Dânesh Zaki

I had been to Esplanade to attend a gathering. While returning I chose to commute by the local electric train (also known as EMU - Electric Multiple Units). I have always been nostalgic about electric trains and it was the primary mode of commuting to and from college. We had a good group of friends including Sushil who used to commute by train. It was fun as we travelled in the opposite direction, away from the morning and evening crowd as our college was near Tambaram.

Coming back to today’s commute, the train that I got in was the latest model of the EMU. It had vertical windows, full steel interiors instead of the painted yellow ones, soft cushioned seats and an emergency chain painted in silver instead of the usual red (A picture is due and I will try to post one soon). To my surprise, none of the seats were slit or scratched, there was no graffiti on the inside and outside walls of the compartment. Neither did I find the advertisements frightening commuters about the evils of Rabies with a picture of an ugly dog or the ad for curing Piles Fistula with a man wearing a lungi in different styles (if you’ve seen the ad, you’ll understand what I am talking about). In all, the train was great and so was the commute. Expectedly, I reached my destination, Nungambakkam station in about 15 minutes. But to fully the savour the new train’s experience, I should take a ride to Tambaram, which is about 45 minutes from Nungambakkam.