Number of words: 114

Air travel was still thirty-five years away and he set sail on a passenger ship. Sea travel was still quite rudimentary. It was well before the time of air-conditioned cabins. Pigs, goats and a very large number of chickens were carried along as fresh food; in fact, the number of chickens on board rendered the vessel more a seaborne coop than a passenger ship. A determined Jamsetji overlooked the stench, the seasickness and the long and arduous journey with single-minded focus: he must reach London to open his office in a country that ruled his motherland.

Excerpted from Pg 12 of Tatas: How a family built a business and a nation by Girish Kuber