On the four-hour bus ride today, there sat an obnoxious man in the seat behind me for most of the journey. For an irritatingly large part of the ride, he bellowed into his cellphone, speaking to one “client” after another. The man claimed to be the “director” of a “crushing” company – stone crushing I gathered – that was the “market leader”. It’s a different matter that several people he called could not identify who he was.

Apart from the fact that he used sugar-coated “Hellojis” for one category of people – and even invited himself for elusive lunches and dinners – and snapped at his “MBA” employee for not making enough calls, he got on my nerves simply because of his utter disregard for fellow travellers.

He was not the only one to talk one the cellphone. The woman next to me did. The guy across the aisle did. They were almost inaudible. The fellow behind me amply made up for everyone else.

Yes, I should have turned around and asked him – Mr Nagesh, as he repeated for the nth time – to pipe down.

The man, I must say, is not an exception either. And it’s not the ambient noise that makes the likes of him holler into their cellphones. For the lack of a better excuse, I think it’s just the way they are: they think the people around them are not worth considering.

And it is up to us to remind them once in a while that they are wrong.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have grandparents.

I have, of course, had grandparents. But I was too young to know them well... or well enough. And they weren't around for too long. There was, however, no dirth of great-aunts and great-uncles in our extended family. Interactions with them - on occasions when that rather large extended family got together - were limited to "Oh look! How you've grown!", accompanied by immediate concern over my scrawny self. On my part there were, usually, embarrassed mumblings and a close scrutiny of my toes as they wriggled uneasily.

But among those many great-aunts and great-uncles there were some who were genuinely loveable and others greatly avoidable.

My last grandparent passed away when I was 11. So I can safely say that I did most of my growing-up without one. And there were times when I felt that having one of the loveable great-aunts as a grand-parent would be rather fun. I even envied (a tad bit) the cousins who had these loveable great-aunts as their own grandparent.

As growing-up (the physical part, i.e) drew to an end and I hurtled into college life, I heard of several grandparents from my friends. Marriages being pushed onto their plates, careers being vetoed, clothes being sneered at... And then, sometimes, I thanked my stars that I didn't have a grand parent like their's.

Now, I almost surprise myself by missing my grandparents sometimes - not all of them though. I think it would have been rather nice to have them around. Perhaps because I have learnt a little more about them, perhaps because I know I am old enough to have my way when I know it's right, perhaps because I think it would be fun to exchange notes with a wisened, old soul once in a while.

I wish a couple of them had not left as soon as they did.