Reformatted for India, First Day

Fling open the door to your cab, shuffle in with your bags and you're in another world. Immediately small children and women with babies will come to you, as if you were magnetic and they your polar opposites, perhaps it isn't so far from reality. Money is their first request, but quickly they move onto sweets, and finally they ask for a tooth brush. You must say “No, I'm sorry”, and you do truly feel sorry, but what really can you do?

It is as if even in your cab with its' windows closed you seem to be caught in a cloud of dust, which seems to permeate all of your senses, but your ears with its presence, your ears are rather filled by the cacophony of horns honking. As you look through the vale of dust you can see parts of a highway sprouting like flours in a fastidiously planned garden. But the order extends no further. Below the sprouted stems of the planned highway are cars, pedestrians, bicycles, scooters and motor cycles simply existing moving around in endless chaos.

As you look around you see a young boy in front of his father with the most serene of smiles, flapping his arms and undulating with the wind and traffic. In the U.S. we have family cars, in India they have family motor bikes. All around are people with their families on their bikes, quickly, a bike rides by with a woman in beautiful sari sitting behind its' driver side saddled while it weaves through traffic.

We quickly pull into a filling station. We briefly sit in front of a gasoline pump, which is completely empty, all the cabs and auto rickshaws are filling up with CNG. An opening appears and we quickly maneuver into place. The hood is popped and the nozzle is fixed onto the fueling port and suddenly right behind the sound of the CNG blasting into the empty metal tank behind, causing a slight sense of uneasiness that something with such explosive power sits just behind the cushions of the seat. There is a woman at the station covered by a sari with her face veiled to keep the insipid dust out of her lungs. On first sight her sari seems pristine, but on a second looked it is mottled with holes. All she does is sweep away the ever piling dust and debris from the stations ground.

Pulling back into the flow of chaos that is the street suddenly we pull up to a stopped intersection, which doesn't mean there is a read light, just that the intersecting street's flow has momentarily over come the street that we are on when a series of buses block our way. To our left is an auto rickshaw with it's driver siting on his crossed leg with it's bare foot's sole facing me, while his other bare foot is pressed on the brake peddle, while his passenger leans back insistently chatting on his cell phone, totally oblivious to the world external to himself. Perhaps this passenger is correct and has simply realized that he must surrender himself to this chaos, that his input and anxiety will get him nowhere. The flow of traffic seems to be controlled by simply which way, vehicle or pedestrian pushes hardest, whether through honking or steadily pressing on, allowing their flow to push through. So I just lean back and surrender myself to the chaos and how my taxi driver navigates it.

Moving again in our new sense of relaxation, I still can't help cringing every time we seemingly almost kill a pedestrian, all that the driver seems to do is honk to assert his superior momentum and presence to a pair of men walk side by side, at the last moment that one furthest from traffic pulls his companion out of the way of our chaotic vessel. Nor can I stop cringing every time we are almost killed, whether because my driver passes a colorfully painted truck, by simply holding down his horn and flooring the gas or when some other vessel seems to want to occupy the same space as us, which is physically impossible.

The trucks, often carrying garbage and its' stench with them are brightly colored and patterned to bring some sense of color and joy to everything and everyone around them. The trucks generally carry Hindu motifs on their rear, with requests for drivers to honk at them, such entreaty though is only visible after they almost kill you and pass by. An SUV quickly drives by, it has a special state of India plate and a sign in it's tailgate that implores to call some number if the driver isn't following driving norms.

We drive past some delivery people on bicycles with flat beds in the rear who simply seem totally oblivious to the chaos around them. Then a group of well dressed mothers are along the side of the road with their smartly dressed children in uniform, seemingly on their way to school, they show some sense of agitation with having to wait to cross the street. The only ones who seem to fully understand the whole absurdity of this whole chaos are a pair of dogs who seem to be barking at everything that passes them by.

We turn a corner and I look up and I see a skywalk, a side walk in the sky. Above are us walking on these skywalks are people who have tried to escape the chaos on the ground to the serenity of the sky above. We quickly turn away from this segregated reality.

One thing to say though is that the chaos is never allowed to move too quickly, we never seem to manage of 50km/h even on the highway. Much of this has to do with the fact that on the chaotic streets if there isn't a speed bump, their concave variety potholes, or simply some other road user in your way. On the Highway things seem to open up a bit and calm down, but not completely, it is though enough that my tension seems to drop and I begin to occasionally nod off. I open the window to allow the breeze to blow on my face, but the constant stream of garbage trucks makes this a mixed blessing. I reach up and grab that hand hold above the window and nod off, I'm awoken by my arm slamming into the arm rest after my grip must have relaxed.

Navigating seems to exceedingly difficult, my cab driver after a certain point begins to ask every driver he can find how to get to the station. Eventually he finds a scooter driver who says that he will lead the way, so we follow. Luckily the driver was able to keep track of the scooter and we successfully end up at the station.

Now slightly more wary and slightly shaken, I carefully alight from the taxi, finally with my feet back on solid ground, grab my bags, thank the driver and bid him adieu. I slowly walk to the station, leery of all cars around me. I make my way to the information window at the ticket window and show them my ticket. The woman looks at me shocked, for a moment I'm worried, but all that she is shocked by is how early I am, which is two hours. I ask her which track and she replies “platform 7”.

Having had not eaten yet that day I head over to one of the small kiosks on the platform. Worried about essentially everything making me sick I choose what appears to be a safe choice, crackers. In the end they turn out being rotten egg flavored.

Now I can start to take things in and look for a place to charge my phone with credits. I had luckily the previous night met a German who was finishing their India travels and kindly gave me their airtel sim card. Everything on the station is dirty, there is simply a constant presence of dust. Ahead me is another kiosk with vodafone stickers, so I thought that perchance they would also support airtel, but after inquiring with the clerk, he directed me across the bridge ahead. I couldn't see the best path their, but I saw one way, which seemed most circuitous, but I decided to go that way none the less. On this walk I walk by multiple offices, where the occupants appear to be holding court. In the ticket master's office it even looks like his wife and children are in there doing school work.

As I make my way to the bridge I begin to notice the great sense of poverty and disrepair that the whole station gives off. All around are stray dogs, with people stepping over them while they sleep. I eventually make it to the stairs of the bridge and begin my assent. No one seems to keep to the left or the right, they simply fill empty space, not so different from the roads. Once at the walkway of the bridge more young children are begging. Once again, what difference can I really make? I make my way to then and start down the stairs where an old lady is begging sitting facing the flow of people passing her by going up and down the stairs.

At the bottom I can see what looks like a cellphone store in the town ahead and follow all of the people over their. I have to squeeze by a sleeping dog and then quickly dodge a person coming from the opposite direction towards the narrow passage that I'm walking through. We walk through what appears to be a large empty lot and make our way to the street. I sleep between two scooters and remind myself that I must look right first. I dodge an auto rickshaw and wait on the medium 'till traffic clears the other way and make my way across. I note a pharmacy, but quickly singly mindedly head for the cell phone shop. After a quick back and forth with the proprietor I manage to add 300 rupies to my phone.

On my way back I notice some people frying samosa's, and quickly decide to head back to the station. I make my way back to the street and cross it, but find that I crossed quite early and my path is blocked by what looks like an old concrete bus stop, so I go around it and enter through its front. I'm immediately hit, by a horrid smell and try to traverse the shelter as quickly as possible. My eye is quickly attracted to some movement in the corner of my eye and a notice a litter of puppies. I decide I must move even quicker out of fear of the mother showing up and baring its' teeth.

I make my way back to the station and decide to sit on platform 7 for a bit. Once again I'm bombarded by many young children begging in a addition to a woman with a dog following her. I just sit and think and try to relax. I still have quite a bit of time. Now that my cellphone is charged up with credits I decide to very quickly check in with home, but notice the time and call my Brother to let him know that I've safely made it to India. As my ticket was just changed from being a wait-list ticket to a real one, I conclude that it would be a good idea to make sure everything is on the up and up, so I make my way to the ticket master's office. This time I know the direct route from the bridge. I make it to the ticket master's office and he quickly looks at my ticket, says everything is fine and sends me to the waiting room. I however decide that I need some real food so back across the bridge.

On crossing the bridge this time I notice two dogs fighting or playing, one can never tell the difference without seeing their ears, in front of the bus stop. I decide to give them a large birth and cross the street far down from the bus stop. I decide to first go to the pharmacy and buy some bug repellent. It's called 'Odomos'. In the town I seem to be a bit of spectacle with many people just saying hello to me, which I always echo. Looking for food a man running a biryani shop approaches me. I first tell him that I'm unsure and head over tot he Samosas, but I quickly am reminded of a story I was told about people using motor oil to fry stuff, so I decide on the Biryani shop. I get a simple biryani to go and have a small conversation about nothing with the owner. I head to the waiting room to wait.

After arriving in the waiting room I take my food and start eating. It is quite good with little purple carrots and spicy yellow rice. All of the components are in little plastic bags, which I poor over the rice for lack of any better way to consume them. It is surprisingly spicy, but this is fine and actually quite nice as it helps to wake me up. Not to long afterwards an announcement is made, which I surmise means that the train is coming so after asking a nice looking young couple for confirmation I head over to the platform.

On the platform I find a place to wait and see two little boys showering themselves with water pipes running parallel to the tracks. They seem to be brothers where one seem no older than 2 or 3 while the other is probably around 6 or 7. The youngest keeps filling up an old coke bottle and dumping the contents on himself. Now I'm confronted with a dilemma of whether or not I should take a picture. In the end perhaps right, perhaps wrong I chose not to take the picture, but the scene is forever in my mind. The older brother knocked the bottle out of his younger brothers hands and it fell down into a bit of ditch, which elicited a loud cry from the youngster, who reproached his brother to retrieve it. This little scene attracted the attention of some adults and station employees who started to chastise the children. The older brother cleaned his shirt and then the train pulled into the station making the children disappear from my existence likely forever.

As the trained pulled in a person who I had previously asked for advice on where to board the train told me to run down to the rear of the train. I somehow completely missed my car, A1, and just saw B1 and HA1. I asked people for help as I was worried the train would leave and everyone else was equally confused. They all told me to just get on, making me even more fearful that the train would just leave. So I hopped onto the HA1 car and then was told to get off and to get on at the other end, so I'm racing for the train to not leave. I walk into the passenger compartment, which turns out to be first class, not my class, where I find a helpful couple who seem super relaxed, with perfect English and point me in the correct direction and send me on my way.

I make my way through the aisle of the train, pushing and nudging through all of the other people who have recently embarked onto the train and I'm struck by the harsh blue air of everything, which is caused by the florescent lights above and the completely blue interior of the train. Everyone is also either barefoot or in socks, which I considered, but the train always felt quite dirty and in disrepair. This was actually one of the most surprising things to me as to the trains looked like they were well over 20 or 30 years old, but they were apparently much newer and ever had been over hauled just a few years ago. China I must say has considerably nicer trains, but perhaps the passengers don't all wear smiles. I finally make it to my birth and meet those who will be my primary traveling companions for the course of this first train voyage. There is one couple, the husband is a mechanical engineer who works for oil companies, his wife has amazing English. There are two young men on their way to business training course in Goa and there is a slightly elderly women whose story I never heard, but she carried with her a large blanket in a rectangular clear plastic bag, which she kindly moved for me to sit. I then put my bags up onto my birth and with some knowledgeable advice from one of the two young men put my bag up in the most efficient manner. Quickly while we are still stopped in the station one of the porters comes and asks me about lunch, without think I just assent to what he says and he brings me chicken biryani. A minute later I decide I don't want it and simply want water, I inform him of such and he kindly takes it back and gives me a little hermetically sealed plastic water cup. Pealing the lid away was its own immense challenge, which I was luckily able to over come. The train finally gets going, so all my rushing and agitation was totally unnecessary. Now the cabin is filled clatter of the train and the continual sways. After drinking my water and exchanging a few pleasantries I hope up to my berth and take a nap, which a few of my companions do as well, as if they all wanted to, but were simply waiting for someone else to be first.

After awaking and getting back down we all began to converse and get to know each other. Most of our conversations revolved around my travels, with each person offering their own opinions on what I should do. I've discovered that most people when they hear you are traveling immediately tell you all about their experiences and what they think your trip should be like. Though I'm always happy to hear helpful advice I do at times think people are too forceful in expressing what they think you should do, rather than simply offer ideas. One of people did however offer great advice in a totally none forceful manner and I will likely be follow a large amount of his recommendations. Every few minutes a porter comes by singing “chai, chai, chairichai, chai, chai” over and over again. After a few of them go by a decide to get a chai, these chai will be a continual treat throughout the entire journey.

By 8:00 my stomach was in need of food and the porter was coming by taking dinner orders just in time. I got a vegetable biryani, which unlike my earlier one was quite bland, but it hit the spot. I had this with a nice cup of chai. We continued to talk about my travels, which was quite helpful and helped me reshape my time in Kerala a little better and then it was time for sleep, if you could call it that. One of the my companions snored throughout the night and I just lay there hoping for some sleep. I tried listening to some pod casts of radio lab and hoping that the swaying train would rock me to sleep but no luck. A few moments here and there of sleep, but not until the snorer awoke did I really get any appreciable amount of sleep, what luck, but now I was somewhere else...