OPINION

Having just got back after a two weeks business trip to Paris, here are some of my rants against its public transportation system, especially the metro. I reached CDG on a Sunday evening. I went to the RER-B kiosk (Metro to the city), to discover the metro don’t run at that time. Did I hear it right? Metros don’t run on Sundays in Paris, at least on this airport line. There were some boards displayed that informed me that I needed to take “Roissybus”, presumably the name of a bus company, to the city. I needed to get the ticket first and I didn’t find any counter for this Roissybus. I then went to an information desk and they said the RER-B metro ticket would also work on the bus. At the RER-B counter, I chose the option “From CDG to Anywhere in Paris City” and got the ticket for 10.5 Euros. I then walked to the Roissybus stop. A bus came to Opera and I tried to validate the ticket. The machine won't accept my ticket! I was flabbergasted. After all, 10.5 Euros isn’t cheap. If RER-B...

Last week during my journey back from New Delhi to Bathinda in my favorite “Punjab Mail” I was eavesdropping conversation between a family and one lonely traveler.   The family want to exchange a seat of theirs, which is 5 compartments away, with this person so that they can all sit together. The lonely traveler is ready to help out, but with a condition that he don’t mind any berths other than Upper or Side Upper or Side Lower . Seat number the family want to exchange is “42” and they have no clue which berth this is. All were totally clueless to my utter surprise! I had been routinely confronted with this birth allocation problem, especially when tickets in “RAC” gets confirmed while checking the “PNR status”. I could help them out almost instantaneously (which is middle berth!) with a very simple solution. This is the berth allocation for Seat # 1 to #8 1 L 5 M 2 M 6 U 3 U 7 SL 4 L 0 SU Whatever your seat numb...

Everyone in India knows it, experienced it, that the western toilets in trains are virtually useless. Western toilets are for "dry" type, to be used with tissue papers; while a vast majority of Indians prefer water over tissue . Indian/Asian toilets are built for just that; to clean with water. Western toilets with washlet are on rise in Punjab  (you turn a knob to spray water underneath, a miniature version of TOTO ); it works fine as well. But all western toilets comes with a big catch; it obviously not good for public toilets comparing with Asian toilets; know why? Contact Transfer! Skin contact is the "silk route" for microbes to transmit contagious diseases and avoiding surfaces that are exposed to skin contact is the best practice for public hygiene- the very reason why infra-red based automatic water faucets were invented. Coming to Indian Railways- world's biggest open toilet , everyone knows toilets are dirty and emanates ammonia stink such tha...