Dear Dr K,
What is your favourite thing about going on long train journeys? My favourite thing is sleeping, since I feel like the train’s rocking motion gives me very comforting sleep. What is your least favourite thing about long train journeys? My least favourite thing is probably being bored when I’m not asleep and having to use the small stinky toilets.
Pott T
Dear Pott,
I don’t normally respond to questions from people who are only enquiring about my personal preferences in some matter, choosing instead to devote my time and mental resources to those who seek my unprofessional opinion on some highly serious matter. However, I decided to respond to your question since I sensed a certain seriousness and sincerity in your asking, and besides, I felt an immediate bond with you when you said that your preferred activity on trains was sleeping. This is my favourite activity on train journeys, followed closely by consuming the variety of drinks and snacks sold by vendors on the train and on the stations, namely ‘idlivadabreakfaast’, ‘coffeecoffeenescoffee’, ‘breadomblait’, ‘cutlait’, and samosa.
I often find myself quite disappointed when I reach my destination as I can no longer continue to enjoy the comforts of being rocked to sleep and having various delicious fried snacks, and therefore try to take journeys as long as I can possibly fit into my schedule. The downside of this is that eventually, after all this eating and sleeping, I find that I have to use the toilet — and as you said, the toilets on trains are not very large or particularly nice-smelling. After all, there are several people using these toilets, and no one to clean them for long stretches. I agree that using these toilets is perhaps the least pleasant part of the train experience. But at least there are toilets — imagine having to hold all your business until you get down at your stop, that would be a disaster. It’s a good thing then, that the compartments on all Indian trains have holes in the bottom for letting people empty their bowels and bladders onto the tracks below.
This always leads me to wonder – if the train toilets are stinky, how stinky are the tracks, since they are constantly receiving the business of so many millions of passengers on a daily basis? The tracks are, of course, laid out over several thousands of kilometres, but all that bodily waste will certainly pile up and get very stinky over a period of time. A lot of these tracks pass near human habitation, so either a lot of people are tolerating the stench of railway tracks near their homes or the tracks are magically absorbing all that waste, or there is someone tasked with the job of cleaning the tracks and transporting that waste to somewhere it can be safely disposed of. The last possibility strikes me as the most absurd — can you imagine having the job of shovelling and transporting the waste of millions of passengers? It would be quite a degrading job and a rather inefficient way for the Indian Railways to manage the problem.
This is where I am quite stumped. If you can find out for me what actually happens to our waste once we have sent it down the mysterious holes of train toilets, I would be very grateful indeed.
Yours questionably,
Dr K