It was a box full of underachievers. And I found myself sitting on one corner on the baggage stand. Some of us were packed up there, like pieces of baggage ourselves. We sat on the stand made of strips of wood designed for baggage. And in front of us was another such stand filled with more such people. And real baggage. Dull gym bags of fake brands, stuffed more than to their capacity, were fighting battles on two fronts. One with themselves as the poor material tried hard not to give up despite being pushed to their limits by the excessive stuffing within. And one with the other bags as they pushed onto each other for more breathing space.
They all belonged to different people from different worlds. But as they sat there, stifled, one could hardly help but notice how similar they were. Clothes and food and water. That's what most of them must have. Not more than one of them probably had clothes of the same color and size and make. The bags were all unique in many ways. But in ways that didn’t seem to matter here.
It was midsummer and we couldn’t get the fans on the train to work. Somehow, we seemed to be missing exactly the things which we wanted most. Air. And space. Food could wait.
I could see most people in my box from my strategic vantage point. Some of them, I could see clearly. There were meshes between me and the rest. Most of them were either asleep or trying to get some sleep. Clearly, not all of them were sleepy. But, they were trying nevertheless. Under the given circumstances, there seemed to be little else you could do to forget where you were. To stop trying to avoid meeting the eyes of the person in front of you that you just had a fight with.
The situation had calmed down just then. Moments earlier, a huge man was shouting at the top of the his voice at the young lady sitting in front of him. It was partly a misunderstanding, as it later turned out. The guy sitting beside me was her husband. He climbed down to sit beside her as the man who had been sitting there got off the train. Apparently, the huge man had made a deal for that seat and this person wasn't aware of it. The fight went on for a long time. People tried to help at first, but soon, the voices of the 3 people involved - the huge man, the lady and her husband became part of the background noise that everyone subconsciously ignored. The sound of the wheels, the people fighting and some kid crying - just noise to be discarded or put up with as long as the journey lasted.
Once the fight subsided, I surveyed the crowd from high above. Everyone seemed to have settled down - albeit uncomfortably. The 3-seater below me had 5 adults and two kids dozing off on it. Same was the case with the seat in front of it. The ones on the edges were in such delicately precise configurations that a slight change of angle of their legs or shift of weight of their upper bodies would throw them off the seat. The ones who were not fortunate enough to be seated, made the most of the places they got to barely stand. Their priorities seemed to be to position themselves near the windows or doors to get some wind. One middle aged man, who lost his balance occasionally, was managing to have lunch from a tiny steel box despite his position. Another was taking some load off his legs by shifting it to his arms. He achieved this my holding a high metal hook with one hand. The other hand clutched this one tightly and his head rested on his upper arms as he snored heavily.
Some of us were in relatively better living conditions. The baggage stand on which I sat had 3 adults and 3 bags including me. This was not as much better compared to those seated below us as It sounds. This was because we also had to accommodate our legs on those seats. The ones sitting below could freely let their legs hanging. We had to curl them up and frequently keep changing positions to prevent legs from sleeping - which can be quite painful while stretching them is a luxury you could not afford for the next 9 hours or so. And since the seat was not meant for people, you also had to shift uncomfortably where you sat. It is surprising how much of a burden legs can be when you were sitting up there. The rest was manageable, but legs -they were a pain.
Nevertheless, life up there was far better than that of people seated below. And the ones standing could clearly see that.
My position was typical of my unplanned travels. Despite the sight of the overflowing unreserved compartment from the station platform, I always knew that there would be a niche for me somewhere up there. This was not mere wishful thinking. There is always someone lying down on one of the baggage stands while there is hardly any place on the floor for your feet. And as certain as that, there are always standing people who enviously look at the sleeping person and battle in their minds whether and how to ask the person to sit up so that they could sit too. The sleeping one generally faces the wall and strategically places bags around him to make the place look less comfortable than it is. Worthless tricks in front of a veteran like me. I take pleasure in waking these people up from their fake sleeps.
With sights like these and plenty of time to burn I had little to do but ponder. Was this the most efficient configuration? Could you stuff the same people into the same box in a better way? Or was this chaos the best you could do? Did this apparent chaos really have underlying order? Why are some people standing while the rest are sitting? Did they all just start late? Or does each one of them have their share of moments of hesitations to blame? Why aren't the seats being time-shared? Is that practical at all? Could they possibly stick in a television here to distract the people? How does the old woman selling raw mangoes here pay for her ticket?
For a moment, I thought that the solution was to mark seats with numbers and make reservations. But this was the unreserved compartment and, by definition, that was not allowed. What if a railway official stands at the door, lets one person in at a time and chooses a seat for them or a place to stand depending on their age and physical condition? But who is to decide what the right rules are? I guess you could make a case for making the youngest and strongest stand while the weak and old sit. But that was probably happening already. I did not see any very old people standing. The weak and old were sitting indeed. Probably, all rules which are worth enforcing are already hardwired and don’t have to be enforced at all. But forcibly enforced rules still have to have their benefits, right? A configuration that results from everyone acting in their own self interest can hardly be the most efficient? But what exactly is an efficient configuration? Even if you could quantify comfort, would it be something that maximizes the average comfort? Or minimizes the cases of discomfort? Even if this hypothetical golden sets of rules to arrive at the best configuration was found, would it be far too narrow to make any long term sense? The existing system gives people an incentive to start early. But with trains stopping at stations for only few minutes, that hardly matters. The quick and strong manage to get in first. But they, precisely, should be the people who need the seats the least. So, does the system select against the weak? That isn't as wrong as it sounds after all. Selecting against the weak gives the weak a better reason to book their tickets in advance and not travel in an unreserved compartment. But what about the ones who cannot afford the reservation fee? Should there be such a fee at all?
Connected to this compartment are the reserved compartments, the first classes, the AC s and all. Imagining how much legroom there must be in those compartments makes one wonder more than ever if something somewhere is possibly wrong. The reserved ticket costs less than twice as an unreserved one and the unreserved compartment is stuffed to more than twice the density of a reserved one. And they cost lesser to maintain. Do unreserved compartments make more business sense for the railways? Why don’t we have whole trains of those then? Because you need to accommodate people who belong to different strata of the society? So, there is no escaping from tying boxes of varying degrees of comfort together. The only solution possibly is to get more trains to run. But can we afford to underutilize them? This, after all, is just a problem of few people fighting for limited resources. For some air to breathe. And more legroom.
They all belonged to different people from different worlds. But as they sat there, stifled, one could hardly help but notice how similar they were. Clothes and food and water. That's what most of them must have. Not more than one of them probably had clothes of the same color and size and make. The bags were all unique in many ways. But in ways that didn’t seem to matter here.
It was midsummer and we couldn’t get the fans on the train to work. Somehow, we seemed to be missing exactly the things which we wanted most. Air. And space. Food could wait.
I could see most people in my box from my strategic vantage point. Some of them, I could see clearly. There were meshes between me and the rest. Most of them were either asleep or trying to get some sleep. Clearly, not all of them were sleepy. But, they were trying nevertheless. Under the given circumstances, there seemed to be little else you could do to forget where you were. To stop trying to avoid meeting the eyes of the person in front of you that you just had a fight with.
The situation had calmed down just then. Moments earlier, a huge man was shouting at the top of the his voice at the young lady sitting in front of him. It was partly a misunderstanding, as it later turned out. The guy sitting beside me was her husband. He climbed down to sit beside her as the man who had been sitting there got off the train. Apparently, the huge man had made a deal for that seat and this person wasn't aware of it. The fight went on for a long time. People tried to help at first, but soon, the voices of the 3 people involved - the huge man, the lady and her husband became part of the background noise that everyone subconsciously ignored. The sound of the wheels, the people fighting and some kid crying - just noise to be discarded or put up with as long as the journey lasted.
Once the fight subsided, I surveyed the crowd from high above. Everyone seemed to have settled down - albeit uncomfortably. The 3-seater below me had 5 adults and two kids dozing off on it. Same was the case with the seat in front of it. The ones on the edges were in such delicately precise configurations that a slight change of angle of their legs or shift of weight of their upper bodies would throw them off the seat. The ones who were not fortunate enough to be seated, made the most of the places they got to barely stand. Their priorities seemed to be to position themselves near the windows or doors to get some wind. One middle aged man, who lost his balance occasionally, was managing to have lunch from a tiny steel box despite his position. Another was taking some load off his legs by shifting it to his arms. He achieved this my holding a high metal hook with one hand. The other hand clutched this one tightly and his head rested on his upper arms as he snored heavily.
Some of us were in relatively better living conditions. The baggage stand on which I sat had 3 adults and 3 bags including me. This was not as much better compared to those seated below us as It sounds. This was because we also had to accommodate our legs on those seats. The ones sitting below could freely let their legs hanging. We had to curl them up and frequently keep changing positions to prevent legs from sleeping - which can be quite painful while stretching them is a luxury you could not afford for the next 9 hours or so. And since the seat was not meant for people, you also had to shift uncomfortably where you sat. It is surprising how much of a burden legs can be when you were sitting up there. The rest was manageable, but legs -they were a pain.
Nevertheless, life up there was far better than that of people seated below. And the ones standing could clearly see that.
My position was typical of my unplanned travels. Despite the sight of the overflowing unreserved compartment from the station platform, I always knew that there would be a niche for me somewhere up there. This was not mere wishful thinking. There is always someone lying down on one of the baggage stands while there is hardly any place on the floor for your feet. And as certain as that, there are always standing people who enviously look at the sleeping person and battle in their minds whether and how to ask the person to sit up so that they could sit too. The sleeping one generally faces the wall and strategically places bags around him to make the place look less comfortable than it is. Worthless tricks in front of a veteran like me. I take pleasure in waking these people up from their fake sleeps.
With sights like these and plenty of time to burn I had little to do but ponder. Was this the most efficient configuration? Could you stuff the same people into the same box in a better way? Or was this chaos the best you could do? Did this apparent chaos really have underlying order? Why are some people standing while the rest are sitting? Did they all just start late? Or does each one of them have their share of moments of hesitations to blame? Why aren't the seats being time-shared? Is that practical at all? Could they possibly stick in a television here to distract the people? How does the old woman selling raw mangoes here pay for her ticket?
For a moment, I thought that the solution was to mark seats with numbers and make reservations. But this was the unreserved compartment and, by definition, that was not allowed. What if a railway official stands at the door, lets one person in at a time and chooses a seat for them or a place to stand depending on their age and physical condition? But who is to decide what the right rules are? I guess you could make a case for making the youngest and strongest stand while the weak and old sit. But that was probably happening already. I did not see any very old people standing. The weak and old were sitting indeed. Probably, all rules which are worth enforcing are already hardwired and don’t have to be enforced at all. But forcibly enforced rules still have to have their benefits, right? A configuration that results from everyone acting in their own self interest can hardly be the most efficient? But what exactly is an efficient configuration? Even if you could quantify comfort, would it be something that maximizes the average comfort? Or minimizes the cases of discomfort? Even if this hypothetical golden sets of rules to arrive at the best configuration was found, would it be far too narrow to make any long term sense? The existing system gives people an incentive to start early. But with trains stopping at stations for only few minutes, that hardly matters. The quick and strong manage to get in first. But they, precisely, should be the people who need the seats the least. So, does the system select against the weak? That isn't as wrong as it sounds after all. Selecting against the weak gives the weak a better reason to book their tickets in advance and not travel in an unreserved compartment. But what about the ones who cannot afford the reservation fee? Should there be such a fee at all?
Connected to this compartment are the reserved compartments, the first classes, the AC s and all. Imagining how much legroom there must be in those compartments makes one wonder more than ever if something somewhere is possibly wrong. The reserved ticket costs less than twice as an unreserved one and the unreserved compartment is stuffed to more than twice the density of a reserved one. And they cost lesser to maintain. Do unreserved compartments make more business sense for the railways? Why don’t we have whole trains of those then? Because you need to accommodate people who belong to different strata of the society? So, there is no escaping from tying boxes of varying degrees of comfort together. The only solution possibly is to get more trains to run. But can we afford to underutilize them? This, after all, is just a problem of few people fighting for limited resources. For some air to breathe. And more legroom.
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