Thank you German.

It was the year 1980 and I had taken up a job with a multinational in Pune (then called Poona). After living in Bombay (now called Mumbai) for a couple of years and finding it fascinating as culturally it didn't belong to the rest of the country in those days. As aptly named Financial Capital of the country in those days Bombay was more like any western country where business meant business unlike the rest of the country where business meant "chalta hai", closely resembled Singapore as that in one place that was similar to where Bombay was just 15 years back and it was moving ahead and had matched any developed country in the world. Just to give you an idea of prosperity and the monetary progress of the city, the city provided 1/3rd of the taxes to the exchequer. Bombay was fast catching that progress Singapore had gone through. The ethos of the place was no nonsense, professional, committed, non interfering, unassuming. Anyone who was coming to the city was mesmerised by these characteristics and unless s/he wanted to be complete dud fell in love with the place. It offered a life that no other Indian city, then, offered. It was a land of opportunity, where if you had skills and luck helped you had a chance to make a meaningful life... even if not, you still made a life and a living in the city that was so supportive to everyone and embraced people with open arms.

Well, Pune was quite different from Bombay in the late seventies. It was a regional, parochial and not a metropolitan city. Unlike Bombay where people spoke different languages and had a mix of cultural not just from different parts of the country but also internationally too. Many were vocal in comparing it to NYC and I will completely agree with them. Living in Bombay I managed to learn the local languages both Marathi and Gujarati only to the extent to communicate with people who didn't understand either Hindi or English, but there were few such people in Bombay. I had also to accelerate my basic language skills in both these languages as majority of people there didn't understand that with the surname like JOSHI I am neither. A vast majority of locals who were either Marathi or Gujarati whom I used deal either personally or professionally would insist that I didn't know who I was and perhaps, forgotten my roots being away from Maharashtra. Well, in Pune this problem hit me 100 times more, no one will speak to me in the languages I was comfortable with with this notion, even in the office of the multinational that was at a project stage and most people around were locals barring a few who came largely from Bombay. In just about six months or less with this "pressure" to communicate with people, I learn fairly good amount of Marathi to not feel embarrassed. But this story is of the time before that stage.

One of the few international institutes besides multinationals like Philips, Atlas Copco, Widia Tools, Sandvik, Alfa Laval, Ingersoll Rand etc. in Pune was "Goethe Institut" Max Muller Bhavan on the Boat Club Road, as the name suggest there was a boat club in vicinity and the institute was on the banks of Mula Mutha river. This was the headquarter of this German language teaching institute in the country and the only one that ran advanced German courses, leading to equivalent to Masters in German and further specialised courses like teaching German. One of my friends Nitin had done his basic courses in German in Bombay and was aspiring to learn more so although he had a professional degree in naval architecture and was working as one he decides to take short time off to compare a course there around the same time I came to Pune. I only had a handful of friends either from my college days who were working in Pune and some introduced to me by a colleague and a friend from Bombay. He decide that I should stay with his college friends on Prabhat Road ( a posh locality mainly habitat by artists and literary people of repute) till I find my own accommodation in the city. Eventually, in a couple of weeks Nitin helped me in securing me a PG accommodation with Khandelwals who lived in the apartment block of the other side of the river Mula Mutha. But that's another long story I will talk about some other time

After being in Pune just for a week or two, I was to visit Bombay office and so I went to Pune Railway station to catch an evening train... I presume. it was the prestigious Deccan Express one of the two glorified connecting Pune to Bombay, the even more prestigious and faster train was Deccan Queen, that would only run from Pune in the morning and return in the evening. I reached station15 minutes before the departure time and weather being pleasant in October, was strolling on the platform while I waited. Suddenly, I noticed two people, just about my age, speaking a language that was alien to me. I started listening with some attention and putting two and two together I went and asked are they conversing in German. Both looked little uncomfortable with the intrusion and with a smile together said, yes why? I said no I just thought so since it appeared foreign and there is an institute of language here where I have a friend. The obvious question was "who".. again both said together, Nitin was my answer. They both knew Nitin since he was doing the same course like them he was also from Bombay. बस फिर क्या था!! By then the train came and we decided to sit together. 3 1/2 hours just went in air and we felt we didn't say anything more than exchanging pleasantries. 

The two gentleman were Chetan and Sujeet who became friends for life and we shared a whole world together and are still sharing.. not just that it opened a whole new world to me and their other linguist friends and friends' friends became my close coterie of friends with whom I spend and share my time and life regularly.

I still remember that journey that was so fulfilling for my life. I have seen people making friends in train journeys who are largely forgotten once you say goodbye at the arriving platform but this 3 1/2hour journey was indeed different.

Pic courtesy punekar.com.