Of Men that laugh and children who cry!

It was a tranquil night. The moon was silently whispering to the barren lands that swished pass by. A lone tree or few bushes,looked on serenely now and then. It was around 10.00 and I was on my way home. Almost all had retired to their berths and when the last light was put out, I had decided to take in the beauty of the countryside in the moonlight, sitting in the dark train. But then, there was this family, to the right of my compartment, with two small kids who found the idea of traveling in a train, a little discomforting. This hunch of mine was confirmed by the kid suffering from wailisirenotopia.( This is a syndrome when the afflicted keeps wailing like a siren every 4 mins and 53 secs.) This one was unique though, coz the wailing was in a different tune each time. And then, there were this group of men to the left of my compartment, who definitely were trying to prove Darwin right, in that we evolved from monkeys. From the time they had boarded the train, they were behaving like a bunch of excited teens out on a trip for the first time. Every 10 mins, it was like a bunch of Narakasuras from Om Namah Shivai had descended on the train, booming at the hapless devi who had fallen victim to them. It was like 10 gorillas roaring in pain (well, it really couldn't be counted in as laughter, you know, so I didn't want the good old hyenas somersaulting in their graves, if I used them as metaphors here)

Now this was not bothering me much, coz staying awake was my idea. I had to get down in an hour or so, and did not want to snore all the way to Trichy, missing my station. Now by around 10.15 or so, this kid with the wailisirenotopia had got into this pretty drab tune, which was certainly not music to the ears. But of course (no sarcasm here) everyone understands how difficult it is to manage kids, and so all patiently waited for the kids to go back to sleep. That was when one of the men from the gorilla gang, wearing his 10-yr old son's shorts, crossed my compartment to the next and kind of gave a look , that was surely meant to be a warning to the parents.

How insensitive could people get! At 10.30, those people never had the sense to pipe down a bit, but the man in shorts had the gall to remind others to quieten down, a kid at that! Appalled, I went back to the barren lands, wondering about the manufacturing defect that Lord Brahma had made while dishing out this particular specimen.

After about 15 mins, the kid had gone to sleep and the whole train was softly sighing in sleep when these men - on a apparently rib-tickling one, went into this ritual of slapping thighs and making sounds that was like 5 old Bajaj scooters + 8 gorillas + 7 Narakkasuras and 11 buffalos on a high!!! The compartment almost jerked, when some 60 (remember a sleeper has 72 berths and a good 8 were occupied by these ppl, one by me, and 3 were unoccupied yet - I'm good at my math, you see :P )people were jostled from their sleep. The ones sleeping in the middle and lower berths banged their heads on the top of their berths, when they were woken up with a start! And our child with the wailisirenotopia, poor thing, also seemed to find a new tune to kick off now!! :(

Now, I decided something had to be done. But what? Hmm... yeah.. there was one thing. But, I had my own doubts. What if they went into another of these thigh-slapping, and guffawing rituals, if I did that?? I couldn't even imagine me being the cause for another of those!!! :O

But well, given that I take approximately some 53.9 seconds to make up my mind, before these thoughts could even play out in my mind, I was already on the way to their cabin. (Remember it was dark everywhere except in their cabin)I went and stood at the entrance of their cabin, and gave them all a bewildered look. I looked at each of those specimens for a good length of time,especially the one in his 10-yr old's shorts, all the time not letting go of the blank expression. There was silence. The guffawing gorillas now closely resembled dumb buffalos basking in the sun, open mouthed. I returned back to my seat, with such of sense of satisfaction, I had never felt before. That had done the trick. Within seconds, the lights went out, and the train went back to it's sleeping mode. I had not actually expected such a quick response, so to say, I was actually scared, if they would start off on another laughing spree, seeing my dumb look. Phew! :D :D Luckily the child also seemed to get tired of wailing, and had quietened down.

The tranquility returned and I went back to the moonlight barren lands, and in all that silence, barely missed snoring all the way to Trichy!

Note: I know the title is grammatically wrong. But it is intentional, which I hope you understand better after reading this post. :)