My father, a central government of India employee, made sure we made our religious LTA (leave travel allowance) when he was in service.
Thought there was no IRCTC, my father almost always made sure we had
all the tickets reserved in advance, which meant a trip to the railway station and long wait in the queue and with a finite probability of not getting your tickets after hours of standing in the queue.
Once the tickets in hand, these journeys those days used
to be great, especially because my father used to make it a point to
write to all his friends about our train travel, the date and the likely time it would hit the station close to them.
Invariably, we had someone or the other come and meet us along
the way at the stations that our train used to stop, so this once in 4 years LTA meant we did meet our friends and relatives albeit for a couple of minutes on the platform.
As kids the most interesting aspect, more than just getting to meet
them, was the breakfast, the lunch or the dinner that his friends used to
get; it was not so much not to eat outside -junk- food, but it was
more to do with this aunties food or that friends breakfast. The well
cooked and packed food was a show of friendship and in a way was a
substitute for the warmth and affection that they would have bestowed
on us as their guest were we to park at their place for a couple of
days.
On one such LTA trip in mid 1970's my
father had planned a trip to Jammu and Kashmir. As usual he had
written to all friends who lived in towns and cities along Bangalore
to Jammu via Delhi. The ongoing was as usual great, the train was in
time (couple of hours of delay was usual!) and we met all our
friends; to us kids, it was the food. On our way back from Jammu and Kashmir,
we got to Delhi from Jammu and figured out that the train that was to take us
back to Bangalore was a non-starter and as a substitute a couple of extra compartments were clubbed with another train; while this was
comforting; however in this process we found our compartment (the extra bogie) to be
almost invariably not on the platform or so far from the shops on the platform when ever the train halted at
any station.
At Delhi, because of the uncertainty,
my parents did not think of the food we were to eat during the
journey and as night fell they panicked because we the kids were
hungry. There was no food in sight and there was no pantry on the
train. As night fell, my mother tried to put us to sleep on an empty
stomach. It was, as often recollected by my mother, when we the kids
were asleep, the train stopped yet again at some station. But luckily
this time, she saw a group of people on the other side of the
platform (they had booked a compartment for themselves and it was
halted to be tagged onto another train the next day) and heard them
speak out tongue; she walked to them and saw them finishing of their
dinner on the platform. Very shortly she figured out that they were
pilgrims and quickly the pilgrims got to know that there were these
two hungry kids who were asleep.
What I as a kid remember, is the
instance, where my mother is asking me and my sister to wake up with
hot rice mixed with daal, mango pickle and ghee in front of us. I
think that was one of the most fulfilling dinner that we had as kids.
To this date, we always recollect this
incident, the kindness of sharing food by complete strangers in a
distant platform.
