Speechless!

"Miles passed without a word."

I stopped reading further at this point in John Grisham's The Confession (page 182, 10th line from bottom).

Reverend Keith Scheroeder is at the wheels and murderer Travis Boyette is seated next to him as they dash towards Dallas, Texas to save an innocent man from capital punishment.

Two passengers travelling with a deadline in sight. One a priest and the other: murderer.

I stopped proceeding further because I could not help correlating to my own experience a few weeks ago while trucking 2800 kilometre from Chennai to Gurgaon with Umesh Rana (driver) and Pinto Sau (assistant) for company over 8 days.

Considering the fact that we use to drive for close to 20 hours daily, spending time in the 8 x 5 ft cabin was a task. Added to this crisis are two more issues: one, my HIndi was no where close to their Jharkhand version. Secondly, lack of common topics to talk about.

There used to interminably long hours of silence en route.

Day one was not a challenge as I managed to wangle as much personal information out of them as possible.

Somehow, I was able to break ice with this twentyish driver-assistant duo as early as possible.

Conversational comfort began to emerge from Day two. Umesh was the spokesperson for the two, due to his seniority. Except broaching his sex life, I made Umesh spell out everything else.

Not that I did not want to discuss sex with him. But what stopped me was his initial remark on Day One (actually "first night" of our travel) that I reminded him of his father!

I was floored and felt ashamed to talk 'sex' with him.

Umesh was a quiet guy. He responded only when asked specific questions.

They never watched movies. So any talk about Bollywood was ruled out. They never smoked or drank. So no question of such interesting topics.

Most of our talks used to centre around the life of a truck driver.

I used to wonder how can he be driving non stop, silently for hours together.

Even between the two, the conversation could have been tough. Pinto was a rookie and an able assistant to Umesh. PUt it differently, Umesh was boss to Pinto.

Occasionally, they used to speak in a strange dialect which I later learnt to be "Jharkhandi".

Irrepsective of who was driving, I used to occupy the front seat watching the vast expanse in front. For a short while between 2 and 4, i quietly moved to lower berth for a short nap to avoid harsh November sun as we were passing through Karnataka and Maharashtra.

How much one can talk, anyhow! Silence was the only way out.

Am sure they also must have felt what to share with an old man like me.

Surprisingly, not a single day passes since I returned home without a call from Umesh.

Thank you, Umesh!

One day, Pinto casually remarked that people of my age in his hometown sit on the charpoy and smoke hookah. Don't hop onto a car carrier weighing 22 tones and travel 2800 km like a madcap.

That's me, Pinto.

Can't help it.

Just before entering Gurgaon final stop, Pinto asked: "Sirji, will you do this again?"

He was, am sure, disappointed with my "Yes" response.

Maybe a trip to Jammu in Feb/March is very on the cards.

Or a trip on car-carrying ship to China from Chennai.

Why not?