The Daredevil

Due to some unfinished business at the office, I missed the 17.05 train and had to be content with Patas Purwakarta of 17.26. The train was half an hour late, naturally, and upon its arrival I just knew that there’s no way I was going to get inside the train car. The closest entrance was barricaded with bodies packed so tight that it looked waterproof. Feeling rather adventurous, I scrambled with the rest of the passengers to the locomotive and secured myself a place on the deck, a narrow extended platform about a foot wide on both sides of the locomotive. Riding on the roof was out of the question. I’m a married man with a baby on the way, mind you.

I should have known better. The locomotive had to pull six train car, each weighing 20 tons at the very least, so it was understandable that the locomotive began to rock like Inul’s rear-end, especially when it switched track. Instinctively my grip on the railing above my head tightened and I began cursing my idiocy for climbing on this thing, thinking that it was a safe way to travel.

Soon my head became a playground for morbid thoughts. What if I fell? Surely, at 80 km/h some bones were due to be broken. What if I fell to the other track and got run over by other incoming train, that huge Argobromo-thing? People would collect my mangled carcass with a sack and sent it to Dr. Cipto hospital for autopsy. My pregnant wife would have to identify what was left of my body. Darn! I watched too much Patroli.

But then this guy popped out of nowhere. He wore a dark PT KAI uniform, a haggard face, unkempt hair, and grease mark. One hand gripping the railing and one foot barely stepping on the deck, he held out his free hand to me and said, Ticket!. This was totally unexpected. I could understand if a conductor squeezed through a packed train car to check for tickets, but out here in the running locomotive? You’ve got to be kidding me! I gave him my ticket. He expertly tore it with one hand and gave it back to me. The man next to me was apparently ticket-less and gave the guy 1000 rupiahs. Then he moved on, inching forward and stepping on whatever room the passengers left him as the locomotive was packed with at least twenty passengers on each side.

Apparently he started from the right cabin, worked his way to the front, god knows how he crossed to the left side because there was no deck at the front of the locomotive. All this was going on while the train travelled at a considerable speed and there were no safety net or rope. This guy made Fear Factors looked like kindergarten picnic.

When the guy was gone, the man next to me leaned closer and commented that that guy collected around thirty thousand rupiahs from illegal passengers, on locomotives alone. What do you mean ‘on the locomotive alone’?, I asked. The man nudged behind me. I looked back and was truly amazed. The demented daredevil was collecting ticket, and money, on the roof!