I thought I'd be settling in New York, but life has taken a sudden turn (thus vindicating my resistance to acquire anything at all and my propensity for throwing shit out). Having given up our flats in London and New York Pete and I are now like two snails, carrying our homes around on our backs as we travel around before moving to Cairo for the next year. Like snails, we are also sticky and slimy because we are SO HOT in India. It is 42 degree celsius here - that is 107.6 degrees fahrenheit! After a quick detour from BKK because of escalating civil violence, we landed in Calcutta and have been trying to get to my grandparents house in Jamshedpur for the last 3 days. It is only a 3.5 hour journey, but our plans were repeatedly thwarted. The first day, we weren't allowed on the train due to a peculiarity of the Indian railways called the waitlist system. The second morning, we woke up at 5 am in the hopes of getting a same day ticket, only to find out that a maoist rebel insurgency bombing along the route had affected all trains to Jamshedpur. We were finally able to get here today, after a sweatylicious journey in second class non-AC. For those of you not in the know, that just means a mighty hot sandwich between fat old ladies, being treated like a human leaning post, and being hassled by a vendor/singer/beggar/transsexual every 10 minutes.
For your viewing pleasure - our journey:
