Kitchdi Post- The Sunday Haul and Other stuff

A Cancelled Trip It would have been a kind of a personal record had last week’s planned trip to Chennai materialized. Unfortunately, the railway reservation wasn’t confirmed dashing my hopes for creating a personal record of making three trips in a single month. Earlier in the month I had been to New Delhi and a day later to Tirupati and a week later I was scheduled to go to Chennai. But things did not work out since I was on a waitlist and my reservation was not confirmed. I waited with hope until the last minute. I was looking forward to the visit to Chennai and after that disappointment I cancelled another trip to Pune later this week. One thing I learnt about the whole experience was that one had to get unused railway ticket cancelled as soon as possible preferably on the same day. It was my mistake not being aware of the rules for getting refunds for railway tickets not used. I had thought that being on Waitlist I would get a refund easily whenever I presented the ticket. But when I went to get my refund I was in for a shock. It seems the rules say I have to present the ticket for cancellation within 12 hours. I went a day later with the result that I had to go to Rail Nilayam in Secunderabad and fill an application form. It seems I have to wait for nearly three weeks to know if I could be considered for a refund. Back to Airtel Six months ago if anyone had asked me what I thought about Airtel I would have told them that I would never, ever go for Airtel even if they paid me to become their subscriber. Exactly in September 201 our office decided to opt for BSNL under the number portability scheme because Airtel wasn’t offering good service. But now just six months later, we are bidding goodbye to BSNL and embracing Airtel again. This, perhaps, is the ultimate irony. Happy with BSNL I voiced my opposition to the plan to return to Airtel but in the government things are different. So now I am back to the routine of running out of the house every time I get a call on my mobile. But this time if I get a message from Airtel that they are charging me for using Airtel radio they are going to listen to some music themselves. The Sunday Haul After a bumper haul of Spenser titles the previous Sunday at Abids, I could pick up only one book this Sunday. At one of the sellers at Chikkadpally I found Bertrand Russell’s ‘The Conquest of Happiness.’ At the end of the brief preface Bertrand Russell’s writes ‘It is in the belief that many people who are unhappy could become happy by well-directed effort that I have written this book.’ No points for guessing why I want to read this book especially since I got the book for free. The seller did not accept money from me as earlier I had given him quite a number of old and not so well known titles that I had with me.