A different kind of welcome

Crazy Chennai rain!

I’m back in Chennai today, after a gap of three weeks, for my “all reals” US Visa interview tomorrow morning. Like last time (when I was here for the biometrics), I took the Vande Bharat to come in here, though unlike last time I’m going back by (tomorrow evening’s) Vande Bharat as well - as I found it hard to sleep in Mail.

I got a little late in leaving home this afternoon, and ended up taking what were possibly the last metro trains I could have taken to catch the Vande Bharat (2:20 pm from South End; 2:36 pm from Majestic - one stop). I timed myself - it took just six minutes to walk from the platform at the KSR Metro station to where my Vande Bharat bogie would come on Platform 7 of the main station.

Anyway, the train was late - it came in at 3:10pm (scheduled 2:50 pm), and this gap only continued to increase as we went towards Chennai. In 2000, my parents and I had been stuck in a supposedly 7 hour train journey that was 10 hours late (due to a derailment near Kuppam), and my father had then told me that Indian Railways policy is that once a train has been delayed, it gets deprioritised in all signalling, and it ends up really really late.

In any case, post Katpadi, the train picked up speed and deposited us at Chennai Central at 7:55, 35 minutes behind schedule.

I have written in the past of getting triggered by having to travel to Chennai. The thing that used to trigger me like crazy was getting out of Central station, be faced with hordes of auto drivers trying to fleece me, and not knowing what to do (especially early in the morning).

In my last visit three weeks ago, I solved this by getting an Uber Premier, with an excellent cab and polite driver who picked me up promptly.

Today, however, it was a very different kind of welcome for me to Chennai. For a city where it hardly rains, it was belting cats and dogs while I got off the train. Thunderbolt and lightning, very very frightening, and all that.

I instinctively tried to book an Uber and walked to the side of the station where Ubers pick up. Given the rain, there was absolutely no luck. Any Uber I would find would be at least 20 minutes away. As you might expect in Chennai, there was standing water (thankfully only a few inches deep, and I was wearing good custom-made leather shoes), and one had to tread rather carefully.

After some 5-10 minutes of unsuccessfully hanging around in the Uber area (only one auto driver accosted me there, and wasn’t interested after I told him where I wanted to go - highly unusual behaviour from a Chennai auto driver), I decided I WANTED the experience that used to usually put me off in Chennai - hordes of auto drivers accosting me trying to fleece me.

The rains had thrown the operations of the station into disarray. Trains kept depositing passengers there. Incoming auto rickshaws also started depositing passengers headed to departing trains. The issue was that given the rain there was no way for the new empty auto rickshaws to match with waiting passengers. And that created crowds. Walking around the station became a pain.

Anyway, when I reached the front of Central, a group of auto drivers dutifully approached me. One offered to take me to my hotel for ₹300, and I sensed a decent deal (Uber had surged to ₹600, and there was no supply). The driver made me quickly follow him to the auto.

In my hurry to follow him, I slipped and fell into a sort of half-split - with my left leg (the one that slipped) stretched out straight in front of me, and my right knee bent and hitting the floor. Maybe if I try, I can do pistol squats after all!

Soon I was in the auto and on the way to the hotel. I quickly got reminded that large parts of Chennai lack storm water drains. The auto driver drove like you would expect an auto driver to. Soon we got caught in a massive traffic jam on Mount Road (the sorts I’d never expected in Chennai). My knee hurt and I had no clue how I had hurt it.

In any case, by 9, I was in my room, and hurriedly ordering room service (at home I have dinner at 6).

It’s funny how some adversity (heavy rains) made me seek out the one thing that I used to absolutely despise about Chennai - having to negotiate with auto drivers in front of Central! I must also mention that after my fall, I kept calm and carried on. Nowadays, a lot of the time, stuff like this really psyches me out.