Today was rather uneventful, something for which we are glad. We didn’t have to worry about driving for 6+ hours back to Jodhpur to catch a flight to Delhi because we decided to stay in Jodhpur instead of going to Jaiselmer. So we missed a camel ride in Jaiselmer. We figured that, if we really wanted to, we could have a camel ride in Jodhpur. There seem to be a lot of them around. We chose to hang around the hotel, go for a swim, go to the gym, and then get on the plane at 1:00 to go back to Delhi. It is really just a day (and night) of travel for us.
In Delhi, we had a few hours to kill so we went to a restaurant called @live. It seems to cater to Westerners because it has a very North American feel about it and they were playing Bryan Adams when we went in. The wait staff didn’t really speak English, but that’s okay. We seemed to get what we wanted and needed.
When we arrived at the Delhi train station, of course there were lots of porters in red suit jackets to meet us. We opted to carry our bags themselves, something that is difficult for them to understand. The Delhi train station is very interesting, with an array of different kinds of people. We were getting on a sleeper car with assigned seats, so we didn’t have to worry about running onto the train to try to get a good seat. Those in 3rd class have to sit wherever they can find a space. You can usually see a few people sitting at the doorway or hanging off the side. I’m not sure if they would be hanging off the side overnight….they might fall off while they are sleeping.
We are in 2nd class, not 1st class. That, in itself, is a good experience. It’s funny that we came from the Taj Hari Maha Hotel in Jodhpur, which is very posh, and are on our way to the Gateway Hotel in Varanasi, which is also very posh, and right now we are sharing sleeping quarters with about 16 other people, separated by a curtain and in some cases, about three feet of air. Grayson and I are sharing our space with a 2nd year college student and her mother. Mic and Jane are adjacent to our quadplex. I’m sure the mother and daughter duo wish they were somewhere else. Everyone seemed to go to sleep almost right away. I am the last one up and it’s only about 11:30. I say that it is a good experience because it is good to understand how another culture goes about its everyday life. The father of the girl next to us is a doctor and he is in the bunk next to us. This is the type of transportation that regular people use.
We will arrive in Varanasi at around 8:45 a.m., all refreshed from a good night’s sleep, in the same clothes that I have been wearing since around 8:30 the morning before. Woohoo! We’ll be going right to our next hotel, which is apparently the nicest hotel in Varanasi, eating breakfast, taking a shower (I hope!) and then going on a city tour. It should be fun!
