iDNiGHT

I always crave for something new, something unique, something that makes sense or sometimes not at all. iDNiGHT was one of those somethings. It’s administered by a company called iDTGV which is independent from SNCF, the French leg of the Eurail operations. iDTGV operates two kinds of train with three different ambiences, or so they call it. One of such trains is called iDTGV and the other is iDNiGHT.  iDTGV is similar to the conventional TGV in terms of the speed which touches almost 300kmph. I travelled by iDNiGHT, the third ambience designed by iDTGV. It’s an overnight train operating between cities separated by at least 600-700km like Paris-Nice, Paris-Marseille, Paris-Toulouse, etc. It’s a double deck train operating at an approximate speed of 100-150kmph. I travelled by iDNiGHT from Paris to Nice on a Saturday, luckily. It has a disco cum bar cum lounge on board. Two compartments are dedicated for that. One for the bar & disco and other for a lounge for people who like to have a quite time with their drinks and if they are lucky enough, with their partners. It took 10hrs for the train to reach Nice and I must say it was one of my most memorable train journeys ever.

After spending an hour or two at my seat, I decided to check out the disco/bar on board. I went with one of my friends. We were actually 8people travelling together, but a majority of them were pretty content dozing off in their seats. I have seen discos and bars before but none of them compared to the one on board. The way the train rocked when running at full speed was what made the experience different from conventional discos. I sat at one corner of the compartment where I could see the whole place from. Soon, it was swarmed by people, drinking and dancing. I, not being too much of a dancing and drinking type, was quite content being the cameraman for the occasion. I had my handy cam on me and was recording the whole thing. It was a lot of fun and I guess the handy cam somehow excited the people. They were all cheering and waving at it. For a short while, I too danced a bit.

I observed a lot of people on board that night. I hardly had anything else to do. Sleep was a luxury for people who had a bed instead of a non-reclining seat to crash into. There were a couple of Moroccan girls at the disco. They were call centre employees and were on their way to Marseille. One of them was very outgoing and I guess she danced all the way to Marseille without a break.  The other one was a little shy and spent most of her time cheering her friend on. There was also this other girl who did her best to blurt out all the English she had ever learnt to ask me where I was headed to. Later I found out that she was the bartender. I figured that out when she promptly threw my friend’s beer into the dustbin. Drinks not bought in the bar weren’t allowed, she said, with a smile on her face. But apart from that she was very friendly. I should have guessed she was the bartender from her costume and warned my friend but whatever.....he was in too jolly a mood to care about a 50cent beer.

There was also this lady, who must have been around 40, having a good time on board. She was another person who I guess didn’t bother to check out her actual seat even once during the entire night. One girl I remember most vividly was the one who probably spent the least time in the disco. She was with her boyfriend who was kind of having a hard time convincing her to dance. She was a little shy and was like really cuteJ...... (I hope her boyfriend’s eyes don’t get anywhere near this blog).....

The train reached Marseille at around 5am and it rolled further along the Mediterranean Sea passing cities like Cannes, St Raphael and finally arrived at Nice at around 9am, our destination....it was just 12hours before we took the same train back to Paris on sunday night....

Paris

I hadn’t been outside Rouen since I came to France 4months back. .......and so the two day trip to Paris and Nice was a very welcome break from the monotony of Rouen.....my trip begun with an hour long journey from Rouen to Paris St Lazare........it might seem funny but since the day I saw DDLJ, one of Shahrukh’s most memorable films, I always wanted to see Europe, to travel by Eurail and probably even meet my cinneritaJ.....lol.....so here I was travelling in Eurail to the city of lights....it’s hard to explain how excited I felt....I felt like a little kid being taken to the circus for the first time in his life......I cldnt stop staring outside the window, I cldnt stop remembering all the days I spent dreaming that one day I’ll be zipping across Europe in Eurail, I cldnt stop remembering DDLJ....

An hour later we arrived at Paris St Lazare station and the image of Paris I had in my mind cldn’t be farther from the one right in front of my eyes. Paris is sometimes called the most romantic city in the world......they say famous painters and poets flocked to Paris in the past.....well it might have been true centuries back but talking about the present, I am pretty sure those painters would rather go to New Delhi than come to Paris. I was in Paris for just one day, but that one day was enough to make me realize that Paris is not part of MY Europe.

The most important part of any city is not its monuments, museums or the public transport, it’s the trust and helpfulness you see in people’s eyes and manners that really matters. In the metro I saw a young couple sitting by the door with the women sitting just beside the door with a handbag on her lap.....she had both her hands on it.....and as if that wasn’t enough, I saw her boyfriend/husband whatever covering both her hands and the bag with his hands too......he was scared somebody might steal the bag.....he saw everybody coming in and out of the metro with eyes full of suspicion and distrust.....I am sure they had their bag stolen before....you could easily guess that if you looked at the man’s eyes long enough......

And then in another metro station, there was this man with his family who was trying to take his bulky luggage across the narrow entry points in Parisian Subways...he was finding it very difficult...I was standing just behind him and I took a step forward to help him out with it.....but as soon as he saw me take a step towards his bag, he suddenly turned towards me and put his hands on his luggage as if I was trying to steal his bag......finally he managed to take his bag across.....and then I too went across and he gave me a good hard look, as if trying to decide whether his instinct that I was a thief was right or not....I hope to god that he chose the later......not for my sake......but for the sake of any remaining trust that might be left in the city......

I saw the Eiffel tower, Notre dame and a few other places in Paris.......they were beautiful.....but none of them could make up for the treasures the city had lost on the way to modernization.....today Paris is the most populous city in Europe.....and I guess it has lost a lot on the way of becoming one.....

I came back to Rouen two days later........with the calmness in the faces of people, beautiful little houses perched on the mountains, little children playing in the mostly empty metro......Rouen accentuated everything Paris had lost and it hadn’t....later in the day when I was crossing the road, I saw a car coming towards me and I waited for it to pass by....the lady driving the car stopped it and gently waved her hand asking me to cross....she had a smile on her face....I never loved the city more......and that day I realized I had already seen the best of Europe right here in Rouen......and I cldnt stop humming ‘Tujhe Dekha to ye jana sanam’......