From
bed to bus stand, I hum through a flurry of chores like a drone.
I
gobble up food like a pelican, get garbed, grab the bag with lunch packed,
a hurried
bye to dad and mum, walking and running through the maze
of
palm trees to catch 29D at 6.30 from Madhavaram Milk Colony.
I
hop into the dark and light green omni-dragon reluctantly,
hoping
to reach in time to catch the popular and all-important 29C.
If
late, we sprint to latch ourselves like leeches on to the moving bus.
Stretched
on a time-rack between stops for ‘tickets’ ‘tickets’ ‘tickets’,
we
wait in hope to hear the shrill double whistle or the ‘raiee’ ‘raiee’.
At
Perambur, at last, we are belched out and stream into 29C.
The
insatiable toad swells head to torso with students at every stop
not
an inch to maneuver, we are jammed hams salted and heat-dried.
Male
students hang on chivalrously making space for groovy girls
hormones on fire, many a match made on those
buses perhaps.
Every
student of Loyola, WCC and Stella in town make their presence felt.
The dragon scrambles on, crawls at times, makes
a dash or stops abruptly
crushing us like a tightening vice as we lurch
forward like projectiles.
The driver steers as though on high seas, his
hands and legs in a trance like dance.
Money, bus passes and tokens are passed by
dwarfed hands and constrained necks.
The struggle to reach the door starts well
before we reach Sterling Road.
Like telepathic worms we wriggle our way
through layers of human flesh.
My shirt button entangles in a girl’s hair
(preordained?!) as I tried to slide past.
We spend a good minute untangling with
embarrassed contrite smiles.
If you don’t make it to the proximity of the
doors in time, the crowd,
which gets down to let you out, will box you
in, moksha denied.
Then you are neither in nor out, stuck at an
inclined angle
like Hercules supporting the roof of the bus
from collapse
and in resigned karmaic silence, you wait for
the next stop.
Getting down at Sterling Road we venture into
the final lap – catching 49D or 41D.
A journey short and honey sweet, a gush of
relief as we spy the college gate.
Were those Ulyssian journeys worth it? – For
millions of us who couldn’t afford
a bike, a car or private transport, those city
buses were our lifeblood,
our lifeline to a college education and a
future in those early 90s.
