Is It You?

For various reasons, I have to do quite a bit of travel on my own. Eventhough this travel often happens without much prior notice, there is a strangeman who seems to get my itinerary even before I do and manages to buy a ticketto not only travel on the same plane or train or bus as me, but to also getassigned a seat very close to mine.

He is clever, this man. He looks different each time. Sometimes, he evenbecomes two men. And, very occasionally he has a wife or family in tow. But Ihave enough experience of him by now to not be fooled by these subterfuges. Iknow it is the same person each time, because whatever his physical disguise, Ican predict exactly how he will behave on our joint journey. I don’t know hisname, but I believe he is some kind of royalty. His sense of entitlement istotal and not to be questioned by poor subjects like me.

The first give-away occurs as soon as we have found our seats on a plane.Barely have we sat down, that call bells are rung and harried staff imperiouslyasked to produce water and blankets and lozenges. Needless to say, there isnever a ‘please’ or a ‘thank you’ preceding or following these requests.

The second hint of royalty is dropped by his bejeweled hands. I notice therings as these hands determinedly scoop up ten or twelve pieces of orange andcaramel and tamarind candy in one fell swoop.  But while there may be halfa dozen rings on the fingers (five to each fight off a different category ofmisfortune that might dare to visit the owner of the rings and one last one foraesthetic reasons or to declare their owner’s wealth perhaps-- who knows), Ihave to say that there are no bells on the toes. I know this for a fact because,more often than not, shoes and socks have been taken off in preparation for alordly journey, and I have been able to check and confirm that there will not bemusic wherever he goes.

At those (frequent) times when he miraculously becomes two men, one half ofthe duo is sometimes seated right in front of me. But he makes his presence feltsoon enough by interrupting my morbid dreams of a plane crash with by a sharpknock to my knees as he suddenly decides, even though we might still be in thetake-off or landing stage, to recline his seat, so that he can relax in the wayis his birthright.

At other times, this split man manages to sandwich me between two seats. Andwhat happens when I am thus sandwiched? For a start, I can be sure that thearmrest on neither side of me will be available for me to rest my arm on foreven a fraction of a minute. I might try to gingerly place my arm on one if thehalf of this man that is on my left has gone to perform some ablutions. But justas I use this pause to let my resting arm go limp and almost forget that thisman needs both armrests to be comfortable, he is back and my elbow isrudely shoved aside by a damp arm that reclaims its right. The owner of that armthen proceeds to join his brother on my right in flipping through a newspaper,thus effectively obscuring from my view anything but two giant rustling sheets,accompanied by gymnastic elbow thrusts into my waist every time one or the otherdecides to turn a page; which happens very often since neither is actuallyinterested in reading anything in the newspaper, all he seeks is interestingpictures to stare at. That is why, on international flights, the newspaper isusually replaced by the duty free shopping brochure -- which is much better formy eyes and my waist.

Given that there is no armrest and there are frequent elbow thrusts, all Ican do to protect myself is sit ramrod straight in as narrow and as centred aspace as possible, the attempt to do which reignites my determination to go on adiet so that this occupied space can be made narrower still.

As for other modes of transport, one recent example will suffice. Travellingwith a female friend in a first class AC (no less) compartment from thenation’s capital to a nameless state’s capital, complacency set in becausethis time not only did the man look different, he even had a wife travellingwith him. I told my friend (who, astonishingly, has had this man accompanyingher on her solo trips as well) that we could therefore relax.

How foolish we were. As soon as we had had our ‘continental’ dinner, thisman proceeded to attire himself for a comfortable night of rest by firstproducing his pajamas from his suitcase (to do which he jammed the suitcasebetween the two of us), then waving these pajamas in our faces as he unfoldedand aired them, and lastly wrapping a towel around his waist and artfullywriggling out of his trousers and donning the pajamas. His wife kept her headburied in a magazine through the entire operation and did not seem to mind atall our fascinated observation of this ritual.

The reason this behavior seems tame in retrospect is that its effect couldnot compare at all with our experience the next morning when the whole operationwas performed in reverse. Having clean pajamas shaken out in one’s face is onething. But being fanned by pajamas that have spent the night ensconcing theirowner is an altogether different shock. No wonder the wife this time gave us abrief apologetic smile before returning to her magazine.

If this ubiquitous being does not soon identify himself, I think thecuriosity will kill me. My only consolation is that my delusions are not minealone. Every female friend or relative I have talked to says she knows this man.Not his name or his address, but his royal antecedents and his cunningdisguises.

Who on earth is this man? Is it, by any chance, you, dear reader?

PS: I am writing this in one frustrated shot from Frankfurt airport. I havejust arrived here from Kolkata with a severe crick in my neck because therolling head and shoving elbows of this man, this time in the seat next to me,meant that I was crouched at an odd angle in one corner of my own seat allnight.

PPS: A last few lines written after a flight from Frankfurt to Florence a fewhours later. This time I had an aisle seat, so my left armrest was mine.But the Italian man in the middle seat made sure I got no part of my anatomyanywhere near the right armrest -- throughout the flight, his arm covered thethis entire rest and, being burlier than my usual Indian follower, the elbowhits were much more painful than I am used to.

Just as I was beginning to wonder if my man had the ability to morph into anItalian at will just to fool me, he reappeared in his Indian incarnation. Irecognized him at once because he had been sitting a few rows ahead of me on theKolkata-Frankfurt flight. He arrived panting to discover that he had beenassigned the middle seat in the row in front of me.   He requested theItalian in the aisle seat to switch places. Naturally the latter declined. Hethen proceeded to wring the Italian’s heartstrings by talking about hispainful knee condition which made it impossible for him to sit in a middle seat.The Italian still demurred. My nationalism spurred, I silently wished mycompatriot success without actually expecting it. But I need not have feared.Soon the blackmail turned to accusations of selfishness and to threats tostretch his leg across the Italian’s knee during the flight.

Sure enough, before we took off, there was one bemused Italian man in themiddle seat and one triumphant Indian reclining in an aisle seat that repeatedlyhit my knees.