Luxurious travel and its analogies with wedded life

I think traveling in Rajdhani Express is just like living with my MIL. Both love to feed, feed and feed without really worrying about the appetite the said party might have. Both love to pamper you crazy with all luxury available. I had one such 'gluttony' and 'pampery' trip to Delhi by Rajdhani Express on Thursday and it was totally crazy.

Digestive system is a relatively unknown terminology in the lexicons of these railway attendants. Especially for irate passengers as me, who basically like to have their moments of privacy in train journeys with no one telling you when to wake up, when to eat, when to go to sleep and such. What I love to do in any train journey is lie in the upper berth and read like a freak and sleep like I haven't slept in months. Now that was typically not the done-thing traveling in Rajdhani. I would pick up a book and in the next 10 mins I would be offered a tray full of kachoris, frooti, some farsan-type thing, chai and call the whole thing snacks. So far so good since I have had a busy day at work and I have traveled in sweltering afternoon sun from Borivali to Mumbai Central to catch the train and my stomach is growling for attention.

I start to read again and in another hour and a half or so, I am thrust upon with another tray, this time its palak paneer, daal, paratha and pulao. Wow..! I would gladly have gobbled up the food on a regular day. But not when my tummy is still busy trying to digest the kachoris which I had about an hour ago. Anyways, I manage to somehow force the food down my gullet. When I thought the ordeal for the day is over, the attendants arrive with ice cream in the next half hour.

It was the most torturous time to go through. Thankfully, it was the last item in the day. Just when I thought that I can now read in peace and harmony, the harmony part was destroyed by the follow berth members. They just shut the lights in the berth without even looking at my side. How could they for they probably thought reading is the biggest blasphemy one could commit in a train. How rude..!!
First of all I am fed up to the brim and then I am deprived of reading and now forced to go to sleep at 10:00PM. Life couldn't get more unfair!

Next morning was even better. Attendants started hovering around with tea/coffee etc right from 7:00 AM. All my plans of sleeping until late lay shattered. I sat up at 7:30AM with a frown and made myself mentally ready for yet another 'feed' session. Started with Chai in the morning, followed by some frooti-like juice in half hour, followed by omelet and bread and one more glass of chai in another half hour.

Needless to say, the number of items I ate in the whole journey easily outnumbered the number of pages I read of my book or the number of hours I slept in the train. After this severely-indulging gastronomic experience I couldn't help thinking how liberal my MIL is. She at least lets me read and sleep. :-)