To Delhi, To Shimla

That Sinking Feeling
Two and a half months of meticulous preparation went into the pre-departure of this new story. But sometimes, you can miss the most obvious.

On June 16th, I heeded my brother's advice, and headed out on the 2:30 p.m. airport bus to Logan Airport for my 6:15 p.m. departure out of Boston. Be really early, just in case there are any problems on the way. The puzzlement I'd suffered for the previous week over time zones and flight durations and arrival times still had me unsettled, so I was once again reviewing my shorthand itinerary. My return flights from Anchorage to Boston, Amy's return flights from Anchorage to Delhi, and my return flights from Delhi to Boston were all carefully condensed onto the back inside corner of my journal. And suddenly I had worked out the math: it never added up because I'd been looking at the departure time for my flight out of Boston back to Anchorage on August 12th. My other departure out of Boston, the one I was on the bus to the airport for, actually left at 9 a.m.- 6 hours ago. I'd missed the plane! As undelievable as it was, it was easily believed by the ticket agent, and I was able to finagle my way to London and then Delhi, arriving just minutes before AMy. Unfortunately, all the jetway stands were full, so we set on the tarmac at Indira Gandhi International Airport until Amy had quite left the terminal on the pre-arranged pick-up, fully expecting to meet me at the hotel, which I had presumably arrived at 12 hours earlier. After a cat and mouse game- when I arrived at the hotel on my own, I found that she'd already left with a driver to go back and get me at the airport, since I had emailed ahead and asked for her pick-up driver to wait and get me too but the message got crossed somewhere. Eventually we were altogether with our tattered bike box and our musty but functional air conditioner running on our 4th floor hotel in the Pahar Ganj area of Delhi.



Delhi
Whatever assault on our senses or sensibilities, none of that happened. We ate street food, had (yogurt) Lassis with ice, pomegrante juice from a common street seller's cup and escaped without the notorious Delhi belly, without beggars beseiging us, without anything more than an occassional whiff of human excrement, urine and garbage. We walked all over town, surivivng the 95+ degree temperatures and 70% humidity. So many last minute errands, a reconnaisance visit to the train station and a delightful cold beer. That was Delhi.
The train was more like Asia. We learned where to go and what to do and arrived at the station at 4:45 a.m. the next morning. It was classic. We had been told the day before that we should check our bikes all the way to the hill station of Shimla, and that the train crew would do the transfer at the connecting station. But this morning there was just a grouchy guy and he only would book the bikes to Kalka. So we registered our bikes just for the first leg and then the guy said to bring them to the shed. He just pointed in a general direction and kept repeating: "the shed." After several exasperated minutes of wandering around, I returned to the man who finally walked me to "the shed" which was just the loading station opposite the registration desk. The confusing thing was that all I was to do was remove the panniers, deliver the bikes to this spot, return to the registration desk to pay the baggage fee, and then return to that spot with the receipt. Why I couldn't pay when I was first at the registration desk was beyond me. Even more, we then had to hand carry all our bags while the train workers wheeled the cycles halfway across the station to our departure platform on the other side. I finally insisted on re-attaching the panniers to let the bikes carry the load, but that was only acceptable when the worker understood that I myself would push the cycle. Evidently he was only paid to carry the freight that was registered.
When we got out of the train in Kalka, about 5 hours to the north, we had to switch to a narrow gauge railway known as the Toy Train. When it became apparent that this train had no baggage car, I clandestinely whisked the bikes into our assigned carriage when no one was looking. I certainly wasn't going to part with them to have them sent tomorrow on the train that did have a baggage car. It was crowded in our little car, but our small set of seats held just us and a delightful Indian family. The man, a Minister of Culture in the Indian government, kindly assisted us in blocking the rear toilet and exit with our cycles and then proceeded to invite us to share his family's home cooked picnic. Not only was it a fantastically delicious hot meal of panner and dahl and chapati and tomato, we each got our own sweet, juicy, messy mango for desert. It seems the true hospitality of these people has only just begun to envelop us, as it has continued for these past few days.

Time's Up
I'd love to write more, but the dear girl who invited us to dinner is waiting patiently outside this Shimla cyber cafe so we have to go. We've enjoyed our 2 days in this Indian tourist destination- look it up on line- the former British summer capital of India. We'll see you next time.