It is the month of June in Rameshwaram, a small coastal town in southern Tamil Nadu. The monsoon should have set in but there is no sign of it yet. The sun seems to be in full power, draining the last bit of energy from the already weary travelers. Me and my brother are on the last leg of our train hopping tour of South India. And on this hot and humid afternoon we were waiting for another train to Madurai.
After what felt like a lifetime of wait, spent watching a cricket match on Jio’s internet in the General Waiting Room, the train slowly made its way to the platform. The sight of it brings me some relief. I didn’t fancy being stuck up on this island. We quickly jump in and find a side berth of single seats, just to avoid requests of “Tambi konjam anda pakka navuru”(Make some space for us). The horde of devout pilgrims(apparently that is what Rameshwaram is famous for, a temple which we skipped altogether) start to fill the train’s compartment. Pretty evident of Tamil Nadu’s demographics, most of them are old men and women. Few all the way from the north India. Each trying to establish their supremacy over the lower berths just like they do with their language. 😉
It is a symphony of cacophony. A baby starts crying, the mother starts singing a lullaby and the co-passengers chime in with their skills to put the baby to rest. Meanwhile, somebody starts playing Ilaiyaraaja’s Tendral Vanthu on his mobile phone. The volume just about right to wake up every child in Rameshwaram. A tea seller comes in with shouts of “tea-kaapi”. The old uncle next to me stops him with “tambi evalo?” Hot tea on a hot afternoon, you might ask, but that’s how we roll.🤷🏽♂️ Amidst all this, my brother has summoned his superpowers of falling asleep anywhere and anytime, and is already in a deep slumber. I open up my book — The Way of Kings, to teleport myself out of this hullabaloo.
The train finally begins the journey towards the Pambam bridge and onwards to Madurai. The Pambam Bridge is the longest sea bridge in India, connecting Rameshwaram to Indian mainland. As the slow-passenger train chugs along, I notice a bunch of Catholic churches some old and abandoned and some new under construction. The Christian missionaries are still going strong by the looks of it. With the train picking up speed the noise slowly begins to die down. The synchronised clatter of the train took over.
Then comes the Pambam Bridge right on time for us to catch the sunset over the sea. It makes a majestic view, the sea, the sun, the huge rocks that seem to be doing their best to rise over the waves and the ruins of a former bridge all enhance the beauty of the views. But, I am lost on a different journey. The one where Kaladin is standing over the Shattered Plains overlooking a far more majestic and stunning sunset, something reality can never ever match. I need the symphony of cacophony to start over again to snap me back to reality.
