About half-way through my second night in a row of shivering through my sleep, I awaken in a drowsy fog with the sudden realization: I must go South. I've been in Mcleodganj for about a month, during which time I've seen beautiful, eighty-degree days and incredible thunderstorms that covered the ground in marble-sized hail. This weather will pass, I think assuredly, but for now I'll go somewhere warm.
I can't help but think to myself, as I pack my small bag and prepare to leave, that this trip is the definition of self-indulgence: a wanderlust trip in the middle of the ultimate wanderlust trip? What has India done to me?
For the last few nights I've been sharing my beautiful mountain-view porch with the wandering English teacher, Mark, who took to my bumpkin habit of watching the moon rise over the mountains as if it was the most natural pastime imaginable. In these hours, we shared stories of travel and adventure that made the crave being on the road, the feeling of moving through space and time by train, plane, and automobile.
So when Mark finally swung his backpack over his shoulder and continued on, I was ready to leave. I looked down at his chair, now empty as though he had been a figment of my imagination, and swung my own bag over my back.
The trip down to Delhi from the mountains is only possible by bus or car, so I stopped at one of these many Adventure/Travel Stores (specializing in mountain climbing, horseback riding, and all of your travel needs), and bought a ticket for the next bus down the mountain. This would be a Volvo Bus, the mountaineer assured me, a deluxe AC bus running from 6pm to 6am. A good night's sleep.
As I wait at the bus stop, a local bus whizzes by, revealing in a flash of white letters the phrase “O God Save Me” with an outline image of Shiva above. Thinking of the hairpin turns, the steep ledges, and the awkward boxiness of the bus, I internally repeat the phrase to myself.
Something's wrong. There's no bus to Delhi anywhere near, and it's about time to go. I run back to the Adventure/Travel store, and the mountaineer takes me down the hill a bit to a parking garage with several buses and two old-fashioned, white SUVs. It seems as though there weren't enough passengers to justify using a bus (just twenty of us), so the company has decided to fill up these two SUVs with the 20 passengers. “O God Save Me.”
There are fringes danging from the ceiling of the car and a dome-light that beams bright blue when its turned on. Somehow, nine people (later, ten) with luggage precariously tied to the top (my small bag sitting securely below my feet) manage to fit into this car. In the front, a hippie French couple (for, as Mark says, there's always a French couple), who smoke like chimneys. In the backseat, I share the small space with three other people: two young Tibetan men who appear to be athletes, and a Tibetan teenage girl, who clandestinely cries upon parting with her friends and family. In the “trunk” space are two more Tibetans: a monk and a large, warrior-like tattooed man, who are later joined by a petite American woman hoping to escape the confines of the too-crowded second car.
We dash through the night, tassels swaying from the ceiling, bodies getting somewhat inured to the extreme squeeze. The driver plays loud (and rather out of date) Hindi music, the volume of which continues to increase through the night as he grows more and more tired. Every two hours or so, he stops for a thirty minute break. We ride huddled like the dozen hamsters piled into the tiny plastic house at the pet store; during these breaks, when the bodies are removed from close proximity I feel oddly cold and alone. But eventually we pile back in and continue on.
Sometime in mid-morning, we arrive in Delhi, a few hours behind schedule from the driver's many breaks. He pulls over at one of those tarp-and-garbage slums and begins to pull the luggage off the roof of the car. Last stop? Only stop? I wonder. It seems so. I groggily step out and hail an auto rick. Train station, please.
The vultures are out. They call to me, grab at me, trying to get me to come with them, although to where I do not know. I stop in a travel agency to find the price of trains, where a greasy man tries to sell me a ticket for approximately eight times the cost. His subordinate, a white-haired man with a limp, follows me as I head off in a huff to the station and through it (although he's a rather easy person to lose). On the sidewalk, I stumble a bit when my legs tell me to give pause: there is a man lying on the ground, completely covered with flies and covered with almost no remaining rags. Is he dead? I wonder, looking around at the others, who don't seem to recognize his existence. Should I do something?
I keep moving so that I can lose Limpy behind me, but when I look back I see the corpse has lifted his head and shoulders, zombie-like, dazed. I don't know whether to be relieved or not.
Foreigner Ticket Bureau, upstairs. I enter a room filled with Western backpackers, bohemian travelers of every type, fill out a form and stand in line, trying to politely ward off an aggressive come-on from a soft-spoken Nigerian while one of the curly-blond bohemians repeatedly flashes us from her tank top (accidentally?).
It becomes very evident that the Indian government is not happy about these free-spirited roamers traveling throughout the country. Quotas have been placed on every train, ensuring that only a very few foreigners can ride while the rest spend their money on more expensive means of transport. After many rejections, I manage to find tickets, and move down onto the platform for the train to Gaya.
I'm not sure who are more intent on eating me alive, the flies or the other passengers. As I sit, I'm bitten dozens of times through the holes in the bench (I later find a patch of my bum with no less than two-dozen bites in a 6”x6” square). It's been some time since I was living in Chandigarh, so I'm no longer used to being stared at for no apparent reason. I quickly remember what it's like.
It's mostly men, for only rarely do I see Indian woman about in public, and when they are present they are usually preoccupied with a task or guarded by an escort. The two or three women near me on the platform open their eyes wide, but it ends after only a few (maybe ten) minutes. The men however... the men. Some simply stand in front of me and stare, no disguise. Others are more clever, pretending to be facing the other direction and discreetly looking at me when I turn my head. They don't seem to notice each other, however, in this large semi-circle of three to ten men all surrounding me, pretending to be sly. The face I learned from taking the New York Subway everyday (you know the face), is dissuasion enough for many of them. Others, I have to actually stare at, raising my eyebrow, grimacing, or rolling my eyes, until they walk away, embarrassed that they've been found out. With a little bit of work, I shake away most of them and ignore the rest.
I try not to watch as dozens of people step onto the rails to urinate or defecate. The toilet here costs three rupees, but the rail is free, so they jump down onto the rails, amongst the garbage, rats, and other people's feces, for relief. Some simply hang off the side of the platform to go. A man comes to the drinking fountain next to me and proceeds to wash his beard in it. People are lining up to watch the “Weight and Horoscope” machine light up and sing, then dole out little cardboard cards for those who have paid it two rupees. A man nearby picks his ear with a pen. A woman yells at her children, who have grown anxious for play. Women in worn saris and men in simple shirts still stained with the colors of the Holi celebration walk along the platform, enticing the waiting passengers to pay for a shoe shine, a new pair of socks, a handkerchief, a cup of chai, a slice of coconut. Flies cover everything dark. The train comes.
It's another 16 hours to Gaya, so the train is an overnighter, lined with bunk beds. Seat 52, upper berth. Although inconvenient, upper berth is the way to go: it provides protection from thieves and gropers. My bag makes a nice pillow, and I safely tuck away in my nest. I'm lucky enough to have gotten third class for this trip (vveery classy!) and my berth has a curtain. I hide myself from the prying eyes of the seven Indian men with whom I'm sharing this cabin and enjoy a Indian Railways meal (I hate to admit that I love road food). I stop a chaiwalla who looks as though he's carrying a trash can and hand him my dinner garbage. He makes a motion for me to throw the garbage out the window, as my fellow passengers have done. I pause, wanting to ask him something like "why do you hate your country so much?" But all it takes is a moment's glance at him, at his tired face, worn clothes, at the way the passengers treat him, and I already know the answer.
Train rocking gently through the Indian countryside, I sleep. Crane 93 adorns my berth, traveling through space and time for who knows how long.
I relish in the freedom of my small bag, my railways tickets, and my wandering heart.
Two hours after we're scheduled to arrive, I open my eyes from a doze. The first thing I see is a Tibetan Ani (nun) looking at me from the next cabin. “Bodhgaya,” she says knowingly while she folds her blanket, although I have never seen her before.
The sun rises over Gaya as I step out into the light. 36-hours of traveling. Stop one of my two-thousand mile journey across India: Bodhgaya, the home of the Bodhi tree, site of the Buddha's Enlightenment. No onen said pilgrimage was supposed to be easy.
Bodhgaya.
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| The Main Temple, Bodhgaya |
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