Train journeys are nearly always interesting. Much more interesting than a flight where everyone carries a mundane expression. You come across many peculiar characters. Some can make your journey pleasant while others can make it almost unbearable. I am listing here a few characters which I have come across quite often and I find them very irritating.
1) People travelling with kids: A well behaved child is no nuisance. Neither is a mischievous kid who entertains you with his antics. The trouble is with babies who have a knack of crying after midnight. Or with kids who behave like "hooligans". But the worst is kids who litter the whole compartment.
My advice: Book upper berths and always carry earphones. Music is more soothing than a child's crying.
2) "Papa Poirot" or The "All-Knowing" uncle: As the name suggests this particular breed of uncles knows everything from engineering to medicine, from law to commerce, from politics to cricket. He will ask more questions than a job recruiter. He would have done everything better "in his time". The perennial misanthrope!! He will keep pointing out the wrongs in your generation until you are so bored you will simply agree with everything just to shut him up.
My advice: Ignore them from the start.
3) "Anu Aunty": For those who are unfamiliar with the name I strongly recommend you to read "How I braved Anu Aunty and co-founded a million dollar company".
My advice: Yet to figure out how to dodge them. So if anyone has an idea please leave a comment.
4) The "VIP" uncle: He is not an MP or an MLA. He is the one with most VIP suitcases. In addition to all the suitcases he will be carrying an enormous food packet and will keep eating from it after every few minutes.
5) The damsel with the phone: Let me share one of my experiences. While travelling from Bangalore to Chennai on Shatabdi Express I was very pleased to find myself seated next to a very beautiful girl. She was talking to someone on phone. I decided to wait for her to disconnect and started thinking what would be the best way to start a conversation. Since she did not end the conversation soon, I took out a novel and started reading. Trust me it is very difficult to read a novel when someone seated next to you is arguing with someone on phone. Unfortunately I did not have my earphones on that occasion and had to suffer throughout the 6 hour journey, What still puzzles me is which service provider was she using that gave her uninterrupted service for 6 hours.
There are many other menaces you may come across on a train journey. I cannot list a few here because it may offend some but the above 5 are the most common ones I guess.
