In the 80s, I remember travelling third class on an Indian train from Calcutta to Varanasi. We were pretty comfortable, talking, taking our packed lunch and watching the villages and rice fields outside. A woman sitting across from me took out HER packed lunch (a big bag of peanuts)and sat and ate the whole bag, throwing the empty shells on the floor between us.

In the evening, we slept along the seats, our feet sticking out into the corridor. I ket waking up through the night - someone kept tickling the soles of my feet! (I never did work out who).

The worst part of the trip was the toilet - basically a hole in the floor of a small carriage, surrounded by mementos from those who had missed their aim on the bouncing train. It was disgusting - I decided to wait until the end of the trip.   the next morning, waiting was no longer possible - and so I left my own mementos somewhere on the train track to Varanasi.

Varanasi was worth it - a beautiful, ancient city of temples lining the Ganges. I swam in the Ganges at dawn, and took a boat along the river to see the sunrise, and to be greeted by the joyful leaps of the ganges dolphins!

freda