Lasting ties: Journey time is bonding time

The year was 1999. It was a sunny morning in October and Sriparna Banerjee, an employee of the central government?s Ground Water Board in Calcutta, boarded a train to Delhi, from where she would travel by bus to the Valley of Flowers. She was on a ?package tour? to Mussoorie and while she was looking forward to spending her Durga Puja vacation there, the unmarried 40-something was feeling a little lonely, as she sat by the open window, flicking through a glossy. ?I was wishing I had some family to share my holiday with, as most people do,? she says. ?But I don?t have any siblings and my parents are too old to go on arduous treks to the mountains.? So, resigned to her fate, Banerjee buried her face in her magazine, while groups of people sharing the compartment with her chattered amongst themselves.

Interestingly, when she returned to Calcutta barely three weeks later, she had acquired what she calls today, ?the family that I always wanted?. After spending days in close proximity with others on the tour, all of whom were strangers when the trip began, they became, according to Banerjee, ?like one, big happy family as the trip progressed. We had our meals together, many of us slept in the same room and we even squabbled about petty things like who was going to bathe first?.

Packaged tours, organised by different travel agencies, in which individuals and families, unknown to each other, travel together, are all the rage now since they make travelling accessible and affordable. And like Banerjee, many people who embark on these schemes find that they often develop bonds with their travel companions, even forming lasting relationships.

Says Soumitra Kundu, executive officer of Kundu Special, the travel group which organised Banerjee?s trip, ?When the families arrive for the trip, say at the designated train station, bus stop or airport, they are complete strangers. At the end of the journey, they are hugging, crying, exchanging phone numbers and promising to keep in touch.? In fact, according to Kundu, ?There have even been marriages between people who met while travelling in our group tours.?

?It?s natural that a sense of camaraderie should develop between people travelling together,? explains Dibyojyoti Basu, Director, Tetris Worldcom Ltd, which is the content provider for such travel programmes as Chalo Jai, a reality series broadcast on Bengali television channel, Akash Bangla. ?All of them, first of all, are away from home, coming in contact with unfamiliar places and environments,? Basu points out. ?In such cases, people travelling together tend to want to stick together. They provide each other support and solidarity as they face adventurous situations together.?

Stories abound of how individuals have formed friendships as close as family. Debika Mukherjee, a housewife who lost her husband and only child in February this year and now lives in Taalpukur in Barrackpore with her mother, went on a package tour with Chalo Jai to escape loneliness. ?What I didn?t expect was that I would find the love I craved from fellow travellers,? she says. When she went on her first tour with the travel group to Darjeeling in May this year, she was touched by how much attention little children paid to her, when they learnt about the death of her child. ?No, they were not my own children, but being with them helped me get over the pain of losing my own child.?

Rajasree Chakravorty ? who now refers to Mukherjee as her sister ? and her husband Tapas Chakravorty, both employees of Eastern Railways, who first went with Chalo Jai to Gadiara two years ago, have become so close to the families which travelled with them, that now they plan all their trips together. ?If one person wants to drop out, everyone creates a big fuss,? says Tapas Chakravorty. ??How can we go without you?? they say?. In fact, when the Chakravorties decided that they would not go along with the group which was going on a tour of Kashmir for 15 days on October 29 with Chalo Jai, they were flooded with phone calls refusing to accept their decision. ?Even though we aren?t related by blood,? laughs Rajasree Chakravorty, as she packs her suitcases at her residence in Suvam Apartment on Calcutta?s VIP Road, ?we certainly feel like we are.?

But the virtual family feeling is not limited to camaraderie alone. It extends to the way members squabble and quarrel, too. ?Often, a member of one family will crib about how we gave someone else a hotel room with a better view,? says S.R. Gupta, office superintendent, Kundu Special. ?But none of it is very serious. Because soon, the same two families could be seen laughing and sharing jokes, sitting at the same table at the hotel restaurant.?

?Yes, there are fights,? confirms Sriparna Banerjee. ?In the group I went with, there was one woman (no, she will not name her), who took a long time in the shower, while the rest of us waited. It was inconvenient and all of us would tell her so. But we still make sure she goes with us on all our trips because it just wouldn?t be the same without her. You can?t leave your sister out just because she takes too long in the bathroom, can you?? she asks.