Train Ride to Hell!

March 23, Shanti Bhavan
Well, last night was certainly something to remember… as soon as we found out we couldn’t ride on the sleeper car, we made a mad dash to get our money refunded and purchase tickets on the 3rd class car. Then we hurried to the platform to try to get the best spots for getting on the train first. All of the other people on the platform looked at us in disbelief and asked us why we were riding in the 3rd class compartment. We just laughed and said we had no other option. When the train pulled into the station, we were lined up and waiting. I had all this adrenaline pumping, like I was getting ready for a fight – and a fight it was. By this time there were a few dozen other people waiting behind us and we were shoved and pulled and generally jostled every which way in the feverish rush to get on the train and get seats (seats – ha!). The train was already packed with people and there were eight of us, with our bags and backpacks, trying to stay together and find somewhere to put our bodies. It was mayhem. All of the other passengers were yelling at us, telling us what to do, and of course, we couldn’t understand anyone. There were four and five people squashed together on the bench seats, people lying on the luggage rails lining the sides of the car, and people sitting on the luggage racks above the benches. Someone grabbed my bag and put it under their seat and told me to get up on one of the luggage racks. In my first true act of being an Indian, I shook the guy stretched out on my apparent seat and yelled “Wake up! Move!” He finally obliged and I began to put all of my gymnastics skills to use to climb up onto this metal rack. As I was attempting this feat, all of the people below me started yelling at me to take off my shoes. I did, and someone grabbed them and threw them up onto the cage of the little ceiling fan in the middle of the seats. I helped Molly up beside me and checked around to see how everyone else was doing. They were all performing their own individual circus acts and lodging themselves in places where no person is supposed to go. We were all laughing hysterically at this, the most quintessential of Indian experiences. The rest of the ten hour journey was pretty mind-numbing. We tried our best to get comfortable, not yet possessing the native quality of just being ok with lying on and smooshing into any stranger that happens to be near. I swear, these people have no issues with personal space. Steve was sitting up on a luggage rack next to a guy who had a sleeping stranger’s face shoved into his butt and he didn’t even seem to notice… neither did the sleeping guy. People were stretched out on newspapers on the floor and other passengers getting on and off just stepped over them – or on them – without a second glance. We saw one man sitting on a seat and he had spread some newspaper down on the floor for his wife – how chivalrous. Later on in the trip, he was trying to open the window and couldn’t, and so he woke up his wife to yell at her about it. She opened it right away, of course. By hour six or seven, we had reached the point of delirium. Every time the train stopped, there was a host of vendors walking next to and through the train and their loud droning “Chai, chai, chai,” or “Coff-ay, coffay, coff-ay,” made it impossible to sleep – as if I would have been able to anyway. When I was about to really lose it, I made my way to one of the open doors at the end of the car and someone moved so I could sit on the stairs and get some air. It felt nice to have some non-B.O. infused air blowing on me and the countryside looked very nice in the moonlight. I basically stayed there until we got into Hosur at around 5 a.m. We all tumbled gratefully off of the train and into the car that was waiting at the station to take us back to Shanti Bhavan. We arrived just in time to go teach our morning aerobics class… which we skipped in favor of an hour or two of blissful sleep. It was an experience I hope to never repeat, but looking back on it, I wouldn’t have traded that night for anything. It was pretty fun, and I definitely feel closer to the Indian people now – but not close enough to stick my face in their butts. I have my limits.