OK- I am finally there, well- at least *almost* there.... the day of the Taj Mahal is upon us. Unfortunately for you, there is QUITE the back story to our Taj Mahal adventures and despite the fact that I have already regaled most of my friends with this tale, I am going to tell you all again to preserve the memory for posterity as a part of this illustrious blog =)
We had planned to go to the Taj on Friday, but as I have alluded to, it didn't quite work out that way.....
When we were planning this trip, K., a Delihi native, had suggested that we take the train, which seemed like a fun thing to do and probably the lease nausea inducing given that the alternative was a car ride and I am not one who enjoys long car rides in 3rd world countries. And, he assured us that the train was very very nice. Tourist class, very fancy and even good food. So K. arranged for our tickets and I started fantasizing about all the picture taking that I would do at the Taj.
Fast forward to Thursday at lunch in Delhi, when K.'s very wise friends informed us that, despite no prior warning from the guidebooks (thanks for nothing "Top 10 Delhi"), the Taj Mahal is closed on Friday. As panic washes over my entire body I realize that I may have to leave India with out seeing the Taj Mahal- which is the real reason we came all this way in the first place. K., who sees said-panic (and by the way has never actually been to the Taj himself), promises to fix the situation and generously scrambles to arrange for train tickets for Saturday. We take off for some shopping- and K. takes off to set up the tickets. He calls with the details and warns us that he couldn't get the same kind of ticket on such short notice and the times were not as good. As in, our train was scheduled to depart from Delhi at 4:40am. But he swears it will be just fine.
4:40am. Ugh. I hate early mornings. Hate them a lot. And I really hate early mornings when we have arrived in Delhi on a red-eye flight which provided us with a paltry (and uncomfortable) 4.5 hours of "sleep" and we have been moving across Delhi at a brake-neck speed ever since setting foot in the country. But, "for the Taj," I tell myself "anything is worth it."
So, we haul our exhausted bodies out of our comfy hotel bed at 3:30am to drive to the train station and await our chariot to Agra. On K.'s suggestion- we had asked our driver to park and take us in to the train station and deliver us directly to the platform. This proved to be excellent advice as we arrived at Nizzamudin Station at 4:00am to be greeted by a bevy of unclear signs in Hindi that seemed to indicate our train was late and provided little other guidance. Well, our very kind and patient driver informed us that it was in fact late (so glad we got up at 3-in-the-freaking-morning) and deposited us in the train station cafe to wait out our delay. While in the cafe, which was full of Delhi-revelers awaiting their ride back home after a Friday night of partying, we met our soon-to-be-new-friend P., who happened to be the only other foreigner in the joint.
After an indeterminable about of wait time- we, under the careful supervision of our very protective driver, head back to the platform to wait for the train. He interprets our train tickets- and in the super hero act of the day- pushes us through an intense amount of human traffic- to the right train car- and even on to the train and to our designated births. P. was in our car too- and we picked up a few other travelers along the way who were grateful for some direction on finding their car- so we were quite the parade of lost and tired souls running along behind our driver at 6am through a crowded train station. But we all made it to the proper seats and we were off.... Little did we know that this bit of the adventure was only a small taste of what was to come.
How to describe the train situation...
We had planned to go to the Taj on Friday, but as I have alluded to, it didn't quite work out that way.....
When we were planning this trip, K., a Delihi native, had suggested that we take the train, which seemed like a fun thing to do and probably the lease nausea inducing given that the alternative was a car ride and I am not one who enjoys long car rides in 3rd world countries. And, he assured us that the train was very very nice. Tourist class, very fancy and even good food. So K. arranged for our tickets and I started fantasizing about all the picture taking that I would do at the Taj.
Fast forward to Thursday at lunch in Delhi, when K.'s very wise friends informed us that, despite no prior warning from the guidebooks (thanks for nothing "Top 10 Delhi"), the Taj Mahal is closed on Friday. As panic washes over my entire body I realize that I may have to leave India with out seeing the Taj Mahal- which is the real reason we came all this way in the first place. K., who sees said-panic (and by the way has never actually been to the Taj himself), promises to fix the situation and generously scrambles to arrange for train tickets for Saturday. We take off for some shopping- and K. takes off to set up the tickets. He calls with the details and warns us that he couldn't get the same kind of ticket on such short notice and the times were not as good. As in, our train was scheduled to depart from Delhi at 4:40am. But he swears it will be just fine.
4:40am. Ugh. I hate early mornings. Hate them a lot. And I really hate early mornings when we have arrived in Delhi on a red-eye flight which provided us with a paltry (and uncomfortable) 4.5 hours of "sleep" and we have been moving across Delhi at a brake-neck speed ever since setting foot in the country. But, "for the Taj," I tell myself "anything is worth it."
So, we haul our exhausted bodies out of our comfy hotel bed at 3:30am to drive to the train station and await our chariot to Agra. On K.'s suggestion- we had asked our driver to park and take us in to the train station and deliver us directly to the platform. This proved to be excellent advice as we arrived at Nizzamudin Station at 4:00am to be greeted by a bevy of unclear signs in Hindi that seemed to indicate our train was late and provided little other guidance. Well, our very kind and patient driver informed us that it was in fact late (so glad we got up at 3-in-the-freaking-morning) and deposited us in the train station cafe to wait out our delay. While in the cafe, which was full of Delhi-revelers awaiting their ride back home after a Friday night of partying, we met our soon-to-be-new-friend P., who happened to be the only other foreigner in the joint.
After an indeterminable about of wait time- we, under the careful supervision of our very protective driver, head back to the platform to wait for the train. He interprets our train tickets- and in the super hero act of the day- pushes us through an intense amount of human traffic- to the right train car- and even on to the train and to our designated births. P. was in our car too- and we picked up a few other travelers along the way who were grateful for some direction on finding their car- so we were quite the parade of lost and tired souls running along behind our driver at 6am through a crowded train station. But we all made it to the proper seats and we were off.... Little did we know that this bit of the adventure was only a small taste of what was to come.
How to describe the train situation...
Dave, sitting on our side berths. They were about as spacious as they looked.
This is not exactly what one might call luxury travel....
Check out how narrow the "aisle" is. Now, if this was just for normal use to get to-and-from your berth it wouldn't be so bad. But no, this narrow little walk way was the bustling commercial thoroughfare of the train. About once every 2.5 minutes someone, with a large kettle of hot tea, would come tromping down the aisle, screaming "chai, chai, chai, chai, chai." Then someone else would follow him and join in the chorus by offering some other snack or item for sale.
Spacious. Comfortable. Not to mention very clean.
"Anti-social elements"- nothing like a warm welcome to the train.
Come on, you knew you were wondering...
This, my friends, is the bathroom.
And, because I know you wanted to know, if you looked down the hole, you could see daylight, which leads us to believe there was no storage tank system in use here.
Oh, and yes, the hole does look pretty small. And yes, the train was pretty rocky.
Think about the logistics on that one, and then imagine someone like me, who really strongly prefers not to touch anything in any variety of bathroom, but even more so in this particular kind of bathroom, trying to sort out how one is going to balance on a moving train whilst aiming for a very small target. Let's just say I was really regretting having consumed a lot of water and tea earlier in the morning.
More train adventures next time....
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