The Rush Of "Madnesh"

The following is an incident, which happened a couple of weeks back. This is the sort of thing that I sit & wait for at Bandra Stn. to happen, all the while not knowing my office buddy would be involved in such an incident. I really hate to ruin someone’s reputation by talking about his or her embarrassing moments, but then what are friends for?

(I owe it to my office buddy to reveal his name on the Internet, though people used to call him Yadnesh until the time this mail was sent to everyone in the office, people have somehow liked the new name, even I believe it fits him. All in all it was a fun incident that no one got hurt in, except for 2 buttons which are missing in action & presumed dead somewhere on Andheri Platform)

Date: 25^th April 2005
Time: 7:56 PM
Place: Reay Road Stn.
Cast: Myself, Madnesh (name changed to protect identity), Paras (in
supporting role).

The three of us, i.e. the phenomenon called Madnesh & I are supposed to meet Paras at Andheri station at 8 - 8:15 PM. The only problem being, Paras had already reached Andheri by the time we ran up to Reay Road Stn. just to see the 7:56 PM Andheri Local leave (thanks to the phenomenon called Madnesh,as he sat in the workshop trying to make an electronic equipment work, which by the looks of it was winning the stubbornness competition between the two). There was not going to be another Andheri Local till 8:24 PM.

We wait on the Reay Road Station planning to catch the next best thing, the 8:09 PM Bandra. Madnesh knowing that going in the Bandra Local means 30 mins.delay & in a rush of madness declares that we will change trains at Bandra & catch a Borivli Fast. Despite all my protests which were met by certain training instructions on boarding & alighting. I have to mention here that I really don’t like traveling in a fast train, it’s kind of this complex that I have. I have, not under hypnotic regression but under the influence of alcohol & a cheap cigarette found the reason to be a traumatic experience I underwent when in college. That time I had innocently hopped onto a Virar Fast during peak hours. The incident left a permanent scar on my psyche not to mention the permanent bump on my head. I do not know if there is any word to describe the fear of traveling by a fast train but if it exists it should, I demand, have Virar in it.

Halfway, that’s at Vadala, Paras calls me on my cellphone & knowing what will be coming I let Madnesh handle the call. (A person who is that confident of traveling in a fast train can handle anything, least of all Paras). I do not know what the conversation was about but it did involve death threats which increased the level of madness already existing & out of this madness, Madnesh claimed to be at Bandra instead of Vadala where we were (Now, not only did we have to rush from Bandra till Andheri but also make up time from Vadala to Bandra). Alighting at Bandra Madnesh scared that Paras just might make true his threats, pitched again for us to travel by Borivli Fast. All are aware at how athletic both of us, Madnesh & myself are plus we carry 20 kg bags (the bags are supposedly for carrying our Tiffin weighing 84 gms, the rest of the weight is of the rocks that couldn’t fit in our cranial cavity). Our athletic physique & the weight that we carry made the enterprise of boarding & alighting a fast train even more risky.

Eventually after much arguments & "Mad"-nesh logic (I also wanted to overcome my fear, I guess), I decided to give it a shot. We boarded a Borivli fast but in the rush of madness or Madnesh we end up in the luggage compartment. I have heard that, people, in stressful/life threatening situations connect with the cosmic consciousness & have visions of the future (it also happens when people are stone drunk & get locked on the terrace at 3 in the morning). I remember telling Madnesh "tujhe Andheri pe nangaa karke utarenge". I never guessed it would be so true. Anyways, we stand at the door enjoying the breeze & making good time, so much so that we approached Andheri in the time we would still be standing at Bandra Station for the Andheri Harbour Local. I started to think that maybe I was wrong in doubting Madnesh that I should do this everyday so I could reach home earlier, that all my opposition to traveling by fast train was a phobia (This is where I learnt that when a person loses connection with the cosmic consciousness they, for the next 30 mins. generally behave in an erratic fashion, coming up with nonsensical conclusions). But as Andheri approached I could see the crowd on the platform to board the train & the thirst of blood in their eyes. So as soon as I thought the train had slowed down enough to be safe to jump out I used my martial arts knowledge (learned from very relevant & informative Mithun films, namely “Cheetah”) to jump over people’s head (something like Matrix along with my bag et al). As soon as I land (that is as soon as I trip, stumble, jog, bump into a signboard), I turn around to congratulate Madnesh for a mission accomplished. But Madnesh is nowhere to be seen, there are only a couple of bhaiyyas trying to get into the luggage compartment with these huge jute sacks (I’d say 5’ by 3’ jute sacks), but no Madnesh. I silently prayed for Madnesh, thinking of all the excuses to say to my boss for having lost a 120 Kg. stubborn service engineer to those 50 Kg. (cumulative weight) bhaiyyas. Just as I am about to turn around to get on to the foot over bridge, I catch a glimpse of a head coming out from near the bhaiyyas knees, I see a red face peeping out from in-between the soiled dhotis. It’s one of those incidents, which Ripley’s will be proud to telecast on their show. Madnesh resurfaces around 2 feet off the ground, to achieve this feat, he has to either lie down in the train or have his legs picked up by someone standing behind him (& knowing that he has got a slip disc, it should be excruciatingly painful). Soon there’s more of him than his head, slowly he’s coming out from between the bhaiyyas (although here I wanted to use the words “appeared from in-between bhaiyya’s legs”, it sounded too obscene). The whole thing reminded me of the scene from Ace Ventura, where Jim Carrey comes out of the mechanized rhino. Madnesh is now out of the train upto his waist, he has lost 2 buttons & I can see the part, where most of the 120 kgs. of his total body mass is concentrated. He is almost nude waist up as the bhaiyyas have him pinned between that huge sack & their legs. After a lot of struggling Madnesh does manage to extricate himself and there is a happy re-union of me & Madnesh on the Andheri platform. Where Madnesh lost his buttons & the belt of his new, gifted-by-his-fiancé bag (not too mention his confidence, he is now content to sit out at the Bandra Station looking at people indulging in madness, across the platform).

There on the platform of Andheri station I learnt an important lesson "Never give in to Madnesh, doesn’t matter how convincing he/it sounds".

Also a new phrase was born "Dar ke maare buttons phat ke haath mein aa gaye"

There’s just so much that is possible to write about a nice person, who is probably somewhere on a nudist beach in Goa right now, trying to flash unsuspecting foreigners. If only they knew about this incident they would have one more thing to laugh about.

Yadnesh if you are reading this, remeber how i had promised to make you famous? Atleast 2 people somehwhere in the world know you messed up. Cheers!!!