Bus rides in the college days!

Something that I wanted to say for a pretty long time. It just happened that today morning, my cousin and I were discussing on some ideas for his multimedia project when this idea struck me. Bingo. I immediately thought of posting my experiences. Have you ever travelled in the RTC bus where the conductor doesn't mind shoving you in the dense crowd? Or those mindless senior citizens who don't mind sounding stupid when they force you to go inside the already crowded joint.

Man, back in my college days, watching a 16A bus approaching the bus stand (Rathifile Stop), could challenge every ounce of courage in my body.The very sight of that bus in the evenings would cause an uproar. My inability to catch a running bus would cause me to curse myself everyday and look down upon myself. Now when I think about those moments, it sounds so stupid and unnecessary.

Coming back to 16A, I believed and implemented on the philosophy that "Strength is in the mind, not the muscles" and used to act street smart! Never mind if you can't board a running bus, but at least your bag can! I used to take the biggest risk of my life by throwing my bag on the vacant seat in the running bus and then struggle to find a way inside the bus. Imagine, my assets in that bag: Rs.350 worth book on Computer Hardware and Rs.150 worth C++ book , the precious Rs.300 EDP book and an entire year's hard worked notes, all lying unattended in that bus. On top of that, the risk factor increases multi fold if the driver turns out to be a psycho, who wouldn't mind starting the bus before all the heavy aunties are safely parked in the bus.

My heart always pounded hard during these moments when your bag is inside and you are outside. The next step in the mission was to get inside the bus as quickly as possible. I am sure even Indiana Jones would have been afraid taking up this task looking at those determined and bone-strong uncles, whose sole purpose in life is to stop anyone getting inside the bus while they struggle amongst themselves to get inside. And to add to anybody's fury is the presence of those big butt and beer belly uncles who are too heavy to drag their body to the first step of the bus, and too strong for a feeble and not-so-strong guy like me to push them aside to get in. Being short and lanky always was an asset as it made my path inside the bus a little easier compared to others.If there was a competitor in this fight, God save the others, we would never mind flexing muscles of people to be inside before the other. At this time, I always prayed that the heavy bulldozers, a.k.a. Aunties take their own sweet time to board and the men in the rear end at least get time to get inside the bus.

Once you are able to get to the 1st step of the staircase, the goal becomes closer, yet toucher to reach. Why? There are 10 other(honestly, God-Promise) men who want to get in before you do. This fight is worse than a rugby game, where you (at least) have an opportunity to run away from the game. But here, when the warrior uncles have surrounded you by all sides and you have no alternative but to fight. In case you want to act humble and wait till everybody gets in, then be ready to wait for at least 2 hours before your patience breaks down and you accept the fact of life that its the same case with every bus and you finally jump in the crowd to get in. Anyhow you enter the bus successfully complete phase one of this long, enduring mission.

After boarding the bus, the next challenge is to locate the bag. I could sense every emotion of fear, anticipation, trauma during this faith testing time, where you would struggle to find your way to your bag. If some selfish dude (Of course who is as smart as you) decides to act smart, you can find that dude sitting on your rightfully(???) owned seat and holding your bag. Often, I would suppress my rage and travel the entire one hour journey standing and cursing the guy with murderous looks.

And sometimes, in a meek courageous tone, challenge the authority of the seat. Somehow, in this hard, laborious and sweating battle, where every centimeter of my shirt has turned into a crease, I sit down and feel triumphed.

I wait for the breeze(hot most of the times) to cool the jittery nerves and wait for the bus to finally move. After few long awaited moments, when the driver turns the key around, the sound of the bus starting is the best stress relieving music. You can actually hear all the uncles, aunties, wailing kids, college girls and sweaty men heave a sigh of relief. The bus starts on its own sweet pace, and in the jungle of heavy traffic, when the bus finally meanders its way out, you start easing into the seats. You start drifting into the sweet and much deserved sleep, waiting for the dreams to take over the reality. The warriors and ememies are no longer traveling with you, their faces morphing from cruel, fist crunching competitors to just the gullible, innocent aam janta who has completed one more day and waiting hard to hit the sack.

P.S. Photographs courtesy: www.Flickr.com and its members.Owners: zhengkun_li, ConfessionalPoet, preachercasy, izumiflowers fnmgkl in the order of the photographs' appearance