27th September, Chennai Central Station. Great Indian Railways. The Train arrives in Chennai perfectly on time - 6.00 am. It never amazes me, the whole Indian Railways thing. Its like a nation in itself, and the stations its cities. As we come onto the Chennai Central platform, a new dawn is breaking in that city. People, ingeneous people still to wake up from their night's sleep, sleeping in proper beds - mattress, bedsheets, pillows, covers, mosquito net hitched up between adjacent station benches. Somewhere people wash up and brush their teeth, somewhere people are getting ready to start their day with boarding the train they must board. And over all the enormous gulf of people, like a steady stream, slow, langurous, moving in one (or predominantly one) direction, weaving, lurching, swinging. As i got on
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