It may have been located right in the centre of bustling activity, but, to their credit, the employees at the post office had not let this minor detail hamper their pace of work. A pace that would make the proverbial tortoise seem like someone fit with jet speed.

I went up to the window marked Speed Post and tried to make eye contact with the man there. A daunting task. For five minutes, he simply refused to look up. To exercise the vocal chords was the only alternative left to cajole/convince/confuse the gentleman into being kind enough to take note of the envelope I had been waving at him in vain all this while. The response then was a mere flick of the hand sideways to indicate that I needed to go to the other window and so what if the words Speed Post are painted atop this one. Yours is apparently not to question why, yours is just to make another try.

I moved to the adjacent window only to discover that there was no one there. Ten more minutes of tapping the finger on the sill, coughing apologetically, looking at the wrist watch. Finally a sour looking lady walked up, cast a disdainful look at me and took the envelope from my aching hands. A swish over to the scales and she handed the subject of her fleeting attention back with a curt ``Twenty rupee stamps''. So would she please give the stamps? Kidding, are you? This is the Post Office, not a shop under one roof departmental store. A slight bent of the head and you don't need to be told what's it-the next window of course.

Window number three and naturally no one's there either! It was three o'clock cash-handing-over-time, so I must wait till. Work? Of course, there's everything official about this one.

Fifteen more minutes later my humble twenty rupees are exchanged for those all important stamps. I pasted the sacred pieces with care and tried to hand it. The envelope had probably developed a major inferiority complex by now, to the man, who told me. ``Speed Post is there at the other end. Can't you read?''

Back to the gentleman now deeply involved in the intricacies of studying his finger nails. His fascinating research interrupted by my crude words `Speed Post, please' he simply did what he did before tilt his head to the next window. Ten more excruciating minutes tick by as the address is copied on the receipt by the lady-next-door.

Encouraged by the fact that the post office is actually occupied with living human beings, I became bold enough to ask, ``This will reach tomorrow won't it?' The camaraderie that had just begun to be formed was broken instantly. ``We will send it from here to Mumbai today. Then it is the responsibility of that Post Office to ensure it reaches on time,'' replied Madame Affronted yet again, as she tossed back the receipt. Catch it or leave it.

You beat a hasty retreat the only thing involving speed till now. Another Speed Post to be sent to Mumbai? No, thanks. I'll take the Deccan Queen instead. Faster, simpler and less prone to reducing your self-esteem to nought.