The setting sun casts a golden glow, turning the child’s
brown hair a glimmering copper. Shadows on the faintly yellow walls of the
balcony have a life of their own. The view from their balcony on the eleventh
floor is what postcards are made of, that is if people still make postcards.
The mother strains a little to hear the chirping of birds as
they return to their nests. The languid calm of the boats floating on the
gentle waves of the backwaters signal the close of a hot, humid day. The
channel splits into two, one arm snakes away ahead of them and disappears from
view behind a thick cover of mangroves while the other flows along their right,
and curves gently, far away right under a metal bridge.
They hear the train a few seconds before they see it. Both
turn their eyes to the bridge in the distance, and wait to catch a glimpse of a
speeding train – they know not which end of the bridge the train will spring
from. A gentle breeze cools the sweat on their skin, and makes it easy to focus
on the beauty of the scene that lays before them. Swaying coconut trees, birds
diving into the water to catch their morsels, a fiery pink-orange sky and the
silhouettes of boatmen in their crescent-shaped, traditional boats. The faint
sound of a prayer call from a mosque across the island adds another layer of
charm - a touch of human gratitude. The scene is picturesque and soulful.
And then they see it. Loud clattering accompanies the
arrival of the train on the metal bridge. The trusses vibrate, adding to the
din the wheels make as the train speeds towards its destination. The boy and
his mother hear the bellowing horn, and then the fast paced rhythm of a train
on the tracks – chachuk – chachuk – chachuk. It is the fourth or fifth train
since afternoon, and every time the little one had rushed to the balcony to
catch a glimpse of a retreating metal caterpillar. This time it is a train with
a red engine and blue carriages, the dark boxes of the windows move along and
create the illusion of a moving filmstrip. The mother sips her ginger tea, she
prepares it with as much love as she does the chocolate milk for the child.
The boy dips his glucose biscuit into his tumbler and
quickly pulls it out, after hundreds of such biscuits he has mastered the fine
art of having the biscuit soak just enough milk before it turns to a soggy blob
that will plop into his milk. If some biscuit does make its way into the milk,
the boy grimaces, he doesn’t enjoy the altered taste of his beloved chocolate
milk, the biscuit adds a pasty taste that just isn’t right. He takes a bite,
careful not to topple the balance of a moist biscuit lest it fall onto his
shirt. He continues to gaze at the passing train, spying a bit of silver lining
the windows of the deep blue carriages. The curved sides of the bridge look
just like the ones he builds in his game of Lego. His toy train doesn’t have as
many carriages though.
The train chugs off, it only jumps into view for a few
seconds before it disappears into the thick urban landscape. The mother brushes
the hair out of her son’s left eye, pats him on the head and looks across at
the now-empty bridge. There will be one more train soon.
