The Five Golden rules of local train travel in Mumbai

1) For a crash course / practice on how to board any local train and to deal with any volume / type of passengers, the easiest way is to travel the Central/ Harbour line route from Dadar to Mankhurd. A week's travel on this route is enough to make any train traveller a seasoned practitioner in the art of catching a train.

2) Thou shall not dare to board a train while passengers are still getting down:- Unless you want to risk the choicest of abuses and a few kicks and blows, never try the former mentioned.

3) Boarding a fast train to Virar and trying to get down at Borivali is a sin:- When they exist seperate fast trains to Borivali, trying to board a Virar fast will register you instant dislike in the eyes of many a fellow traveller. In fact, they may flat refuse to give you way. unless you have fellow brethren from your state whom you can plead to in your mother tongue , do not attempt the same.

4) Fixing a schedule: After travelling for about a month or so , a pattern begins to emerge among your train journeys as you automatically figure which train best suits your timings in terms of various criteria of schedules, crowd , time taken etc.. Sticking to the schedule makes most sense as it lends a certain amount of familiarity amongst your motions.

5) Battle of the sexes: While it may seem that travelling with a platonic friend makes perfect sense , in a train it does not. sheer volumes of passengers with destroy the platonic friendship between you as you discover far more about your friends that you would want to know. this is especially true of second class where intimate positions are generated that would put the kamasutra to shame. The ladies compartment was made for a reason and for those reasons it is best to travel seperately. for lovers, well its just another excuse to hug.. :)