Madras:
So here we are in Madras, in the Church of South India HQ and although it's 7.45am, we're still on English time (3.15 am!). The heat here is stifling and after a harassing ride through Madras and a spot of rain we're not feeling up to much exploring.1
We've been given a letter welcoming us and explaining that our train to Madurai is at 12.40, and that's where we'll be met (Madurai or Madras?). Great. We're alone in India and no-one knows what to do with us. Nothing to tell us how to get to the station or anything. It's impossible to sleep. Looking on the bright side, all our stuff is safe so that means we've got more to carry! I think I'll be able to find out what's going to happen to us. Sleep...
...
11:05 Well that's it then, everything's sorted out. We've met the manager of the CSI place and he's organised everything for us. The train journey's 6 hrs and costs twelve quid for the two of us. Eat your heart out BR! Mind you, we haven't seen the train yet. If I don't get some sleep soon I'll start hallucinating...
22:30 Now we're in Madurai, after the worst train journey of my life – nine hours! I've been thinking too much and got incredibly homesick as we headed further into South India. I could see everything drifting away from me, all that I hold dear to me is now thousands of miles and a nine-hour train journey away. After being driven to the train station, we were deserted without knowing which platform to go from, which train to get, what car to get on when it did come and all our luggage piled up for everyone to stare at.
The tickets are incomprehensible, there are too many people and the rush when the train actually arrives is astonishing. The guy in Madras obviously though it would be a good idea to put us in a First Class Air-Conditioned car,2 being poor foreigners in strange heat. But the windows are blacked out so it seems like it is dusk and every minute of dark palm trees and rice fields is one minute further from home.
I was crying and I could tell C. desperately wanted to comfort me but I wasn't sharing. It was my own catharsis, my own personal adjustment and I wanted to do it alone. Every few minutes someone comes down the carriage selling tea, coffee and assorted foul smelling foods, with such annoying nasal voices! It was mayhem inside my head, allowing myself to get overwhelmed, I think. I'm trying to absorb everything because it will become my life.
When we reached Madurai we were met by Bishop Pothirajulu who bundled us into a huge black car driven by a weird, grinning man and took us to our Madurai home. I've completely lost my sense of direction...
The heat is sweaty and it's impossible to breathe.
- This is the first taste of Indian insanity – the roads! Except where there are concrete partitions, there don't appear to be any kind of rules regarding who goes where, or how fast is sensible. My Culture Shock book outlines the only real rules as: 'biggest has right of way' and a variation of this: 'he that has the loudest horn...' This is fairly accurate. We were in a very small Bedford van which meant that our driver could nip in anywhere, and 'nip' he did, with terrifying accuracy amidst the claustrophobia of too much traffic, too much heat and the terrible cacophony of deafening horns...
- AC cars are the lifesaver for foreigners, being a welcome break from the terrible heat of India. The trains have three classes, third class has wooden seats and too many people; second class has plastic 'cushioned' seats and too many people; first class is air-conditioned, with as many people as there are seats and you can't open the blackened windows. If you want views you have to put up with the heat! Each class has sleepers which are booked as they are available, so if you want a seat they are probably the way to go, especially if you are travelling far. Here however, I hated the AC because it was cold and claustrophobic and not what I needed. I wanted to immerse myself, not hide.
Awwww poor little Dave, hope things pick up for our hero. Mount Doom is such a long way, god speed young man.
I have a feeling he might be alright, but there's a rocky rock ahead, ohyes!