Kolkata

After a fun trip through the heart of India I landed at the Howrah Station in Kolkata.

Forgot to mention...i got see very little scenary of the heart of India since the window panes were thick as anything to control the AC! But its basiaclly all the same...a lot of green palm and coconut trees, huts, naked kids and men and women going about daily work- like farming, etc...

The train pulls into the station about 3 hours late. As soon as the train stops, coolies jump on to collect bags. In my compartment, they let me go first. The coolie pulls out my suitcase and carries my art piece out and I follow. Its a hot day and the bright sun hurts my eyes when I step out onto the platform. The guys in my compartment had suggested I set the price for carrying my stuff before heading out of the station. I figure I have the advantage of knowing the language and will be able to bargain well. The guy doesn't speak bengali! They all speak a different dialect!! Ok, but i get the numbers--they pretty much sound the same in any language in Northern India. The guy says Rs.150, I scoff and look at him like he has gone mad and start looking around for a another coolie. I sugest Rs. 60, he goes on and on and I let him. He says Rs. 100. I say no, there are plenty of coolies around, let go of my things and i will find another--I am speaking in broken hindi and bengali. If he will do Rs. 70 then we have a deal. We agree on Rs. 80. Still high in my opinion but I started to feel bad. Its a heavy suitcase and stairs are involved! The coolie hoists the suitcase on his head and another coolie helps him get the painting on top. I decide to carry my own bagpack and off we went. Its a trip. The platform is full of passengers and coolies carrying bags and hawkers and armed security men. I think there were army supplies on the train. We quite literally weaved through the human traffic, ducking in some places to avoid having heads lopped off by a trunk or other cargo! We walked a good 5 mins then we came to the stairs. The coolie didn't skip a beat and climbed the staris up wihout a problem. I had instructed him to take me straight to the pre-paid taxi stand. Every big station has a pre-paid taxi stand. We came onto a collosoal terminal. Its about Grand Central station size. People were sleeping on top of bags or on the floor (pesuamaly waiting for trains) and others eating their breakfast. Chai wallas going around. Its was chaos. I followed my coolie to the gates that led outside. I had never been to Kolkata and was looking forward to seeing a lil bit of it on the 40 min transit to the airport. As I am about walk out the gate, a lackadisical gate keeper asks for ticket. I ignore and keep walking, which forces him to get up and come after me. He wanted my train ticket stub. I hand it over. Then he stops me and asks whats in package. I look at him like he is stupid or drunk.

"suitcase-y?" (in the suitcase?)
"Na, oop poery ki?" (what's on top?) i look at him, then the coolie, then the frame. Is this man for real?
"chobi." (photo) damn, these people are nosy! If its something that will get me in trouble, will I volunteer that information?? He lets me go after i give him a dirty look.

I have to mention that I was wearing J Crew Khaki pants, black long sleeved fitted t-shirt with wedge heels. I looked ferengi (foreginer-european) except that I was brown. As we left the gates, we were immeditaely surrounded by taxi drivers wanting to take me to my desired destination. From every side, and they spoke in broken english since I walked through them like I didn't see or hear them--and probably they way i was dressed. Some of them tried to force my ccoolie to go to their taxi but my coolie was good and he responded with, "I will go where Madam instructed me to go. Get out of my way". (The Madam part stung---usually I should be called Didi (sister) but being addressed as Madam aged me!)

The coolie takes me to the pre-paid taxi stand...I can't even see the counter cause there is such a huge crowd! But, coolie again, calls ahead, "let Madam through" (he is speaking in Hindi, btw) and the crowd parts like the Red Sea. I go to the counter and ask for a taxi to the airport. They charge an exorbinant fee, i pay it, and they hand me a slip ( I am the only female in this crowd. All other females are standing somewhere in the back as some male member or etc. gets the slip). Immidiately, I get hounded about what's my taxi # and if they can help (very aware of the groping that takes place and cheap feels they want to get). The coolie again comes out and asks me for the taxi #. I stare at the slip. Its in english and hindi but I have no clue where the Taxi # is located. I push it in front of the coolie..but he can't read. So, one of the hounders takes a hold and announces the taxi #. The coolie starts calling it out and walks into the parking lot. I finally look at the parking lot. I wish i was a photographer. Its was a sea of yellow ambassors! I didn't even realize Ambassodors still existed. I felt like it was a scene out of the 1920s! The driver for my Taxi # yells out to the coolie and we follow him into the middle of the hive. I am cautious cause my driver looks a little bit of the angry, hot headed sort. He was shouting to a another driver half the way. So, we get to the car and the coolie unloads. I end up giving him Rs.100 cause that was a lot of work and Rs. 100 is nothing to me but a lot to him. I climb into the back seat. Damn friggin cool! I can't describe, you just have to see the indside of a dilipadted old amabassdor!

The driver starts to pull out of the lot and the car next to him does as well. it barely scratches our taxi. Thats it! The driver is off his rockers! He starts yelling and screaming, jumps out of the car and starts puling the other driver out of the car by his collar. The driver is screaming and fighting back. Other taxi drivers stop and try to stop the fight. I look away and sigh. Nothing I can do. i debate whether to leave, but what about my baggage? He will probably break my painting if I go to the counter and ask for another driver. As i am looking out, 3 women walk by looking pretty scared and nervous. They could have been my aunts. I am not scared, just really irritated. Finally, the driver gets in. I don't say anything, just stare out the window as he pulls out of the humongous Howrah station. It pulls out onto road and i look back...its basically 1.5 times the size of 30th Street station in Philly and there is 2 of them. The old station and the new station.

The taxi drives through a market place. Its full of hawkers selling breakfast foods. I am so very tempted to stop the driver so I can pick up the yummy looking street foods, then i debate, i really don't want to chance getting sick. I look the other way. The foot path is crowded with hand bags and luggage. I suppose appropriate, being across the street from the station.

We go through a tiny underpass and i am greeted with delightful sight of men squatting along the open drains having their morning piss n'shit fest. Very little is left to the imagination! I ask the driver how long it will take and he informs me it'll take 45mins if no traffic. Of course, he asks, where I am going. Upon emabrking on a journey to South Asia, leave the idea of privacy at your western doorstep! After little chit chat, I sit back to take in the sights. Greeted with large bus stops and larger billboards adverting modile phone deals and milk. I look on pensively as a small mother with her tiny child and a tall lanky man try to cross the very busy street. The city is not much different from my native Dhaka. Dusty, busy, hawkers and rickshaws (the bicycle ones). A difference is--rickshaws in Kolkata have a square top but ones in Dhaka are rounded. Odd.

It looked like we beat the morning rush hour traffic. It wasn't much of waiting around in stand still traffic. I watched as men (presumably street kids or homeless) bathe at bathing station around the temples. Again, no privacy. I watch as a young man in his chudis (underwear) stands next to my taxi and soaps himself all over before jumping in with the other men under the running faucet. Temples were holding morning pujas so, ringing bells were heard throughout. Laughter of school children walking in groups were mixed in with hawkers calling out their fares...mostly vegetables. I looked up and wires ran criss cross all over, some hanging dangerously above the passerbys on the streets. People were just going about their daily routine business. It just looked like a very crowded busy city. We started driving through a nicer part of town...cause I noticed an HSBC bank---that wouldn't be located in a ghetto! The city started to look less crowded and brighter--the newness of buildings recently built, fresh coats of paint and the thinning crowd of hawkers on the footpaths. Before Iknew it, we had pulled into the airport.

Howrah Express to Kolkata

I really wish I had a digi cam so I could upload photos. Truth is- I haven’t taken much pictures at all on this trip. But regardless, it would have been nice to upload a few images. My darling friend, the talented aspiring photographer, is now posted in Thailand through her job. She has created a blog and will post her pics up on it. If you love photography and want to know about her adventures in Thailand, check out: shonc.blogspot.com. I will be joining her soon =)

I left Bangalore on Mon, Jan 15 at 7:30pm on the Howrah Express train to Kolkata. The Indian railway system really needs it own "Dummies" book! You cannot just walk into a station and expect to leave with a ticket. You have to either put in a booking or a reservation. Confirmation is not guaranteed. Its complicated…I don’t quite get it yet myself. Anyway, I went Sunday at 1PM to the Yeshyampur station to get tix in to AC sleeper class. At the counter the guy tells me that I will #6 on a waiting list for Mondays train. I quickly tell him its an emergency and I have to catch a flight in Kolkata on Wed afternoon. So, the he puts me on a Tatkal waiting list and that puts me at # 2 on a 3 tier AC sleeper class. Tatkal means—I learned later—an emergency. Each train has a particular # of berths reserved for emergencies. On Monday at 2pm my ticket was confirmed. If it didn’t get confirmed, I would have to go back and cancel my ticket for Rs. 20 and re-book or get 80% refund. Luckily, I didn’t have to worry about all that. Why am I taking a 40 hr train instead of a 1 hr flight to Kolkata? It’s the curse of a limited budget and no constraints on my time. A flight was going to cost me Rs. 6,000 (~$135) and the train cost me Rs. 1,700 (~$40). I had no appointments to keep and traveling through Madhya Pradesh and Orissa on the train seemed like a fun idea. It was also AC and a sleeper car, so it should be pretty comfortable as long as I am not stuck with a crying baby next to me!

Dada helped me pack my bags…I couldn’t fit all my random purchases into my small suitcase so I had a total of 4 items to carry. My over packed suitcase, over packed back pack, 3X2 ft wooden art piece and a handbag of access stuff. So much for being a bohemian traveler!! We get to the station and ladies and gentelmen, we were packed like sardines! There is no separate baggae car, everything you have goes in your compartment and you share that compartment with 5 other folks. I ofcourse have the most # of bags. By the time we had gotten there, all the space under the berths were filled to capacity with small suitcases. Dada decided that I deserved to have my space and pulled out two bags from under the space that was designated to me and Nishu stuffed my suitcase is somehow. The bagpack, art and access bag all shared my seat on the berth. Cozy, very cozy!

The people I shared the berth with: a young woman who worked as a bartender at the Hotel Oberoi and grew up in Darjeeling. We spoke about drinks, vacationing in Darjleeing and Sikim and about the trials and tribulation of being a female traveler (bathroom & smoking issues). She sat across from me, we had the window seat and the bottom berth to sleep in. Next to me was a man from Assam who worked as a marketing/sales person for an incense and scent firm in Bangalore. He was travelling for work. We didn't speak much but was a good guy. Gave me two cigs to share with the other woman and informed that it was illigal to smoke in Madhya pradesh. You would be immidiately ticketed and fined or taken to jail. No smokes are sold at any of the stations. Across from him sat a Konkini guy from Bangaore also a marketting manager. Both these guys were traveling for work. They had the middle berths to sleep in. The last two guys were college buddies on their way to Sikim for vacation. they were fun and clowinsh. They slept a lot and had the top most bunk. Oh, they all assumed i was a an artist and writer since i had the big piece with me and whenever i was really bored i would take out my sketchpad i would draw or write!

Food is not a probem on the train. They have excellent catering service. Waiters walk by every 3 mins selling snacks, chips, sodas, water and magazines. About 3 hrs before mealtime a waiter will come by to take your meal order. They serve chicken and egg biryanis, vegetable and chicken fried rice, chicken roast, curries, dal, rice, chapatti...relatively extensive menu. it tastes good and pretty hygenic, I didn't get sick! Since it was 2nd class, even the bathrooms were clean which was a relief. Last time I travelled on the train, the bathroom was so horrible I waited till we reached our hotel to go!

The last night of our train ride was fun, the Konkini guy was getting off at a station before the rest of us so we all stayed up to kep him company. Our compartment became the place of adda (gathering). all the men that couldn't sleep gathered in our compartment and told jokes all night long and stories that had us in stictches. interesting thing was, no one asked each others names, just professional designation and what was the purpose of trip. It was kind of sad to say bye to them all at the end of the journey. Everyone spoke in english cause i am sure within the group there were 5 diff languges--english and hindi was the common language.

One piece of advice i will leave here...when booking, ask for the topmost bunk. Otherwise, you are stuck waking up at 6am and sitting the whole time. That is if you are being nice to your neighbors that dn't want to lay down the whole trip!