An ordeal with strangers

Faces never seen, voices never heard, people never known sometimes make you think what you would not have otherwise. There have been such instances to pick from everyone’s life.

As I boarded the train for Delhi, I could see Saurabh sitting by the window. There were people giving a strange look at me as if I was an unexpected guest to their party. This is something everyone does. Have you ever felt happy to see some stranger in the train while you are seated, who could in no time grab your seat i.e. the window one that you preferred. As I made myself comfortable, I saw myself behaving the same way. A young couple arrived with their luggage at our bay. You should have seen my face for sure. I bet I would have made even a worse face than my co-travelers did when I had arrived. The obvious reason was it was me who would be sharing a part of the seat with another two people. How could it be possible when we were already 6 people comfortably seated as if waiting for the stupendous dinner to be served around the royal table like a big joint family where every other person hadn’t seen each other’s face since they were born. Mark the size of the joint family then. Well to put it straight we all belonged to the huge human family and were all strangers to each other. Now not making any fuss about we being strangers lets go back to where we were.

I was now wondering how we would share the luggage space; forget about seat for new two people. The extra luggage was thrown away into the upper berth as they made their way to make some space to sit with their best efforts and of course good manners. Now how could we stay back in mannerism? We jumped to our sides making some space for both of them. As they got themselves seated I wondered who could have been the person who had occupied maximum space before the couple had arrived. Now it was all level. Our shoulders started brushing and I could now realize that the train had started moving.

For the next 15 minutes everyone kept silence as if it were a ritual as the journey started. Then came the time when everyone got busy with their mobiles as I got a call from my Dad. Perhaps they must have realized that they too have people to call and inform that the train had started or may be they were going to reach soon which is just another 26 hours from now. Few people would have got excited because they have left to meet the desired loved ones which included me as well. But there were another set which seemed to be upset for the reason that they were moving away from their loved ones. And most importantly there were also people who belonged to the “don’t-know” category of any survey conducted in the news channels.

Soon after the train started gaining pace we started having small talks. It really amuses me to observe and watch what people do. One thing that was common in everyone’s mind was that, the 24hours of journey was going to be really boring if they didn’t start knowing each other. It was really interesting to see the way everyone was trying to break the ice and strike a conversation. I could hear someone say “Who aapka beta tha na?”, (He as your son, right?). How smart that guy must have been!! And guess what, slowly people started talking as if they have known each other since ages or have been waiting to meet for years together. As I got myself involved in few conversations, I realized that I had not yet known anybody’s name. Soon I heard Saurabh introducing himself to another guy, shaking hands after having one hour of conversation. This surprised me to an extent how do people introduce each other having talked about the whole world, when they have not spoken about themselves. This is when I came to know Saurabh’s name. He and Tejas, the other guy, later became my good friends to have a great company through out the trip.

But with in all this there was something which drew my attention to think over for hours together. There was this young couple who had joined us earlier in the morning while we started the journey. They were a couple recently married. May be a year only, I guessed it to be. I would be taking a few assumptions as per my observations. But my observations made me wonder on many things. They must have been a couple married a year back and for sure reasons they must have had an arranged marriage. The guy, was protective caring and loving. The lady, with her sweet smile, carried a little shyness around. They definitely were a happily married couple. But the striking thing was the love that existed between them. It was the guy’s warmth and the love for her in his own ways that made me think so. Their small talks with soft words and the understanding with just a mere eye contact were worth noticing. Why I say they had an arranged marriage was because of the bondage that could only be felt.

Love has always been a subject which I have not understood properly yet but had an idea about love marriages which people get bonded by the institution called marriage after falling in love with each other. Regarding arranged marriages, I had only subtle idea that two strangers meet, feel comfortable, of course considering every other aspect of life and get settled to begin a new life called marriage where they start exploring each other during the journey called life. But love-after-marriage was always an unsolved mystery for me. I agree that I have seen many other couples who love each other even if it were an arranged one. Some how I always doubted the existence of it in real sense. There was a different feeling altogether this time where I could feel love-after-marriage. To my understanding its not always love marriage which involves love in a relationship. Love does exist in arranged marriages as well which has made them successful over the years.

Love after marriage makes marriages successful in true sense.