Goodbye India

This is the first blog post I’m actually writing in real time. For the past two months, I’ve always just been catching up. Now, on our last night in India, I’m caught up.

Scott and I are sitting at an internet café in Varanasi. We have some hours to kill as our night train doesn’t leave until 12:40 tonight. Another overnight transportation adventure; we’ve had many these last two months. They can be pretty dreadful, whether it’s by train or bus, as we don’t usually get any sleep, even in the “sleeper” class.

By early tomorrow morning, we should find ourselves in the Indian town of Gorakhpur. From there we’ll take public transportation to the border town of Sunauli, cross the border into Nepal, and by evening – hopefully – be in Chitwan National Park. Keep your fingers crossed for us. 

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From Bundi, Scott and I went to Ranthambore National Park to make a third attempt at spotting a tiger. We rode around in a bumpy cantor with twenty or so other tourists and … didn’t see a tiger.

From Ranthambore, we took a train to Bharatpur. We were told we’d be able to easily catch a government bus from there to Agra. On that train ride, I remember thinking about how I might miss India, how it was a bit sad that we were spending our last days in the country. But then we arrived in Bharatpur and everything seemed strange, stranger than normal. First, we couldn’t find an auto-rickshaw from the train station to the bus stand. So we got into a bike-rickshaw and watched a barefoot man slowly, but surely, pedal us to the bus stand. Once we got to the bus stand we were told that all the buses (and autos) were on strike for the day. Meaning, no bus to Agra. We spent a frustrating hour trying to negotiate a reasonable rate to go 60 kilometers to Agra. During that hour, needless to say, all those sad sentiments about leaving India were gone. We negotiated a rate of 800 rupees (it should have only cost us 400 in a cab) and finally made it to the famed India town of Agra.

What did we do in Agra? you might wonder. What else. We saw the Taj Mahal. And played cards by the red fort.

From Agra, we took a sleepless overnight train to Varanasi, the holy city of the Ganges. We’ve wandered around the many ghats, witnessed the burning pyres of bodies, rode a boat during sunrise, sat through an evening aarti, and have gotten lost among the windy alleyways of the old city.

And now we’re ready to go. Onto Nepal.