Dorky Guffaw's Local 'Training'

Dorky Guffaw was about to die a horrible death.

Or so he thought.

Standing there within the compartment of a slow local train bound from Thane towards CST, he was supposed to get off the train at Dadar. The train had just slowed down to a halt at the station, and the people within the crowded train were pushing and shoving each other in order to get out while they still could, to make way for those that wanted to board the train.

"God help that poor bastard who will be the last to get off", read the thought bubble hovering over Dorky's head as he joined the mass of people pushing those in front for dear life, trying to disembark when it suddenly struck him that he was the last one to get out of his compartment!!!

There was nobody behind him that was pushing him and it is common knowledge that the last person to try climbing out is usually the recipient of violent blows from an agitated crowd trying to board the train, or is swept up by the crowd and not allowed to get off until the terminus station arrives.

Bracing himself for any possible eventuality, Dorky's entire life flashed in front of his eyes in those few milliseconds as he said a little prayer, hoping to get out of this mess he was caught in, in one piece while clearly acknowledging the fact that his clothing might not be as lucky. But one hardly bothers about clothes and other such minutiae when one faces the prospect of hanging out with the Grim Reaper in the bat of a few eyelids.

It all began twenty four and a half years ago for Dorky, when he was born in Ghatkopar, a sub-urb of Mumbai and thus began his long-standing association with the city which for some people is the city of dreams, while some others choose to call it the 'armpit of India'. To each their own.

Dorky spent his life in Mysore, but a significant presence of relatives there translated into periodic visits on multiple occasions, some joyful and celebratory while some weren't so. Life is a series of such events, as all of you would be obviously privy to.

Dorky's travels on local trains commenced from a young age, but living in Mysore where the population density was less than that of Mumbai by a factor of thousands meant that he wasn't exposed to the crazy kind of crowds that a regular Mumbaikar has grown adjusted to.

At age 13, he lost a piece of footwear while boarding a fast local from CST towards Thane along with his family. This was because the local was late by about twenty minutes and it was during the rush hour. Faced with no choice and the prospect of staying back in CST (then VT), group consensus was reached by the family to get back home no matter what. His sandals, new ones at that, were separated from him in the frenzy that ensued due to crowds wanting to get onto the train.

Lamenting the loss of his footwear (for its not like a 13 year old, slightly retarded at that, would bother too much about things beyond his immediate material realm), Dorky's apprehension at traveling on a local grew after that and though his chappals were replaced by some immediate alternative that he wasn't too happy about, he nevertheless wasn't able to completely erase this incident from his mind.

On another occasion, this time at age 15, when he was entrusted enough to not get lost despite progressively diminished mental faculties seeming to strongly indicate otherwise, Dorky was allowed to travel alone. In a fit of extreme stupidity that we shall assume to be naïveté, Dorky climbed into a ladies compartment that was filled with a few college going women.

Clad in a brightly coloured Tom N Jerry t-shirt (don't even ask!!) that would've spelt death for Dorky had a sniper wanted to use him for target practise in a crowd of about a hundred thousand, he was subject to significant 'Adam-teasing' by those women travelling on the train from one stop to another, as he sheepishly attempted to explain to them how he was new here and didn't realize his mistake until the train started moving.

With chants of 'Tom and Jerry kids, come on down to where all the action is' ringing in his ears, Dorky managed to get off at the very next station and clambered into the regular second class section, but not before he was traumatized for life based on the experience he had to undergo. Well, actually it wasn't like Dorky people ever engaged in eve-teasing, but this experience doubly reinforced his disinclination to even let that thought cross his mind.

These two incidents were what Dorky associated with local trains, and had even had the Chutzpah to brag about being 'Adam-teased' to the two or three people willing to put up with his drivel.

It was these precise two incidents that came to his mind as we left him standing in the local at the beginning of this narrative. Having paid a surprise visit to his relatives family at Thane on sunday morning, as part of a weekend trip to Mumbai, his uncle wanted to drop him off to the railway station.

As someone who had seen Dorky ever since he was a klutzy infant that had a perpetually big forehead due to 'cute' mishaps happening to him, such as tripping over flat surfaces and with hair forever standing on end due to his propensity to insert his fingers within electric sockets and throw on the switch, it was but obvious that his Uncle's protective radar went into high alert mode and he dropped Dorky off into the compartment of the aforesaid station, after giving anyone within the train who had bothered to observe the pair of them enough indication that Dorky was not from town and hence would be easy prey to pickpockets and muggers, by repeating his instructions to retarded Dorky in triplicate.

Without any untoward incidents that happened during the course of the journey (unless you call two people being thrown out of the compartment during transit because they were talking too much as something worth mentioning), Dorky's train came to a slow halt at Dadar, which is where he thought he'd die a horrible death.

Everything seemed to happen in slow motion, as the crowds started rushing out of the compartment violently, in a manner similar to how food would be thrown out of one's stomach in case of a bad case of food poisoning - high speed high intensity puke.

When Dorky finally made his way near the door, the sight that awaited him made him almost faint, and if not for the adrenaline that kept his newly mended heart thumping within his chest, he'd have died twice over. On the platform stood a huge crowd and the number of people to enter the compartment seemed to be more than the combined attendance for the Iron Maiden concert he had been to in March this year!!!

With a wholesome touch of Quixotic foolish bravado, Dorky launched himself full force into the crowd just as he heard loud whooshes made by about 300 people clambering into the compartment per second on either side of him, and just about managed to escape with his feet on solid ground on the Dadar central platform (too many people, he wouldn't have fallen down anyway) and brushed himself off.

He stood a little away from the train, and with a very inconspicuous gesture of gratitude towards the almighty, Dorky then plugged in his faithful companion (the ipod) into his ears and proceeded on towards another journey, thinking all along of how this fraud near-death experience would make for a reasonably entertaining blog post.

So much for his delusional assumptions.