Dubai Metro Chronicles
5-4-2011
Today I begin to chronicle my experience traveling in the Dubai Metro train. Well some things just strike your mind out of the blue and then they linger on to you like the taste of your favourite food dish or like as how we Indian’s would put it; ‘Maa ka Khana’. It’s been 60 days as on today since I have come back to Dubai for work. Everyday teaches me something new about life and it’s so called unforeseeable dynamics…or shall I say gymnastics (since it never prepares us for some unimaginable rollercoaster rides). I have hardly been given a chance to say that today is another day like yesterday. You need not wait for a ‘tsunamic’ change or occurrence in your life during the day to make it different from the previous one. One simple word by a colleague, roommate, family member or none-the-less even a total stranger in your commuting mode (in my case the metro), or a situational experience lasting either for a second or for hours…it leaves an indelible mark on your book of life. I desire to word on paper, my experiences in one of the Fastest, Fascinating and Fun means of local transport of Dubai. What the F!!
Boarded the 9.00am metro from Mator Mahatta Rakham Wahed (Airport Terminal 1). Here I am trying to showoff my Arabic which I am religious trying to learn from my very kind and helpful graphic designer colleague and friend at work. Choosing which door to enter in the train is a very interesting aspect to notice on the platform. Whether it’s a group of passengers or those ‘stags’ & ‘hinds’ like me, wait at the doors with only ONE thought in mind. That thought is the appetizer for the journey that for some will last either for 1 stop or for some until the last stop of that train. Don’t let your mind do the thinking now for guessing ‘the thought’. Just let your eyes do the job of a good reading…well I hope this is worth a good read. So, the thought is… whether I will get a seat to sit or not. Well for some of you folks it might not be an interesting aspect, but for those 100’s and 1000’s who travel by the metro, it’s more than a thought. I got in and found my throne, with also a vacant one beside me. Well, if the train were managed by one of the 1st class private airlines of the world, then I would have used the vacant seat to couch myself on it and not just sit on it. Very soon I was given company by a Pakistani gentleman dressed in a crisp chocolate colour suit. His size was 2 times that of mine, which magnifyingly made me look like a cast member of the latest flick Gulliver Travels. It’s just that I was not from any angle looking like Gulliver. Even before I could make sure that I don’t get squashed like an orange by this gigantic of a creation by God, my joy of having gotten a seat simply vanished even before I could start thinking in which language I felt the joy! Two stops after I embark the train, the third stop gushes in a herd of excited, pissed off, confused, gay (I meant happy; by the way, okay!! for all you language policemen), sometimes pregnant, many a times aged and most of the times notoriously young. Now there is obviously a mix of races that traverse in the train, but the common feature that ‘races’ to the finish line first is the character of what I call the ‘metro-love’ (Here on read as ML). When you get in a restaurant serving buffet, your eyes are hovering allover the platter to check out ASAP the deliciously spread menu that’s waiting for you to scoop a serving. This is exactly how my fellow passengers at this stop and in those next to come, behave as soon as they get inside. This very moment always reminds of that merry game that I am sure we all used to play when we were kids. It’s called the musical chairs…not sure if it’s called something else now. The scene is just the same but when it comes to the music aspect of it, in the train one gets to here the sounds of feet clamping on the floor (metro version of tap dancing), sound of bangles adorned on beautiful feminine hands (metro version of chimes), coughs, hiccups and sneezes – mildly audible like trumpets and saxes played with tuners used to mild their sound. To make this commotion more exciting is the sound of the door opening and closing. It’s nothing less than a glorious yet soft drum roll, announcing the entry and exit of make-up and non-make-up faced travelers. After all get settled as the train began to continue its ride, there were these two Pakistani men seated bang opposite me, chatting about their work. Yeah, you must be thinking was I in a Pakistani compartment. Well, first of all there no such thing as a Pakistani or Indian or any other National compartment, it’s a coincidence that my nearest co-passengers were from my most ‘attached’ neighbor of a country. If only both our Governments saw this attachment! I getting squashed by the guy next to me was my receipt of ML for the today. One among the guy seated opposite me at one time started writing a phone number on a piece of paper as dictated by the person on the other end of his phone, saying the numbers aloud. I am sure you are not expecting that I remember what those numbers are called in his language. I am just trying to share a point here. If I were more attentive (of which there was no need of), I would have learnt how 5279*** are called in a Pakistani local language. Here the point is of a train journey teaching one, something new, without even one asking for it. If I, like I mentioned above, were more attentive, then I would have impressed my senior colleague at work, who again is a Pakistani. I think I have had too much of ‘padosi desh mohobbat’ (neighboour country love – literal translation from Hindi to English) in one day…and the sun is yet to set today. Now having passed 3 more stations, I have now reached my destination – DIFC. As I disembark from the train with the drum roll of the door opening, I get the most fresh and quick glance of an Arab beauty, modestly dressed in well fitted blue jeans and a light coloured top commonly worn in a manner most Arab women dress. Her face and head covered with a light orange scarf and jet black sun glares so large, that give her eyes the feeling of being singularly housed in huge mansion. Could have noticed more about her if I did not care about getting a cold, not very likable stare from the damsel. Went down pretty fast by the escalator, swiped my NOL card and once again got that ever friendly and genuine ‘Hello bossy’ from the fruit juice shop guy in the station. Here I want to mention that he has started giving me a 2 dirham discount on any fruit juice that I hence will buy from him, since I am his regular customer who buys a red apple everyday. This is also my daily dose of receiving involuntary Filipino ML before station exit.
Cut to Al Hawaii Towers, scene 2, stage - floor 2...my office, the place where I have loads of ‘copy write’!!
Roger That!
No comments:
Post a Comment