After a weeklong trip to Goa, it was time for us to pack our bags and return to our city. On our return journey, due to some reason, we had to arrive at the Madgaon railway station about 2-3 hours early.
I wondered, ‘What would we do for 2-3 hours at the station?’
Thanks to Google Baba. We did some research and found that there’s an executive lounge at the station. We decided that we’d spend our waiting time in the lounge.
It was the first time for us to stay in the lounge. We were not able to find out whether we had to book our seats in advance or if we could book on the spot.
We decided – we’ll go to the station and see what happens and take our decision accordingly.
We arrived at the railway station. As we were tourists, we did some photography and clicked some selfies outside the Madgaon railway station with the station in the background.
Next, we checked the lounge from outside. It had solid glass walls and we were able to see the inside of the lounge. It was quite impressive. There were already many passengers sitting on the various sofas.
As it was around five in the evening, we decided to have tea at a restaurant on the platform before we checked into the lounge.
We took a right on the platform connected to the entrance and walked to a restaurant pulling our luggage trolly along. To our surprise, we saw the big cutout of ‘I Love Goa’ on the platform.
Nowadays we can find such cutouts in many tourist and public places. Even many apartment societies have such cutouts with the red-coloured heart symbol instead of the word love.
We were happy to see the cut-out because when we arrived a week before, it was early morning and still dark. We didn’t know where the board was. But what we knew was it had to be on some platform. Before boarding the train for Goa, I had searched photos of Madgaon station on Google, and I could see a few pictures of passengers posing against it.
Now it was right in front of us. My wife and I never leave any opportunity to click a selfie wherever we go. We grabbed the opportunity and clicked pictures against the ‘I Love Goa’ background till the time we were satisfied.
Once we had enough selfies clicked and stored in our smartphone we sat at the restaurant on the platform to have tea and samosa. I tried to delay our entry into the lounge so that we could save some money by eating slowly and enjoying the view. But couldn’t extend the time for long as the sun had set and it was starting to get dark. The other concern was – what if the lounge gets full and we don’t get a seat?
Finally, we entered the executive lounge at the entrance of the station and registered two seats for ourselves.
To book your seats, you will have to give your name, mobile number and your train’s PNR number. They accept UPI payments too. You can scan the QR code and make the payment.
Now, there are certain points to keep in mind concerning the booking of the seats:
You will be given seats on a first come first serve basis as per the availability of sofas.
Each sofa seat is numbered and you will be allocated the seat number. You have to sit there only.
Single seating cushion sofas with package (velvet cover) are expensive – 100 plus 18% GST per two hours per person.
Premium single large comfortable sofa is also 100/- + 18% GST. That’s 118/- per person per hour. The difference is in timing (1 hour and 2 hours).
You get to use free wifi with the above. You can ask at the reception counter and they will provide you with the wifi password. In addition, you get to use the charging point for charging your smartphone and other devices.
Single seating cushion sofa (Normal Rexene sofa) is 59/- per person including GST. So it’s 50/- plus GST for 2 hours. The sofa size is also a bit small.
Here you will not get to use the facilities mentioned above. These things come with a premium price.
Please refer to the picture for other seating charges.
Towards the end of the room, there are open iron racks for the passengers to keep their luggage. Once we had booked our seats, we kept our luggage on the racks.
The enclosed area is fully air-conditioned plus they have fans. This makes the interior ambience cool and pleasant.
The lounge has a washroom exclusively for the waiting passengers in the lounge. The washroom is neat clean and well maintained. You have separate washrooms for men and women even though the entrance is common.
If you and your family don’t want to book a seat in the lounge but still want to use the washroom you can request it at the reception and maybe they may allow it. But I’m not sure if it’s free or they will charge some money for the same.
The lounge also has a gift gallery with a few collections that you can buy if you want.
In addition, you have a magazine stand filled with magazines and newspapers to pick up and read to pass your waiting time. This is a complementary service for all who have booked their seats.
Plus, you have a television broadcasting a news channel muted. So, you can watch the news but can’t listen to what they are saying. Instead of the news channel audio, the ambience is filled with soft music.
There’s also a display on the wall that regularly updates the train details that are expected to arrive and depart.
There’s a small cafe counter and a kitchen inside that offers tea, coffee, pastries, ice cream and other beverages for the passengers waiting in the lounge. As the area is enclosed, it is filled with the aroma of coffee coming from the coffee machine.
Outside food is not allowed to be brought into the lounge. So you will have to buy food from the counter in the lounge or go out and have your meal and return.
Once you take your seat take out some time to read the instructions displayed on the board facing the seat. It reads:
* Please be soft-spoken
* Please use headphones
* Please maintain good etiquette
* Please keep your phone on vibration or on silent
But rarely did anybody read the displayed instructions. Unaware, a few passengers watch reels keeping the sound at full volume. Someone has to tell the staff to request the passenger to either lower the volume or use headphones. These are some travel etiquette we must learn and follow whenever we are travelling.
If we are given some exclusive facilities we need to use them responsibly keeping in mind not to disturb the people around us.
When it comes to food, ordering dinner or lunch inside is not a good idea. At least for us, it was not such a good idea. The food is expensive. The minimum is veg – Maggi for Rs. 150/-.
We had ordered vegetable Maggi and I was shocked to see the quantity of vegetables in it. It was like literally searching for vegetables in Vegetable Maggi. At least they could have added more vegetables.
That was also not cooked properly. It was too spicy and watery. Come to think of it, a trained chef can’t make a simple dish like Maggi and almost every Indian bachelor is an expert at cooking.
The veg-fried rice that we ordered was too dry and the rice was a bit uncooked. They didn’t offer sauce. We had to ask for it. Schezwan chutney was chargeable so we said – ‘No, thank you.’
If you make a stop at the lounge and find the food good then maybe over time they must have improved on the dishes that they offer.
What I feel is that if they don’t have the resources, they should remove the dinner items and stick to refreshments or a bit heavy snacks with beverages. Or, if they want to keep it then they should reduce the price. Because passengers here are waiting for their train and they don’t want to have expensive dishes here. They just want some decent food to satisfy their hunger.
The passengers also have an option to go out to eat and come back to their seats. But those who don’t want to go should be provided decent tasty food that is reasonably priced.
When it comes to getting food from outside, I think I can understand why they don’t allow outside food here. Then there will be a mess all around the seating area. There will be hygiene issues too and may disturb other passengers. The sofas will also get damaged because of food and may attract ants. It’s a good move on their part.
Another thing is that there is only one dining table in the lounge with six chairs. So, at one time only 6 passengers can have food.
Other than the food, when it comes to seating comfort you get what you pay for. We thoroughly enjoyed our time and the ambience sitting there.
You may ask – what if the train is running late and I have to extend my wait at the lounge, then what do I do?
We faced the same issue. Don’t worry. The staff has you covered.
This is what happens – About 15-20 minutes before the staff at the entrance counter will inform you that your time will be up soon and will ask you if you would like to extend your stay. If yes, then you pay the additional amount as per the tariff and your stay time is automatically updated and extended.
Overall it’s a wonderful facility offered to the passengers traveling by train. Hope the railways extend this facility to many more railway stations.
Have you had the opportunity to stay in such executive lounges? If yes, which was the station and what was your experience? Do share it in the comments so that the readers can get a clear idea and make an informed decision.
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