Travails of Translocation

摘要

During my professional tenure, I had been accustomed to the vissicitudes of a life of continual shifting. My initial posting in railway happened to be as 'relieving' Assistant Station Master. The designation implies that I have to proceed to join a station, where unforeseen casualty arose. Movement orders emanated from our headquarters asking me to join a different station in the administrative segment that comprised on an average 15 to 20 stations. This had been the career hallmark of station masters, who joined the railways in the sixties. Mercifully, translocation had been a trivial matter those days. Most of the 'moving' masters had an inseparable piece of luggage with them: a wooden box euphemistically christened the 'line box'. The masters packed in it for a brief existence (or survival!) the essentials consisted of some edibles, a pair of uniforms and other pieces of equipment.