It was festival time, a big cultural event takes place here in our college every November, “Sundance” is the best kind of festival, its not religious, does not involve relatives asking about your grades, it’s both fun and colorful, and most importantly open to other colleges, so It pulls a massive amount of audience and participants every year which means beautiful women, exotic food, amazing experiences.
It happens for 5 days and comprises of various sports and cultural activities so there is also the adrenaline factor pumping up energies to the next level.
The day before the cultural, people started coming in, banners where up, colored lights, decoration, stalls the whole place looked like a huge carnival. We had the whole week off to prepare for the event, me and my friends had big plans for Sundance. Actually not big, but it did involve alcohol and transforming in to the much needed support system aka the audience.
That night I was called up by a friend who told me that the one of college secretaries who were in charge of the event wanted to meet me. I went and saw the guy he told me “brother, we are in big trouble we ordered around 1000 t- shirts they cannot deliver it someone has to go there and bring it here and it has to be done immediately, can you please go?”. The only question I asked him after he made the request was, who will sponcer the trip?, he said the college will, I took the assignment in a heart beat because I needed some money to enjoy the event, I thought I could save up on the trip money, there is bound to be some excess.
I asked a friend who loved trips to accompany me, he was more than happy to. We collected around 2000 rupees from the secretary, we got all geared up to go.
We studied in Jawanpur collage of engineering and technology, we had to go Borkar which is a 11 hour journey by train, all we had to do was go get the parcel and return back. Tickets were around rs 250 per head.
We reached the railway station at 4.45 pm, actually we were dropped there by ‘the’ college car which usually carries only important people, it felt like we were royalty, we bought the tickets and jumped in to our compartments, it was around 5.10 pm when the train started jittering forward.
That evening, we played cards, then a game of chess, I lost, ate from the canteen, and it was around 9.30 pm when we decided to sleep. I inflated an air pillow and took out a very cozy bed sheet, climbed on the ladder laid down on the top bunker, my buddy Vishal took the bunker on the opposite side. I set the alarm at around 2.30 am on my cellphone, to make sure we get up at least an hour before we reach the destination.
I was in Mexico riding a bull when the bull started yelling “Wake up, wake up”, and then it just without any warning pushed me down, I woke up to a in shock to a very grumpy looking Vishal kicking me, I soon got oriented to where I was, and enquired, “why are you waking me up so soon, the alarm hadn’t even gone off yet”, Vishal said “ you fool, its 5am”, I was a little confused “ what do you mean 5”, he said it is 5 am we missed our stop.
“We were standing in the middle of platform no 4 in Haripur station, at least 150 km away from our destination, the next train that passes via Bokar was at 7 am, we will have to get back there immediate to be able to deliver the t-shirts in time, Vishal wanted to take a dump, my bowels started growling too. So we went to the station toilet we didn’t bring any bags because we weren’t planning on staying anywhere, just a cover for the underpants and t- shirts we hit it under one of the chairs and went to the toilet
After both of us came out we went to the counter, at the counter I signaled Vishal to take the money out, as all our money was in his wallet, he dug in to his pocket, immediately had this anxious look on his face, he checked them again, I wondered if something was wrong, he opened his bags and started checking them out, I got irritated "tell me what happened”, he looked up and said “my wallet, it’s gone”. I looked at him surprised “How?, did you check your pockets properly, this is not the time to play games with me”, he shook his head, I understood he was telling the truth.
I asked him “Did you have it on you, when you got down” , he replied that he did, so we traced our way back to platform 4, we couldn’t find it anywhere, I kept drilling him with questions “did you remember keeping it somewhere?”, “did you leave it in the train?”, “did you have it on you when you went to the toilet?"etc. He couldn’t remember, so we checked everywhere, even the toilets, but we never found it, how the money got lost is still an unsolved mystery.
I was really mad, I acted like a child and kept complaining and abusing the whole time we were at the station. Fortunately we saw a railway policeman walking by, asked him for help, he gave us a white paper and asked us to write down a complain letter, he was even kind enough to buy us some breakfast, after we had explained our disastrous state to him.
We couldn’t just call our college and explain the situation, it was a matter of pride to us, and our parents were so far away, we would just be worrying them they couldn’t have helped us either, he was our only hope.
The policeman said he can help us, and took us to a place where many trucks were parked, he told us to wait in a fixed spot, while he went around investigating, after ten minutes he bought with him a sardharji, he was more than 6 feet tall, bulky, he asked us "did you boys need a ride to Bokar”, we nodded, he gave us a wide grin.
The police man pulled us aside “he will take you Bokar, but you will have to find a way to get to you home town from there, be careful these lorry drivers can be tricky, and keep this money with you”, giving us a 100 rupees note, we refused at first but he was persistent.
At 8.30 we started to Bokar in the truck, people from the college have already called us a few times to inform us that they need the t- shirts fast, we told them we are on the way, they said if the t-shirts aren’t there by tomorrow they might never be able to sell any of them.
The truck could accompany only one person in the front, so Vishal sat in the back, we agreed, we would take turns. The truck after traveling for 20 minutes, stopped in a place, some sacks and boxes were loaded on to the truck.
The Sardar was a really jolly fellow he sang, made jokes and kept me laughing the whole time, but I was being a little cautious, because the policeman told us to be. At 10.15 am we stopped near a tea stall, it seemed like it was the only shop around for miles.
The Sardhar asked us if we wanted tea Vishal refused before I could say anything, I was really hungry I would have liked a tea. Vishal grabbed me by my hand, and pulled me aside and muttered “we have to get away from here”, I was a little confused, I asked him why, he signalled me to that we gave to further, we an some distance away “ now, tell me what happened? "l enquired, he said there was sacs of drugs in the truck, I thought he must have gone crazy, but then he showed me his hands, on them were this white powder.
"Are those drugs, it must be just salt or sugar?”, he said “of course it is you don’t I know the difference, touch it, I did, it didn’t feel it it was salt, and it was too powdery to be sugar, things my father told me about cases where many truck drivers smuggle drugs, if he gets caught with us in it we would be indicted too”. I knew Visual’s father was a police officer but his story did not convince me “Hey, we were referred to the truck by a police officer, you are being unreasonable and delusional”.
As we were heading back, we a saw a police officer getting in to the back of the truck, I froze, see I was right, Visual in a scared tone “they are checking the the sacs, they must have been tipped off by someone, we should get away before they arrest us too”, I and started running, I didn’t want to be arrested so too.
We hid in a old isolated temple a few miles away, we decided to hide there until the truck left, we went back to the shop after an hour to out is curiosity.
The uncle in the tea shop called us" there you are boys, the poor Sardhar, was searching all over for you, but a policeman who we wanted a lift to town was getting impatient so he left". I felt like an idiot, I turned to look at Vishal, he started running, I started running behind the guy, I wasn’t going to let him get away with ruining the trip this time, but I fell, Vishal saw me fall down, came to help me up, but I pulled him closer and punched him in the face.
We were 30 kilometers away from Bokar, and we had only a 100 rupees note with us, there was no sign of any buses running that way, and we haven’t even eaten since yesterday, we stood there hopeless and in despair.
I looked at my phone I had received 4 missed calls one from my mother, 2 from my college, and 1 from my friend. I called my mother and said I was fine, I didn’t want to alarm her unnecessarily, then called the college people and told them we were on the way and we will get there soon, then I called my friend, I needed someone to whine about Vishal, I told him everything, he shouted over the phone “why are you so stupid” I stammered in surprise, “me but… but… Vishal”, without letting me finish he added “don’t you know I come from Bokar, my house is there I will call my father and ask him to help you, he will pick you up wait ”. I said this sudden surge of serotonin, I was jumping with the phone in my hand “thank you, thank you so much”, he finally said “next time you call me first” and hung up.
Ravi’s father came to our rescue, he picked us up, gave us food, and put us on the train to our college, he also ported the t- shirt bundles to the train, we we’re indefinitely in debt for everything he did to us that day.
When we came back to our college it was 2 am, and it looked even better than we last saw it, with more colorful people and sweet music, everyone was waiting for us in the reception, it felt like we were hero’s again seeing so many people waiting for us in anticipation, they all came towards us, seized the parcel, started looking at the t- shirts to see if they measured up, examined their quality, counted their number, we waited patiently for them ask us about the trip and give us a pat in the back, but a couple of them smiled us and took off, the rest just walked behind them, didn’t even care to give us a second glance.
