The air hostess of the Indian Airline early morning flight from New Delhi to Mumbai stood with her hands folded at the exit gate , the customary Indian way of welcoming and saying goodbye. The dull look on her face reflected very clearly her eagerness to finish with the drill of saying sayonara ,and when ,I asks Thank You , she gave me a look as I was an alien from some planet. Used to seeing off harassed and still half asleep Company and Government official getting of the early morning flight who had no time for such niceties , she must have found my saying Thank You an aberration . I nonetheless gave a wide grin and stepped down the ladder towards the waiting bus, carrying along with me , a blue cotton satchel slung on my shoulder and a parcel contains laptop for Capt NS Ghoshal , DGM operation, tucked under my arm . The parcel belonged to my boss and therefore it was as valuable as my satchel. I had collected it from Great Eastern Shipping guest house at Chankya Puri Delhi. The satchel contained my Navy retired officer identity card, passport,CDC, GMDSS and certificates of all the STCW 95 courses. My wife had never liked the blue cotton satchel A Jhola as she put it. She firmly believed that carrying the Jhola that to slung on my shoulder was demeaning for a Master with GESCO. Shameful ,she would say at the very sight of the satchel slung on my shoulder. I carried the Jhola nevertheless , for , I saw nothing wrong I. It. With the satchel slung on my shoulder I felt assured that all the important documents I was carrying would never be lost. I do sometimes think , that,having seen me in smart and sparkling white naval uniform until my voluntary premature retirement from the Indian Navy ,how would she react if she ever sees me in cover all and a hRd hat ,my daily wear as a captain on board offshore support vessels. I can however visualise her reaction which would be not very different fro that of my Maali , who politely returned a orange colour GESCO cover all given to him saying that his basti children follow him hooting Hanuman Hanuman when they see him come out of his home wearing the cover all. I did see a point in the children analogy .......(...to be continued.)
Posted on: Sun, 06 Apr 2014 07:28:54 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015