraction of a second.

The rest of our journey to Vijayawada was done in the corridor of the next compartment. At Vijayawada when we heard no RDX explosions, we crawled into the compartment again and berth number 12 was empty. The red bag was gone! And nobody knew who took it.

We searched the whole compartment in and out but couldn't find the bag. It was just gone! We stood there thinking for a while. Sleep, so far suppressed by fear returned with a vengeance. I took my upper birth with little hesitation, as I was sure there was no unclaimed red bag near me.

Soon everyone was fast asleep and the situation could not have been more normal. Joy, who occupied the other upper berth, was awake and he was probably thinking we had taken the matter too seriously.

"What are you thinking?" I asked him.

"Nothing in particular" he said and remained silent for sometime. Then he asked me, "What do you think about the incident?"

I jumped at the opportunity to put across my fundae. "We live in constant fear of terrorism and extremism. When a suspicious bag and the Revenue Minister of the state are in the same compartment, we have every reason to be alarmed. We are an integral part of the mob. And we are not any different from the general public. Only we are a bit more refined in being foolish!" I stopped suddenly as I realized Joy was fast asleep.

Bhubaneshwar was still miles to go… And there were still many miles to go before I could sleep again.

The Milky Way

Nitya was seven years old when she first heard about The Milky Way.

And she was just a day older when she wanted to see it at any cost. Given the fact that she was a resident of Bangalore, any Tom, Dick and Harry can confidently say that it is impossible to comply with such a request without moving out of Bangalore.

This was indeed the main reason why Nitya could not see The Milky Way for exactly sixty days after that.

Daily I came home late in the evening; listened to her screaming; tried to lessen her anger by giving her a gift or two and promised her that the next weekend I would show her The Milky Way.

That next weekend however came only after sixty days when my company finally decided to lay off half of its staff. Nitya was the only person who relished my being in the unfortunate half because now her father could not blame it on his work.

I decided to give her a break and drove her down to Nellore, my wife’s native place. It was much darker there and they had a scheduled power shutdown for two hours every night during which the whole town plunged into pitch-black darkness.

That night we went to the open terrace. It took me quite a while to locate it. “Where is it Papa! Where is it?” Nitya started hanging off my hand. She did that whenever she was impatient. I showed her the dim white patch near the constellation of Scorpio. She looked at it in awe… wonder… Her joy knew no bounds. It was like a dream come true for her. She started laughing. “Look papa, The Milky Way” she pointed towards the white patch with her tiny fingers.

I nodded praying God that she shouldn’t ask the next question. It was only two minutes before she had attacked me with that inevitable query, “Who placed the milky way there papa?”

I smiled at her and looked up. Yep.. the milky way was beautiful… but who placed it there? I was absolutely clueless how to explain that to a five-year-old kid. "God placed it there Nitya. You see it is all made up of stars." I said after giving it a serious thought. "Where is He now?" Nitya asked me curiously.

I didn’t know what to say. "I don't know, He is invisible to us"

"Can He see us?" Nitya was eager.

"Of course He can. He can see anything."

Nitya shook her head, "Isn't He great?" She looked into my eyes.

"Yep! He is really great. Why are you asking me all these?"

"Why did He take mom with Him?" Nitya asked innocently. I stared at her for sometime. She was not able to forget that. She missed her mother badly. I could not fill that void in her mind. I did not marry again after Anjali died.

"Papa! Did mom see me before going to heaven?" Nitya asked. I closed my eyes. I was on the verge of breaking down. Life was going remarkably great for me and suddenly it all changed. Anjali developed some complication during Nitya's birth and she died moments after giving birth to a healthy eight pound bouncing girl. I was holding the baby in my hands at Anjali's bed when she opened her eyes for a moment and then closed them forever. I believe still that she had seen her daughter before dying.

"Papa, they say I killed mother. Is it true?" asked Nitya. At first I did not reply. I just shook my head. When I understood the gravity of that question I shuddered. "Who are they?" the words came out like bullets.

“Granma and Granpa” Nitya closed her eyes. I hugged her. I could not say anything for a moment. "Nitya, you did not kill your mother. It is just that God wanted your mother to be there up in the sky. That's all. Don't think about it."

I didn’t feel like confronting my folk. They were old and that was the opinion they had. I just drove back to Bangalore. I had to put in an Herculian effort to find a suitable job. Nitya had endured it all silently. Now that she had seen the Milky Way, she didn’t know what to bug me for.

I remember the day when I came back from office to find Nitya begging me to take her back to Nellore. “I want to see Mom. Please take me back.” She was on the verge of crying. I couldn’t figure out what had made her think that mom was in Nellore. I asked her directly.

“I want to see The Milky Way” She was sobbing. I assured her that I would show that to her once more. “You have already seen it once, Nitya. Can you wait for a few more days?” I asked her. “Mom’s there in that.” She said without any delay.

I was surprised. “Who told you so Nitya?” I asked her. She was staring at me. “You only told me. You told me that dead people became stars and Milky Way is full of stars.” I argued no more. I wanted to see Anjali myself and the notion that she was in the Milky Way, was comforting even to me.

This time I took her on a long drive to the interiors of Karnataka to show her the Milky Way. I didn’t feel like going to Nellore again.

Since then, we’ve been going on the Milky Way Trip thrice a year. Nitya is growing up and now I believe she knows where her mother is. But still our trips provided a means of escaping from the corporate jungle of Bangalore and reliving the past.

Thank you Milky Way, thank you very much.

Hello, Can I Speak To You?

"Hello"

"Hello Can I speak to you?"

"Ah. What? I mean… Whom do you want please?"

"I want you only.. Can I speak to you?"

"Hay! What’s this? Some kinda joke?"

"Nope… I am damn serious. Can I speak to you?"

"Do you know me? Am I supposed to know you?"

"Nope"

"Then?"

"You don’t know me… I don’t know you. Can I speak to you please?"

"Look Mister. If you don’t put the phone down now, I am gonna call the Protection Cell."

"Am I harassing you?"

"What do you call this? Romantic talk?"

"I am sorry… really sorry. I really wanted to talk to you. But it seems you are not comfortable with the idea. Sorry for bothering you."

"Come on! Tell me who are you"

"Nirmal… Nirmal Kumar Nekkanti."

"Ah? I don’t know any Nirmal?"

"I do know one Nirmal."

"Who?"

"Me!"

"Cha!"

"Never mind… That was a PJ"

"Oh God… you are crazy"

"Kinda… I agree. But I am harmless"

"….."

"Hello, you there?"

"Yep! What do you want to talk?"

"Nothing"

"Nothing?"

"Yep Nothing"

"Nirmal! Can I ask you a question?"

"By all means"

"Are you drunk?"

"If you classify having two shots of red Wine as being drunk, Yes I am drunk"

"Do you know my name?"

"Nope!"

"How did you get my number?"

"I was testing the random number generator of my brain"

"What the hell do you think you are up to?"

"I just wanna talk to you"

"Come on! You don’t even know my name"

"How can I unless you tell me what it is"

"Anjali Ramachandran. Are you satisfied now?"

"Why did you ask that question?"

"I know your kind of people. You call girls who are alone in the house and threaten them up."

"Why are you laughing?"

"You just told me your name, about your being alone in the house. You shouldn’t have disclosed these details to a stranger like me."

"Are you there, Anjali?"

"Yes. But you don’t know my address anyway"

"I know your telephone number Anjali and I know that there exists something called a Telephone Directory."

"Aye! Am I sounding that foolish? I know how hard it is to trace addresses using telephone numbers in a telephone directory"

"H15/G-1, Thiruvanmiyur, Chennai –41"

"What?"

"Your address"

"How could you find it out?"

"From the web."

"Oh My God"

"Yep… Now you realize how easy it is to trap you?"

"Who are you Nirmal?"

"Don’t worry, I am not a bad guy."

"But why are you bothering me like this?"

"Am I bothering you?"

"Ah.. In a way Yes.. You should tell me why you are doing this"

"Hmm… OK Mademoiselle Anjali Ramachandran, I am a graduate student specializing in Psychology"

"So?"

"I am just experimenting on your reaction. How do people react if they get a call like this! You are my fifth guinea pig."

"How did the others react?"

"Two slammed the receiver. One said, ‘F$%^ off’ and one asked for my address."

"Did you give it?"

"You think so?"

"Nope"

"I didn’t"

"Clever"

"Elementary school knowledge"

"So what are your comments on the fifth one?"

"Some girls don’t have any faith in rules like – Never talk to strangers"

"And?"

"And… you enjoyed the talk very much."

"Me?"

"Admit it. You are still talking to me."

"Oh.. I just wanted to find out what is this all about"

"So you didn’t enjoy it?"

"Nope"

"You are lying"

"Come on"

"You are still talking"

"Ok.. Ok.. Yep.. I didn’t find the talk very boring."

"Another way of saying the same thing."

"So what? I enjoyed the talk… Now what next?"

"You are enjoying the talk. The talk is not yet over."

"What are you gonna talk about now?"

"About the great fact that beauty and brains don’t go together."

"Hay.. are you suggesting I am dumb?"

"There you go! Indirectly telling me that you’re beautiful!"

"You girls are always like this only. Want to be beautiful but don’t want to be clever."

"Oye Nirmal! I didn’t say I am beautiful."

"OK.. Leave it. One more observation."

"What?"

"You girls believe all cock and bull stories."

"What?"

"You believed readily when I said I was a psychology student experimenting on you"

"You’re not one?"

"I am a software engineer working for Infosys."

"God!"

"What?"

"I think I know you"

"You do?"

"You are not Venu… are you?"

"Fifteen minutes"

"Come again?"

"We have been talking for fifteen minutes now...and this is your first wise deduction."

"So you’re Venu"

"Yep"

"Why didn’t you tell it before?"

"Haven’t you had fun?"

"Yep.. I am still having fun. The talk is not yet over… <Laugh>"

"Ok.. now it is not that interesting. Gotta go anyway… Call you later."

"You are too much Venu… err… Nirmal Nekkanti. Bye"

"Bye"

Bibo's Missing

And this is being typed in the middle of yet another boring journey from Hyderabad to Chennai on a quiet night through a quiet route. This boring journey will be one hell of an uninteresting story to tell if not for the miraculous disappearance of Bibo.

Bibo has been missing for over half an hour. A search party has examined all the places in the compartment in vain. Bibo has simply vanished into thin air. This fact could not be fathomed by the two astrophysicists in the compartment.

“Matter can neither be destroyed nor created.” One of them states with a rather stern expression on his face. “So Bibo could not have simply disappeared. He should be found somewhere in this very compartment either healthy or badly mutiliated.”

The second scientist, whose scientific knowledge about matter and its various properties is entirely derived from a certain cult classic called “Angels and Demons” written by Dan Brown, comes up with a credible theory to refute the matter conservation principle stated so lucidly by the first gentleman.

“Matter can be destroyed, by simply bringing it in contact with anti-matter”.

The first one took his own time to reply. “If that happens, matter simply converts to energy. It is not destroyed. It simply changes into energy.”

At that point, I chipped in with a dumb question. “So are we going to search for Bibo, the matter or Bibo, the energy?”

That triggered a five minute discussion on what should be the objective of this search program. Finally it was decided that Energy was too abstract a thing to search for. So everyone agreed to look for Bibo, the Matter.

So the search party carefully searched the entire compartment and concluded that if Bibo was not inside the compartment, Bibo should be outside the compartment – Logically deduced by the two astrophysicists.

At this point, a railway vendor came into the compartment selling more Bibos. The person who was grieving Bibo’s untimely disappearance, bought another one and that marked the end of this stalemate.

So much for a water bottle. The journey continues now.

The Methyl Alcohol of Cricket:

It is a nation of sports fanatics. It is a nation where Cricket is a religion. It is a nation where people speak only one language: Cricket. The rich and the poor, the youth and the aged: a simple word is enough to pump up their adrenaline… Cricket! Born in England, worshipped in India, it has come a long way from its original flavor as a Royal gentlemanly game.

Second shows (late night shows) of all the movies in most Indian cities were canceled on the day India played Pakistan in a day/night encounter in Bangalore. Most new movies run deserted when India plays one of those heated matches against Pakistan.

”We do not get even our running costs for shows shown during the cricket match hours. Thus we feel it is better to cancel the shows. In a way, ‘Junta’ should thank us for that; they do not have to choose between Wasim Akram and Hrithik Roshan”. A theatre owner chuckled commenting on the lack of people around his cinema theatre complex.

It pays to observe the spectators. When Sachin Tendulkar lofts a ball over the fence for a widely acclaimed classic home-run, people jump, show their fists to the bowler and shout “Yes!” When he gets out for a chicken ball from Glenn McGrath, the same crowd bangs everything in sight and vent out their anger on whatever is available.. mostly the TV Remote Controller.

“Remote controller sales go up during the cricket matches saab… especially during those matches where India plays down under.” A radiant TV dealer says looking fondly at the fifty guys and gals gathered in front of his showroom to watch the match. “I feel great that I am able to provide some entertainment to all these people.” Just then Rahul Dravid drives the rather clumsy out-swinger to the fence. “Yeah! Kya shot maara hai yaar! Rahul Dravid is the BESHTT”, He says and tells me everything about Rahul Dravid including the number of ducks (Zero runs in an inning) and the number of times he had been dropped off the team.

The national game of this country is Hockey and I bet a million that the billion Indians do not know even the names of their Hockey players. “It is high time they changed the national game to cricket,” a passer-by comments, “Hockey is like tiger… both are on the verge of becoming extinct.” May be that is the reason why Hockey is still the national game of the Republic of India… to be in line with their National animal – Tiger.

So who likes Cricket?

A better question would be – Who doesn’t like Cricket? May be Azharuddin, the infamous match fixing captain of India whom everybody in the country hated for a very brief period. However my friend tells me that even though the disgraced captain does not play or talk Cricket anymore, he is still a celebrity in his native town, Hyderabad, where people invite him as a chief guest for many public functions.

"This is Cricket, bhai saab. Things are forgotten easily.” An ‘Ajju bhai’ fan proclaims. The bottom-line is everyone in India loves Cricket. One or two match-fixers or bad performers do not bring down its popularity. “Cricket is a sensation. It is a way of life… like Hinduism itself.” Says a software engineer from Bangalore who reads Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance on his way to office everyday.

“Passions run high” Neville Cardus said about Football. Lucky chap he was. He died in ignorance. He did not know about match fixing and Cricket’s passion in India. ‘Junta’ here has no food to eat but plenty of Sachin Tendulkars to worship!