So I take the train to Lausanne. Feeling all lonely and rather depressed for actually having left everything that ever mattered back home, I am also all anticipation for seeing the lovely countryside that I have always imagined Switzerland to be. It’s not that easy to concentrate on passing fields when you have just spent the last 16 hours flying. Actually, 10 hours flying and 6 more sitting around and waiting in lines at the various airports you have just visited. I am struggling to keep myself awake. Which is generally the case with me whenever things start moving, car, bike, airplane, train… heck anything, and your body starts to gyrate in a rhythmic to and fro movement. Freud had it right, it all has to do with those formative years. Did I ever tell you that when my brother and I were very young, 2 or 3 probably, it wasn’t always easy to put two kids to sleep together given that we were just a year apart and demanded equal pampering. So how did our parents manage? Simple. They took us both and took us on a scooter ride. And sure enough, we were both deep in sleep in record time. And this worked even in the extreme Kota cold, which the discerning reader will know is about as much as what is described above.
But hell, what is a Freud in front of the beauty of Switzerland. So I try my very best to defy the Freudian truth. And I almost managed to do so too! Just that I was in Lausanne before I could realize the train is moving. Don’t blame me! The last time I traveled in train was from the silicon valley of India to the capital. It takes 42 hours in scheduled time and a couple more coz someone surely pulls the chain in between, which generally results in a big argument between the TT and the supposed ‘culprit’ whether it was legal to pull or not. And the legitimacy of the said action is determined more by the physique of the errant in question. I could have left my whole family back in the last station and still paid heavily for it, and possibly got locked up for a day too! So with that in the back of my head, I am looking forward to some peaceful scenic gazing. The train moves out of Geneva city, which takes a few minutes. In a couple of minutes the TT is here to check. I am waiting to see if anyone pulls on the chain! (Hell, where is the chain anyway? I should make sure I find it.) The scene is beginning to get greener outside. And then we move into another station and pass right through it. My eyes are trying hard to defeat my resolve. Hey, did I just fall asleep? Nah… I ’aint that easy! Oh, another station and we pass right through again. Hmmmmmmmm… Zzzzzzzzzzz (ooops)! Ah, things are indeed getting pretty outside. Hmmmmmm… What, another station? Are they really so close to each other or am I missing something here? What??? Lausanne?????????? Already!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And that brought my first rail journey through the Alps to a tragic end.
The whole thing took under forty minutes. About the time the TT would have taken to get out and find the culprit who pulled the chain. And here I was, at my destination already. So I grudgingly pick up my heavy luggage again and start walking out of the station, mumbling abuses within myself. A taxi looked like to be the best option. And given that a lot of them are Mercs, it should be worth it. But it was as if the lord of disappointment had decided to have a field day on me. Even my taxi ride was over in precisely four and a half minute. And that’s not all… what is that Hindi expression, “Jale pe namak”? I had to pay 15 swiss francs for my promiscuity with the dream machine (for the uninitiated, a swiss franc is around 39 rupees!). Never again!
But the best was still to come. For long I have joked about living in this imaginary ‘pipe’ every time we talked about going to new places. Guess I finally got mine. There is nothing more to say. Here’s a picture. I have no words except that I pay 504 francs for this, and that my first reaction on entering the room was “what the f*** have I got myself into”!
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