first week of travelling....not too smooth

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So.... last time I ended up at the Golden Temple.

A week later, after many goodbyes, we left Palampur, and got on a train to Agra (via Delhi). Getting off at Delhi at 4am, someone managed to steal Kate's handbag, complete with wallet, camera, passport, etc, etc, etc. As it was 4am we carried on to Agra (after wrestling with the police for a statement). Saw the Taj (though it was really overcast, so a bit dissapointing). Next morning Abhey (our camp manager) bribed us onto the early morning train to Agra, which then involved 3 hours of sitting next to 3 members of one family, and having all the other members of the family brought along to come have a look - including a 5yr old, the cutest baby ever and the grandmother who sat and spoke to me in Bihari for about half an hour.....

So next we arrived in Delhi....got off at the wrong station, so we missed the guy who was supposed to pick us up (poor Sanjeev....he thought taking us to Amritsar was hard work, he spent all day panicking about where we were until we appeared at the hotel at 5pm!) and decided to mak our own way to the British High commission - where a very nice lady interrogated Kate, and issued her with a letter of identity and agreed to send her new passport to Goa (Kate's next stop). Inbetween we found the dodgiest looking Western Union ever to get money from, and a passport photo shop which airbrushed all the frizz from Kate's hair in her photos, so for the next ten years she'll have a passport which makes her look like a boy..... Having finished up at the High Commission, we realised that we had no idea where our hotel was, and therefore went on a further mission to find an internet cafe to locate it.... Along the way a McDonalds appeared.... Capitalism has never been so welcome....

Well, we thought capitalism had never been so welcome, until arriving in Kolkata....

After Delhi we made our way to Varanasi, where we managed to get a room overlooking the Ganges - amazing city, we spent quite a while wandering along the ghats, the burning ones are quite overwhelming. I did a dusk and dawn boat ride as well, very worth doing - we saw the evening puja, the closing ceremony of one of the burning ghats from the river.

Attempting to leave Varanasi we turned up an hour early for our 9.20 train.....only to discover it was delayed by 3 hours.... You can tell the British installed the indian railway system.....every train was delayed or cancelled due to fog....
Luckily we discovered the Ladies waiting room, so we sat and shivered in there for four hours, then a while longer... then the train finally arrived. All this time we'd been bouyed up by the fact that we had 2AC tickets (one down from first class, the only class that had tickets left). So, not wating to be left behind, we jumped straight on the train, planning on walking along it to our cabin. Obviously this was not to be, as after fighting our way through sleeper class we discovered that somebody had locked the door between sleeper class and AC class.... So then we got to stand up (its 1am by this point) in sleeper class, which is very crowded, with our backpacks, and wait until the next station (just 5 minutes mam!) for an hour to then jump off (we jumped off whilst it was still moving....very exciting...though I'm not sure that slower than walking pace really counts as moving...) run up the platform and find our carriage...

So, five hours late, we arrived into Kolkata, praised the capitalism that made us drive by such welcome signs (totally not normally my thing, but this week has been just a little trying) as Reebok and KFC, checked into a hotel totally above our budget (sometimes one needs air conditioning, TV and 24 hour hot water!) and have now brought tickets for the cinema (some random American Movie) and decided its Dominos for dinner...

Have mainly been running round trying to sort Kate's stuff out this week (just managed to find a Sony shop here to get her a new camera) so not many exciting photos, and this computer doesn't have a CD drive, so will have a wait a while.

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Comments

[ktoe]

joy
Heyu Sounds like your experiencing some intriging varients of joy... I am south now- heading to MFH later for a few days before my Vipassana starts on 21st till 1st. I go to Norfolk for that and it will be an experience for sure!! I will have to see I am feeling mixes of extreme nerves and excitement about it. Hmmm So sweet enjoy your times and have many adventures Thanks for the updates- i enjoy hearing how youre getting along Will let you know how my vipassana is next year.... Lots of love and plenty o joy to you n seeu next time Ktoe xx

[Kate Cruise]

you describe that ever-so-trying week very well!
Hi Rachael, just waiting for, ooh, probably about an hour, while my 4 photos upload onto my blog, and thought I'd check out yours! Well, after the week you describe on this entry I remember feeling like bad luck was invented with me in mind. But then I started to think maybe I was overreacting. However, reading this now, I think we did pretty damn well looking back, it really was a dreadful week and almost everything did go wrong. It was probably one of the hardest weeks out of the last 4 months for me personally, but we still managed to have a good laugh which is the main thing! Thailand sounds fun, I will return to this site to see your Thai photos in the near future. Take care and keep having fun, Kate xxx