Weekend Away on Indian Railways
Hands down one of the best aspects of living, and traveling, in India is its ridiculously robust and cheap railway network. There aren’t many places you cannot reach by train, and doing so costs virtually nothing when compared to fares in Europe or the United States.
My first introduction to train travel here was on a 36-hour jaunt from the south Indian city Bangalore, to the east Indian city Bhubaneswar. This journey came after a summer spent cramming my 6’3″ frame into the absurdly tiny “deluxe buses” that service the Himalayas from Delhi. As much as I love the mountains, it was getting to the point where the ends simply didn’t justify the means. An overnight bus trip left my old body in brutal shape after contorting to fit into the lilliputian seat offerings. (Wherefore art though brobdingnagian seats?!)
One’s initial reaction to the prospect of a 36-hour train ride might be to recoil in horror, especially when thinking it is here in India, with its reputation for being unclean, overwhelmingly chaotic, hot, and wildly overpopulated. Hell, that was my reaction, but I’m glad it didn’t sway the decision to take the trip as I loved every minute of it.
First and foremost, the experience on the trains here is largely determined by the class of ticket you have. They range from the super cheap Sleeper class with very little amenities, open windows, and a whole lot of people, to First Class Cabins which can often be as expensive as a plane ticket but are extremely comfortable, private, and come with all the fixins’ (i.e., meals). I travel Sleeper class during the winter as the temperatures are low enough to eschew air-conditioning, but be fair warned: if you’re a foreigner, you will draw a lot of attention whether wanted or no. If you’re after peace and quiet, but don’t want to shell out for a cabin, 3rd AC and Second AC options are pretty rad too.
The first train journey was spent in a 3rd AC bunk. The cars are essentially divided into sub-groups of 8 bunks: a set of triple bunk beds facing each other, with another set of bunks, one atop the other, across the narrow hallway that traverses the car. I was in the top bunk within the pod of six beds, with my buddy Ryan on the top bunk across from me; we shared the rest of the pod with an Indian family.
Poor Ryan was sick the entire time, so spent his day-and-a-half journey suffering silently in bed. I was feeling fairly spry so slept very little, opting instead to meander about the train, and sitting by an open door, staring out into the world. It was so peaceful and idyllic; just hour after hour of solitude and vast tracts of farmland with nary a human to be seen. Perhaps this is why I love the train so much: it offers much-needed relief from the usual crush of humanity that accompanies any time spent in an urban center.
Despite this initial journey being so long, I felt a bit crestfallen upon arrival; it really felt like the trip went by far too fast. Since then, I’ve jumped on any opportunity to take a train ride, even subjecting my poor brother and his wife to several 12+-hour sojourns into Rajasthan when they visited a few years back.
It was in this spirit that I opted to take the train from Bangalore to Delhi this past weekend after spending a week in the former for some sanitation project-related work. It’s a few hour flight between the cities, spanning a distance of nearly 2,800 kilometers. By train, there were several options, but one stood out amongst the rest as it took several hours less than the others (read: it was only 31 hours and not 36). Upon further review, it turned out that this option, the Duronto Express, was one of India’s “high-speed” trains (hitting speeds upwards of 130-km at times) and stopping only sparingly between the two cities. Done and done.
The train departed Bangalore around 1130p Saturday night and arrived in Delhi around 730a Monday morning, though it was scheduled to arrive an hour earlier. Given the late departure time, coupled with my elderly lameness, I crashed soon after boarding the train, and slept later than expected, arising at nearly 8a.
I booked a side upper berth, meaning to see out the window I’d have to share the berth with the person below me. (These side lower berths are two seats that fold down to make a bed, so this is the standard protocol). As luck would have it, the guy I’d be sharing the window with was a complete whackjob and, even worse, what my Mother would refer to as a “Chatty Cathy”, or someone suffering from “diarrhea of the mouth”; a conversationalist of insufferable proportions. This is a far-to-common occurrence in my life and has led me to conclude that I, too, must be totally whacked out and that these, my brethren, merely identify me as own of their own.
Thankfully the car I was on was less than full capacity. With the limited number of stops, I was assured reprieve from my neighbor-cum-new best friend for at least a few hours. Fortunately, it turned out that the berth I found was empty straight through the trip; aside from a few awkward interactions with my bestie, I was largely left alone to stare at the verdant, post-monsoon Indian landscape for hours on end.
The beauty of these long journeys is the solitude and relative peace. (Granted, if you’re in Sleeper class, it’s anything but peaceful). I could’ve easily flown back to Delhi and had time alone in my apartment or whatever, but then I’d be ensconced in the madness of a mega-city. The train is a refuge, a counterpoint to the urban insanity here that allows you time to decompress and reflect on what the hell you are doing in India while being treated to incredible natural vistas. You can go hours without seeing a human being or any trace of human civilization.
You are also thrust into some of the worst scenes of urbanization imaginable. The contrast is striking, and disheartening. If you take an overnight train in India and are awake around sunrise, you will absolutely see people open-defecating on the train tracks beside you. You will definitely see slums. And you will most assuredly see garbage and pollution unlike anything you’ve ever encountered.
It’s terrible to say, and feel, this, but I try to ignore the urban scenes as much as possible. I feel overwhelmed by that enough in Delhi, Bhubaneswar, Bangalore, and elsewhere that work takes me; there needs to be a counterpoint to keep you sane, to keep the motivation up to maintain living here. The natural beauties of India are spectacular, but getting to them often necessitates going through the cities; a necessary evil, but an evil for sure.
A positive takeaway from the experience of immersing oneself in India’s cities for a few years is you really learn to appreciate any non-urban setting. Seeing stars is remarkable, as is a clean river or stream; clear blue skies and a beach uncluttered by trash are enough to make the eyes water. I know the grass is always greener and all that jazz, but sometimes the grass literally is a lot greener, and it’s cool to recognize that a bit.
The trip was largely unremarkable and, as always, the time seemed to just disappear. Unlike on the slower trains, the conductors on Duronto Express wouldn’t let me open the doors while the train was in transit. This was a bit of a bummer as that’s truly rad: sitting with the wind blowing in your face and seeing the landscape slide by undisturbed and unfiltered is breathtaking, and affords you the sense of traveling back in time a bit.
As with most trips, I brought several books with me and loaded up my laptop with movies, but largely ignored all of it, opting instead to just enjoy the silence and the time and place I was in. The fear is always that the trip will get boring at some point but, knock on wood, I’ve not experienced that just yet. And that’s served only to feed the need for other, longer journeys to replicate the feeling.
I strung together some shaky footage shot on cell phone through a dirty window, and set it to the musical stylings of Rahat Fateh Ali Khan; check it out below.
Originally published at kevinshane.me on August 13, 2014.
