Labors: Africa to India

"Oshi, please. Uncle is waiting for us."

I am sitting in a renovated immigration hall with too much time on my hands.

"Oshi, please!"

The lines are getting smaller, but I look forward to the arrival of 747s from Frankfurt and Hong Kong. A woman beside me shoos her young daughter away. She is kneeling on white marble, resembling the Taj Mahal, and scribes in black letters the details of her arrival card.

She's finished. Mother and daughter leave for an awaiting Uncle.

I am in India again. India; an India that seems little compared to the journey with Global Citizen Journey. Over a year ago, I was intimidated to be alone in this massive democracy, but now it seems tiny, minuscule, almost nothing. Another bee in the hive buzzing with its own load ready to turn sweet.

The flights have unloaded their passengers. Paces quick; strides long and lean, others short and swift.

Beside me on the plane sat a young British woman with her boyfriend. They were from the Gatwick area of London and were in India for one week on work. She is part of a human resources company and was preparing to give a presentation at the University of Delhi to recruit employees. Those applicants accepted would be trained in London, then returned to India to work in their Delhi offices.

Lines fill again at customs, this time with the Germans. A CD skips over the speakers; music something like an electronic Peruvian flute. In a purple sari, a woman's lace scarf wafts in movement, following the music’s strange beat. It's in the air, yet she's oblivious, scuttling to her own tempo to claim a forward position.

As she rounds the metal poles, which form an orderly symmetric maze, her luggage follows closely behind, cutting corners too close, rising over the aluminum bases of each pole.

Apparently, Hong Kong has arrived, and maybe she has this on her mind. I see no Chinese. If such arrival exists, I expect to see the pairs of young backpackers, or the hoards of tourist groups: name tags, color-coordinated luggage plates.

Still there are none. No Chinese. Only Indians and older Germans.

My plan is to catch a 7:20 train, the 2031 Shabati Express to Amritsar. But it is 2:30 in the morning and my desire to wander the New Delhi Railway Station at this hour is nonexistent. This large room with its movement suites me well, and I will stay until the uniformed workers, a blue ID card strung from their necks, kick me through the booth.

Yeah, there is definitely no flight from Hong Kong. The morning is early. My sleepless brain is weary. My slow body hasn't been horizontal for some forty-plus hours.

4:30 AM
The Shabati is booked. The next available train is on the seventh. I forgo the fancy plans and find a room, get ripped off at this susceptible hour, and crash, checking out at one in the afternoon. 3:30 PM rolls around in the Paharganj district of New Delhi and I am on a bus to McLeod Ganj. The destination looms distant, 12 hours in the future. I have no seat, but the front cabin bench.

Atop my bags, wedged behind the driver's seat, my limbs fall asleep as the cold winter air flushes in the captain's cracked window. He smokes his beedis one after another, but with all this, Africa has prepared me well. I am ecstatic to be reuniting with my brothers in nearing time.

---

---