Of bad days, and even worse

Today was the final day in the PSC&RB course or rather the Proficiency in Safety Craft & Rescue Boat course. It's quite an interesting course in that you got to know about the handling and launching of life saving appliances on the ship. But these 2 guys lecturing at the course? No........ how can you have fun! The class has to be made as boring as possible and so they will drone on and on and on and every doubt will be countered with "Rules are framed by SOLAS! How can you challenge authority!" Sheesh! All said and done, I'm finally out of T.S. Rehaman and boy does it feel good to be out of there! Freedom seems to have attained a new meaning..
So, we're leaving from this place ... 5 of us. 2 of us from Goa, one from Thane and 2 others from Ludhiana. We finally get this 'extended' rickshaw, i don't know what you call it... it's this rickshaw with increased seating capacity. He picks up other people and we're off to this designated place. Mid-way through the journey he tells us he's bringing us to this other junction where the buses start from and we will get it empty so as to facilitate easier transport of our luggage (which i must admit was quite a bit). We refused as we wanted to go to the original place. Finally he stops at this new place which he suggested and tells us the bus is ahead. Now the place we wanted to go to was further ahead so we refused to give the pre-decided fare unless he took us there. We gave him a reduced fare (which was quite a bit) for taking us to this location. He refuses and turns the rick around (we had already disembarked). He suddenly comes at us yelling and wanting the entire fare. The co-passenger sitting with him up front insists we pay the entire fare. A minor scuffle ensues after a few minutes of finger pointing and verbal abuses. In the ensuing melee, which 3 of us were trying to defuse, the co-passenger get's a 'minor tap' on his face from a hand which was deflected by someone. He actually turns around picks up a rock and comes at us. Or rather at me considering that I was standing in front of him. I couldn't even believe this guy would want to do something incomprehensibly stupid as that considering that there were 5 of us and there were just 2 of them. If we had to let it go into a full blown fight, those 2 didn't stand a chance. Asked him to drop it. Best part was the paan-walla who was shouting at us to go somewhere else coz this whole incident unfolded in front of his shop! Better sense prevailed and we told him to take the money and get lost. The guy from Thane vehemently objects to this but we insisted. One reason being that we were 'their' home ground. Any trouble which would get the cops would be to their advantage. And all this for an additional Rs. 5 per head... forget it. Heard of too many scuffles between the locals and the outsiders involving cops with proved detrimental for the outsiders. We're done with our courses. We're leaving. We're outta there!
Got the train after taking a bus to the wrong stop and getting a taxi to the right station (Confusion reigns supreme!).
Met this guy in the train... Mukesh. Graphic designer, DTP editing for Times Of India rather now for the Economic Times. Exchanged info on each other's professions. He was quite interested in knowing about the sea life (who wouldn't like hearing about it the first time? new lands, travel, cultures...).
Finally got to the guesthouse. Can't wait to get back to the room. How inviting seems a bed at the end of such a day!