The burning ambition

I had a burning ambition. The thought of it had been eating into me for quite a while now. Finally I achieved it.

What could this ambition be, you naturally wonder. Let me not keep you in the dark for longer than is necessary. Simply put, it was to travel in those cool new Volvo buses on Bangalore roads. Ah, I can hear you say, "What a lame 'burning ambition'". No comments.

I had had no occasion to use these buses before. We use company transport, and I very rarely use buses to commute elsewhere within Bangalore. But each time I saw those gleaming red buses with electronic route display, those wide doors and huge scrubbed windows, those plush blue seats and the yellow handrails and the sophisticated grey interiors, my eyeballs would follow the bus until it turned a corner.

I finally got to travel in one this week. I left office early, and took one of these volvo buses (which have an additional advantage that they stop right at the office gate). As the doors softly slid apart, I entered the cool interiors, and selected a nice window seat. The polite and smiling conductor issued me a ticket with that ticket-vending machine they hang around their necks. The volvo noiselessly made its way through the clean and green streets of Electronic city. With the soft strains of a song from the radio, sitting in the cool comfort of the bus, gazing out at the glass buildings on either side of the road, it was like being cocooned in a different world altogether.

The bus is, naturally, well-equipped and high-tech. A rear-view screen for the driver. A microphone, into which the driver talks to his passengers and announces bus stops. Well, you know, the works.

It was interesting to watch first-time passengers. A family of four got in. The youngest girl was extremely delighted. She was giggling and jumping around, thoroughly excited to be on this bus. Her older sister was as excited, but she tried very hard to maintain her dignity. But ever so often, her face creased into a smile and she let out a joyous laugh, and then looked up shyly at her mother. The mother, supposedly busy telling her younger daughter to keep quiet and sit down, couldn't get the expression of awe off her face. There was suppressed thrill in each action. And then, of course, the father. Exulting in the reactions of his family, his face was a picture of pride and importance as he peeled off notes from his wallet and paid the conductor.

The conductor, ever smiling, stood near the door, and at each stop, as passengers got in, he appraised them coolly. If he suspected that a passenger was getting in without being aware of the high fares of the bus, he would lean close, and ask, "Yellige, sir?" [Where to, sir?] When the passenger told the conductor his intended destination, the conductor would lean even closer, and softly mouth what was obviously the bus fare. Then a shocked look would come over the passenger's face, and he would back off, and stumble out of the bus, while the bus driver waited patiently. It was uncanny, the way the conductor homed in correctly on what he thought was a passenger who couldn't afford to pay his way in the Volvo. It was somehow saddening too. Yes, I know that it is a special bus, and there are many more ordinary buses along the way, yet, it is depressing that the majority cannot enjoy the comfort of the Volvo. Anyway, let me not dwell upon that.

It wasn't that I haven't been in such buses before. It is just that I hadn't been in such buses in India. And they look even more gleaming and inviting in contrast to the other vehicles. Like a shiny new coin in a bunch of old coins. All a matter of perception, huh? Anyway, I finally did get to travel in the BMTC Volvo, and I enjoyed the comfortable ride. More so, because I had at last achieved my "burning ambition". Again, no comments.