Cashew nuts, waterfalls and toytrain

My first train journey started with a fall. I was three year old. The compartment was waiting at the ‘outer.’ Since it was a break-up journey, we got inside it a little early. While my parents were busy arranging the baggage, I played up-and-down on the exit ladder. My first attempt was good, but the second one got spoiled. I lost grip and fell down. A railway employee (or a policeman?) who sat nearby immediately took me into his hands and performed a ‘pendulum-shake’– towards left and right for five times each. I was ok. But still, there was a mix of mud, tiny stones and blood oozing from my mouth.

The sad patch was soon taken over by surprising images -- the midnight sun of the engine, waterfalls and the cashew uncle. We were on our way to Goa. A handful of peeled cashew nuts would come out of the window before our compartment. My dad would receive it with his right hand through our window. One or two might fall down. It was magic. Although I was clueless about its origin, I enjoyed the chain of action until a lean man finally came and told me: “I will bring more cashew nuts next time.” (I still expect the action, especially when I am travelling alone in a sleeper compartment.)

It was actually a journey to my first forest, waterfalls. The routes of those vertical silvery lines looked similar to the rail-track. Meadows, mountains…and suddenly a halt amid the wonderland of green... "Someone had pulled the chain because he had lost his briefcase," said a passenger. A sudden jerk on the bogie made the briefcase slip out of the window (those days the trains hardly had grills across the windows). Since it contained valuables, the man didn’t want to lose it. He got down, ran towards the ‘imaginative’ spot where he actually lost the briefcase. Two co-passengers followed him. The guard promised them that the train would wait at the nearby station and they could take the Goods train that was to follow soon.

Those who travelled in the late 1970s must know what ‘halt’ really meant. It took hours, and hours from one station to another. Everybody was talking about the guys who went in search of the briefcase. An old man who belonged to the area said the particular stretch is frequented by wild animals. At the station, we kept on waiting for the trio. Some of them prayed for their safe return...

The train was about to move when the trio reached the station. Tired and exhausted, they slept for an hour. A story session followed soon after they got up. A colony of monkeys was guarding the briefcase, scratching and biting on it. “The moment the monkeys saw us, they tried to lift the briefcase. But it didn’t work out. They soon fled the scene, making some strange noise,” said the briefcase man. “We also spot a herd of elephants while coming back,” said the other two who followed him.

The next day when I woke up the compartment was almost empty. The suitcase man and his friends were not there. “What was there so precious inside the briefcase which made the man run all the way back to the forest?, I asked my dad later, for which he said: “Cashew nuts, toytrain, meadows and waterfalls.”