The Dosa and Vada Story...!

Sitting in train among a bunch of senior citizens, right to me is a part time actor in Malayalam cinema, more than being an actor he seemed to be a critical analyst in films and right next to him is his friend who supports word by word to all his sarcastically imbalanced comments.

Train moving at a speed over 80kmph, or might be a bit less, a black lass on the side birth stretching herself, to sleep, my eyes are itchy, for more than one reason and i desperately need to curl on to my berth.

Lights are still on although its about quarter past 10, and in between the T.T passing up and down looking to accommodate the waiting list passengers, that might well just give him his pocket money for a day or two.


Duk duk duk duk, the branded sound and the rocking motion of the train still continue as i look out side the window, into complete darkness and the heavy breeze hitting my face, makes me crave a bit for fresh wind.


Train journey has never been new to me, right from the time i have been in Ammi's womb to this age, i have been into long train journeys, looking out the window a story that was narrated to me flashed in my mind,


Rolling back the reels of time,K was a year or two older than what i am now, a happily married boarding train from the holly city of Banaras to the southern tip of India, Kerala, with his newly wedded wife T.

Kids below 14 running with tea and glasses made of mud, the sun haven't been scorching much yet, the humidity have been rising up and the new bride from the south was quite upset with the climate, unlike the southern part of the country the northern part is yet too far behind in developmental aspects and that was the reason the bride had more of tensed face than a smiling one.


Leaving back the soar memories in the Hindu holly city, she was pretty relaxed that two days from then she would be back home, where she has spend most of her childhood. On the other hand groom was sad of leaving his home, where his parents made their bed, although he has been a traveler ever since his childhood, leaving parents back home is always painful.


Now that the marriage was more of an arranged love marriage, the bride didn't know much about the groom's family, other than the things told, and the father in law of the groom was pretty afraid of sending his daughter to a completely new place thousands of kilometers far. All this had created an inbuilt fear inside the mind of the bride.

She didn't want to be left alone, in the train, she didn't want any third person looking at her, with anxiety everything provoked fear, in her. That was the time she herd a man shout Dosa and Vada at Banaras. And her eyes lit up, glorious god be she praised, though it was just close to a month that she had had South Indian food, it did calm her down that she found something of south in north.


She wished for the Dosa and the ever loving groom was ever ready to buy her, the prime reason being that he could keep her mouth shut for quite a while. Buying Dosa and Vada from platform and a Bisleri bottle with both the hands stuffed he walked back to the train, by the time he put his step on the foot bar of the compartment, the train started moving, dis balanced in steps he fell down flat on the plat form and leg caught between platform and the next compartment to come he did the first summer salt in his life to save his legs from being snatched by the Indian railway, back into sense he boarded d last compartment of the train and signaled the guy standing on the door of his compartment to inform the bride that he has boarded.


Walking through three or four compartment he reached his seat, seeing him the bride had tears in her eyes, he felt blessed about the care that his bride had for him, she noticed that he had shed the Sambar on his pants and the sleeves of his shirt were also soaked in Chatni, with a bit of hesitation and a bit of anger the bride asked him " y did u eat up all d Dosa and Vada by your self, i thought you went to get some for me.."

groom looked at her annoyed...


And the train moved on and on with its branded duk duk sound and rock n rolla...!

TRK