The Shatabdi Express: female over 45 years quota

As I plan my adventure next week  to  the  TED  conference in Mysore, India, I’ve perhaps foolishly rejected the offer to be shuttled in hermetically sealed comfort from Bangalore to Mysore with the rest of the conference crowd, in favour of the fabulous and fast Shabatdi Express (well, so I am told by a very good source).   Navigating the online ticketing of  India Rail I have discovered  a wonderful world of  Indian bureaucracy with classes and castes and multiple categories of discount and quotas. Passing by the option to claim the ‘circus artist, upper class’ or even the ‘artist, lower class’ or the wonderful concessions for doctors of any class… I stumbled on the right class for me - the ‘female over 45 years’ quota.  What a wonderful concept – that once we start to age we get protected and treated as special.

If we only had this on Melbourne trams, we could claim a seat from sturdy 25 year old boys with flat shoes while we wearily weave our way home on our try-too-hard high heels lugging our laptops for the second shift after dinner (sorry – did you whisper ‘work-life balance’ – what was that ?).  We could claim our sex and seniority with pride.  I’m looking forward to travelling alone in India in my newfound class. It’s going to be very very different to the first time.  I first travelled through India as a penny-less 17 year old with trailing blonde hair, very little underwear (or shoes), and a wardrobe of floating granny frocks and sarongs.  And wondered why all the ‘eve-teasing’ (the lovely Indian euphemism for ‘groping and leering’).  Naive ?  Should not have been let out of the nursery without my nanny !   But we take risks, we survive, we learn.  And now I have a class of my very own. I feel special. More news from Mysore soon.

Advertisement