Having to miss a well-planned train or flight journey could be quite an ordeal for anyone. Many an extraneous factor can upset one’s travel plans: for example, continuous public holidays, processions or rallies blocking the road, or even a lull in between rains—any of them can land one in intractable traffic snarls, dragging him to forego his journey. There are also times when the misery is of one’s own making, like in an incident where a family of international travellers forgot until it was too late that they had left their passports at the security-check counter. The slip was accidental, but it cost them a fortune.
I also have had several episodes of near misses, each one making me wiser for the next time. During monsoon, once I was heading for the Bengaluru City station to take the night train to Chennai. Stranded in a traffic gridlock, I abandoned my auto and took to heels, towing my wheeled suitcase. Exhausted, I gave up midway. Another time, we were to take the same train to Chennai for our morning flight to Colombo. But no cab was accepting the ride, what with the station area chock-a-block with vehicles ahead of the upcoming long holidays. Both times, it was the gutsy auto drivers who bailed us out by skillfully manoeuvring their vehicles to the station.
Last April, before we left Kodaikanal Hills for the railway station on the plains to catch our Bengaluru-bound night train, we cushioned our time for possible midway breaks on the 70-km-long route.
To our distress, the time fizzled out so fast that even a minute’s delay in our arrival at the train platform would have left us pulling our hair out. Another episode was when I left early one morning with my wife to drop her off at the airport. Fuel being insufficient for the 40-kilometre drive, I drove past many filling stations along the way, but all were closed. No sooner than our leaving stranded midway and her missing the flight looking imminent, an open bunk on the right of the motorway came as a heavenly gift, soothing our frayed nerves.
In 2010, eight of us hailed two cabs to the airport for our flight to Pune to attend an important function. Both drivers, however, took different routes. As my cab navigated Bengaluru’s notorious bottleneck—the Hebbal flyover—it panicked me that the second one was still struggling in traffic at JC Road, far behind us. Another jolt came when I discovered that our baggage was randomly stuffed in the two cabs, and in the worst-case scenario, even four of us can’t travel! It was sheer providence that the other group, all huffing and puffing, turned up moments before the check-in deadline.