Mera State poor hai toh kya hua honest toh hai (My state may be poor, but honest)

Being born and brought up in the east, having done my masters in Delhi, PhD in Mumbai, and married in south India, for me travelling is a quite a frequent phenomenon. Among all modes of travel, I love train journeys. These journeys are an occasion to relax, a time to sit, eat, sleep, and chit-chat. Out of my numerous train travels this summer journey, from Vijayawada to my home town, Bhubaneswar was nothing special. It was a twelve-hour onward journey and a thirty-hour journey back to Bangalore the next afternoon. It would be just an overnight stay at home. But, home being home, whether it is for a half a day stay or for a half a month – one looks forward to live each moment of it.

I had to board the train at 3 AM in Vijayawada, the much inconvenient time, when most of the people would be breathing deep into their final quota of night gift. But for me, a plus-minus of half an hour to this is the usual time I go to bed. Coincidentally, this is almost the time my father-in-law gets up. So, without making any concession, I had somebody to drop me at the station.

One of the symptoms of people who go to bed late is that irrespective of the time they choose to retire to bed, they wake up between 9 to 10am.  Also, I am among those who love to sleep a bit more during travel. I was in a middle berth. This is the compromising berth, where the comfort to enjoy sleep depends on the mood of others. I was rather grateful to have my co-passengers who allowed me to have my sleep till I wished.

At home my mother used to prepare lunch early as she had to go to office. As I grew old, with my love for sleeping late into the morning I developed the habit of starting my breakfast with the lunch. In travel, this habit too prevailed.

As the train crossed Palasa, it was past eleven. I just had completed my morning dose of newspaper and was feeling hungry. Coincidentally, a few vendors had got in Palasa and there were yells of “meals ready – saada (vegetarian meal): Rs. 50/-, maach bhat (Fish rice) Rs. 60/, chicken meal: Rs 80/-.” The vendors seemed to belong to one group. The person with a thick moustache appeared to be the manager collecting the order. He looked so serious as to give an impression that until he feeds you, he wouldn’t smile.

I took maach bhat. Opened the packet; a full plate rice, a tiny fish fry, a packet of rasam, and the Andhra pickle. I finished my lunch in ten minutes. Needless to say that the food was not even worth fraction the price. But given the train had no catering service, this was the only option to have the pleasure of eating rice in a train.

Now, the train has crossed Ichhapuram and entered into Odisha border. A new set of meal vendors entered. A similar call for food, but price was exceptionally low: saada – Rs 25/- and maach bhat – Rs 30/-.

With me in the boggie was a Telugu family. The male head of the family was able to speak broken Hindi. He asked me – “Brother… aisa kaisa... (how it is...) half price!”

I just smiled. His bewilderment was justified as he had already purchased vegetarian meals for all his family members with each costing Rs 50/-. Within a half hour distance, as one crossed Andhra Pradesh to Odisha, the price halved.

There comes Chattrapur… and there were fresh shouts…
“aa gaya (here comes) 20-20… maach bhat – Rs 20/-.  Chennai–Mumbai 20-20; maach bhat – Rs 20/-.” (The following day was final T20 match between Chennai and Mumbai). I could see fried fish of size twice of the size I got in my meal. I again smiled to myself; and looked towards the Telugu uncle and said –

‘Mera state poor hai toh kya hua honest toh hai’ (My state may be poor, but honest).

He nodded in affirmation.

On the rest of the journey I was thinking, perhaps I should have said – My state is honest; therefore, poor.