Back 2 Kolkata

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After a 32 hour train ride, I'm back in Kolkata (Calcutta)...

After the last blog entry I spent a few days in Pondicherry, nothing too eventful happened.... However, I was walking down a busy busy street crowded with local Indian people past a few stray dogs and all of the sudden one starts barking, I think to myself that surely it can't be barking at me with all these people around. But just my luck it was barking at me, not just barking... growling, as soon as his other stray dog friends heard the barking they all rushed towards me. The main dog, that started the barking had to be one of the most mangy looking things I've ever seen, and only had one eye so he was walking at me sideways, leading with the good eye. I started walking faster... so did the dog... so I ran to a tree that had a fallen branch about 8 feet long and picked it up, apparently the dog didn't need both eyes to see that I meant business so he took off, with the rest of his friends. I thought dogs were supposed to be colour blind? I guess they can even tell I'm a foreigner. This is one of many many close calls I've had with stray dogs in Asia, I'm lucky not to have been bitten, I'm sure most of these dogs are crawling with disease. In Vietnam there was one chained to the street and I stepped over him and he lunged at me and tried to take a bite out of me, luckily, due to my cat like reflexes I managed to get away unscathed.

Anyways, the 32 bus ride wasn't too exciting, a huge part of enjoying the journey is based on who you are with, I got lucky this time.. I think. There was a family, didn't speak much English, and seemed to belch uncontrollably, but they were nice. They also had a 3 year old boy who was very very noisy and cried a lot, but I'm experienced with such things, so I was alright.

And now I'm back in Kolkata, the month in India flew by, but it's nice to be back in somewhere I sort of know. I've got one more day left here then I fly back to Bangkok... if you have been watching the news then you know there's some drama going on there, but I'll be alright.

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