musafir aur murphy

The longest blog I’ve written.

9th of July, 2007 was a landmark day in my life. I had my breakfast at Kolkata, lunch in Delhi and dinner @ Mumbai. Never ever felt as Musafirous in my life…

… until, yesterday.

Was to travel by the Kingfisher morning flight to Mumbai and from there to Bhuj. Missed the flight. A gut feeling told me that Bhagwan Murphy had decided to place his hand on my head for the day.

Took the ticket for the same route on Jet. The flight to Mumbai was delayed, and we landed at 12.35 PM in Mumbai. My transit flight (the last one to Bhuj) was to take off at 12.40 PM. But, with Bhagwan Murphy by my side, how could I take the flight. Along with about 6-7 others, I got stranded in Mumbai.

Jet offered us a 7 PM flight to Rajkot and offered to drop us at Bhuj on a car ( 4-5 hours). Now, the place I needed to get to is about 150 KMs from Bhuj. With no other option, I had to take the option they gave me.

Never ever have I felt like a bigger piece of sh**.

Guess, my boss could sense that. On the phone, amongst other things, he said, “it must be more difficult for you coz you are alone on this”. Never in my life had I seen empathy better at display. I cannot describe in words how light I felt after hearing this. If ever I grow big enough to write an autobiography, this bit would be written in bold capitals.

A couple of days back, I’d met some good friends from my college at IHC. While talking to them, I remember quoting to them an oft-quoted philosophy- “Worry about, and think of changing things that are in your control”. Some very senior mentors in my life have quoted this to me and also to distinguish between things in my control and things that are not.

I smiled inside my mind. This conversation with the friends and the one with my boss ensured that any worry that remained inside me was off loaded. But I had to reach my destination before tomorrow morning.

In the time I had, before boarding the Rajkot flight, caught up with some special friends in Mumbai.

Reached Rajkot half-an-hour late. Took the car… an Innova… good car…great Rafi-Mukesh-Kishore-Hemant Kumar songs playing… lashing rains… cold winds…. Moonlit night… Exotic deserted roads… driving by the river….

But for the fact that there was no girl alongside, this would have been the most romantic evening of my life.

And then Bhagwan Murphy smiled again. The headlights of the car went off. Still drove on. Missed hitting a truck, driving into a ditch and colliding against a bus- all by a whisker. While contemplating on whether to continue driving or not, the ultimate comico-tragedy happened. One of the tyres burst.

And then, more adventure… try helping out somebody trying to change a tyre in the midst of a heavy downpour… you’ll know what I’m talking about. And no street lights around- only the light of vehicles passing by (and the moon) to spot the tyre.

Guess, had had enough of adventure… ventured around…woke up a few dhabawalas fast asleep…tried asking them if I could get a taxi… A couple of them replied in expletives I cannot quote… another did not reply and yet another laughed his heart out. I could still hear him laugh as I walked back to the innova. I could almost hear him mouth “pata nahi kahaan kahaan se aa jate hain”

“Saab, abhi toh theek nahi hoga… aap doosri gaadi le lo”, said the innova driver as I reached back.

Tried stopping a few cars that raced past- they wouldn’t stop. Lifting my wet jeans up to my knees would not have helped me either. I aint Pooja Bhatt of Dil hai ki manta nahi.

Drenched… helpless… I stood there by the innova…. Mukesh singing, “duniya banaane wale, kya tere mann mein samaayee…”…

And then luck smiled. A kind truck driver stopped (if I remember right, his name was Balram). Hitched with him till a place very near Bhuj (he was not getting into the town- was going to Mundra). As I was getting out of the truck, handed the driver a 100 rupee note. He smiled, said, “kya saab” and looked away. He took it after a great deal of persuation.

Thanks to the truckwala, got a cab from where he dropped me who took me into Bhuj. My phone network started working again… got in touch with the company car driver who was kind enough to pick the call and help drop me at the company guest house at Bhuj. It was 2.45 AM.

Woke up at 5.30 today morning… and drove down to Sewagram/ Vayor where I’m writing this.

Something every touching happened on the drive. We had stopped over at a road side stall for tea. This tea was the first thing I was having since my snack on the Rajkot flight.

The tea for my driver and me cost 6 bucks. I gave the stall vendor (a teenaged boy) a 10 rupee note. He didn’t have the balance to pay me back. I was okay with it. He was not. After a lot of struggle, he found a 5-rupee coin and he asked if I had a rupee on me so that he could give me the fiver. I had a 2-rupee coin and felt it was no big deal at all if he took the extra rupee… he would have none of it… he said, “zyaada kaise le sakta hoon saab…”

This guy was wearing a very torn trouser…and an even more torn shirt…. I could sense from his utensils…and his appearance and his thela that he struggled to meet his basic needs.

As I drove past, I felt I had seen a very different world in the last few hours since yesterday morning.

This time, as I saw this world, my eyes were misty.