Bijapur and trains

Hello again everyone! I'm in Jalgaon now, in northern Mahrastra. Not that that means much to you. Or to me, for that matter - all Indian towns being essentially the same: dirty concrete buildings, sprawling markets, diesel rickshaw fumes, lots of honking horns, billboard advertisements, and of course, throngs of people. Plus the occaisonal cow, or park, or ancient ruin.

Kyle finally made it out of Karnataka! Our last stop in that state was Bijapur, where we walked around the city to some mosques and a fabulous vegetable market. Unfortunately, Kyle got an intestinal illness - but he still made it to the Golgumbaz's dome where we sat 100ft apart and whispered to each other. No joke - amazing accoustics. Made me think of Electric Kool-Aid and variable lag.



Then we had quite a train journey. Hopped a local from Bij to Shol (-apur for both: must mean town or something, kind of like -abad). Arrived at 2pm - next train was at 6. Kyle was feeling low, so we checked into the "retiring room." Definitely a British concept - to put a hotel in a train station. Especially since our room was about the size of your average American restaurant, with only two beds, a 30 foot ceiling, almirahs, beauraus, and mirrors on the walls, western toilet and water heater (both luxuries), immacuately clean...all for a whopping price of $5. We read and slept and juggled.

Next train was a sleeper to Manmad. 6pm to 6am. In Manmad we hung out on the station floor watching people sleep, slip on the polished tile, and go to and from trains carrying all sorts of strange stuff. Then I got into an argument with the phone man and we had to retreat to platform 4. We waited for our next and final train that was supposed to come at 9:30. Then at 10:30. Then two trains showed up at the same time going to the same place (maybe?) and we didn't know which one to get on and there were people everywhere and eventually we picked the one that was going the right direction but it turned out the other one reversed its direction (take that!) and we were crowded in with the throngs for 2 hours. Oh well. This is India. We got there. You always do. Eventually.

Aside: people in trains and buses here look SO miserable. Often times they put their heads in their hands, or just look at you and frown. Sometimes they fall asleep - don't ask me how, and next thing you know you're about to be a pillow and then snap, they lean back the other way. The problem, I think, stems from the fact that they don't bring any entertainment with them - walkmans may be a bit pricey, but certainly they could bring a magazine or cards or something!