Ellora bound

Dear Sam,

The Mangala-Lakshadweep Express crawled up north along the Malabar coast the last 24 hours. Right now we are crossing Mumbai and I'm having one last glimpse of the gorgeous Kankan hills and listening to (believe it or not) White Christmas by Bing Crosbi. I again had a crazy idea of getting down at Thivim when I found out we would cross Madgaon, Thivim and Pernem. I really really had an urge to do that because Arambol is only a couple of hours away from Thivim. But luckily, the train crossed Goa in the dark when I was fast asleep without giving me any chance of being spontaneous :-P. So I'm heading to Aurangabad and I'l have to draw the Ellora caves with my paintbrushes. No Ajanta, coz no time!

Before getting into the train, I thought of buying the tickets from Ahmedabad to Amritsar (Kapil already booked the night coach from Aurangabad to Ahmedabad for me). You know how heavily these trains are booked. The thought of a train ticket can cost a great deal of mental peace you know! The guy in the inquiry counter told me there are seats available in tourist quota. First I have to take a sleeper class from Ahmedabad to New Delhi and then AC chair from New Delhi to Amritsar. This was THE best connection given the fact that I'm in a tight schedule and would love to journey by night and travel by day.

So, what do I do? I go to the counter next to the inquiry and ask for the two tickets and pay 1105 rs. Then head cheerfully to platform no. 1. My train leaves in 10 minutes. Made everything in time :-).

I found my lowerberth (SL9) in a very empty S5 compartment; took a look at my two newly bought tickets and ironically enough, I had to appreciate my mottoes "Trust no one" - Fox Mulder and "Constant vigilance" - Mad-eye Moody, once again in my life. There was no seat printed on the tickets. They said RLWL 265 and WL 153. That Raiway bi*** did not give me Foreign Tourist tickets. I paid fudging 1105 rs to be put into the waiting list. I mean WHO on earth would BUY or SELL a ticket with a 265th waiting list??? Now I'l have to pay some extra bucks ONLY AT Ahmedabad to get a confirmed ticket. That Rail way bi*** should be fed to Aragog's sons and daughters -.-. It's been one whole day that I've been trying to cool down. I'm still not over it.

The Indian Railway hast the most number of employees (almost one and a half million) in the whole world. Apparently not so apt with the computerized system and only one of such employee is good enough to rob you off your peace. Just because of these 2 useless tickets, I'm traveling with only 600 rs right now. First thing in Aurangabad: find a Western Union.

This is my 3rd time in sleeper class. The first time was to Goa with Jules in March and the second time was on the 4th towards Kanyakumari. Both journeys were nice and pleasant. But this time, traveling up north by sleeper!!! NEVER do that! Okay, may be once, just for the experience. But it's worse than your worst nightmare -.-. The word "chaotic" is not enough to describe the entropy here; it's just too high! Mothers beating their kids, pulling them by the ear or even hair. Bummers begging desperately as if they were in some sort of competition... who can display his/her misery the best (or the worst?) way. And even the local folks getting into the train are way rude. I witnessed how a nice-well-off looking man uprooted the kid sleeping beside me using really harsh words to the mother and made place for his daughter (or may be wife) and her 2 kids. He even demanded that I show him my ticket. I think he was wishing to get rid of me too. I just said, "Are you the TC?" We, he wasn't traveling. It was just his daughter or may be wife with her 2 kids and that woman is in no way of the pleasant kind either. We neither of the families had any confirm tickets. But you can always pay 200 rs to get a confirmed ticket on board (and you have to be a bit lucky too). Apparently, just from the look of it, the previous family can't afford that and the assholic one can.

Die Leute sind einfach so aufdringlich hier. Ja, die draengen sich in Indien ueberall auf. But in a north bound sleeper? I wouldn't even wish that to my enemy. And you'll just have to live with that pungent stink of Indian pee. Period.

But I'll have to tell you once again. At a certain point, none of these matters any more. Indifferenec. Meh. And then you look around and laugh at the silly things that are quite usual for Indians. Like buying FOUR cups of Chai out of the window at stations when the train is about to leave and the racing of the Cha-walah holding the window bars till he gets paid! India is incredible.

<3 - TZ

12.05.13