So it is the last morning of my stay in India and I am officially 1/3 through my whole trip - at some ungodly hour tonight I shall board my plane and fly to Perth (albeit for some reason I can't understand I am adding on about 12 hours to the trip by flying there via Dubai...)
Tamil Nadu is completely unique, The people are kind and sooooooo hospitable - they will go completely out of their way for a friend or even a confused visitor & their music is definitely unique - tip: Anyone visiting Chennai must bring a new, healthy ipod filled with thousands of western songs or risk suffering an anuerysm caused by hearing the same 3 songs nonstop everywhere you go... The only reason I survived was by singing a compilation of broken Beatles lyrics and 80s Powerballads loudly to myself - it was as if they had never seen someone belting out Aerosmiths 'I don't want to miss a thing' before...
There have been some lows - the hospital, pollution and the withdrawal symptoms from McDonald's, but these were definately beaten 10:1 by the highs! I have had some great times here and i really will miss it... Just yesterday I visited Simiyon's village(Simiyon is one of the guys who run the Gummipoondi boys town and I really shall miss him!) and there we were sitting when one of Simi's friends drove up on a bike and took me back to see his baby boy... He was this tiny little bundle and I found out he was only 2 days old. I asked what his name was and the dad replied 'why don't you name him'...
Instantly my head was full of a dozen different suggestions including (and I'm not proud to admit these) Sonic, Zeus, T-dog or McNugget; but then I realised that the Father was completely serious - he really wanted me, someone he had known for just 10 minutes to name his only child a christian name and wish for him to be healthy. I held back my more immature side and thought deep and in the end christened the boy Paul after my own Dad... Wait a min - does this mean I'm the kids godfather?
Sorry this hasn't been a massive long essay of a post like normal but I have about 30,000 things to do before my flight... I will tell you this quickly though - this is the end of my trip in India but not the end of my blog... the content will completely change, the style will probably change just as much, I will almost certainly be even later in posting stuff up but I shall still be here on this site - until then Bye bye y'all! See you in Oz!!
Showing posts with label Departing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Departing. Show all posts
Monday, 1 February 2010
Friday, 11 December 2009
Waitlist...................................
OK, now i actually have several excuses for why its taken so long to publish a new post - these range from sporadic Internet connection, the worst power design in a building EVER and the fact that I just had my birthday so I had to 'ahem' celebrate in the Indian family fun sober way!
But seriously I have also spent the last 17 days stuck inside of the local 'Railways of India' corp ticket office... This is due to me deciding i was much to cozy and lazy here so i have completely changed my January schedule. Originally this consisted of me going to a different boys town and generally hanging round Chennai a bit longer but I decided to something a bit different, how i do not know though - I have somehow conveniently forgotten to work that bit out yet... but one part I know have decided (as with every other backpacker in the entirety of south Asia) to head to Goa for new years... if you haven't heard it is famous for its parties (esp. new year and on full moons - the full moon this year happens to be on the 31st - double party!!), it also has some of the best beaches in the world and is within a days travel from me - or so I thought...
I was impressed with myself as i walked into the ticket office on the morning of the 9Th of November for being so organised and early in booking a ticket... the hour long queue seemed like minutes and I didn't even notice the incorrect English on the reservation sheet... then I got to the lady at the counter and handed in the sheet thinking how wonderfully simple India is...
I first got the impression that this wouldn't be so easy when the lady opened her mouth and started talking with one of the thickest Indian accents I have ever heard - and it didn't help that she was only whispering over what i was beginning to notice was a more of a mad angry mob than a queue. I told her that 'I wanted to go from Chennai to Goa - though not on the direct train but through Bangalore' this was because the direct train only leaves once a week and it was leaving to early... She promptly spent the next ten minutes trying to book me on the direct train , (O.k. - I know it would be very easy to blame me here by saying she probably couldn't understand my accent, but I had handed her a sheet with the exact itinerary of what I wanted) - when I pointed this out she then spent ten minutes undoing everything before typing it back in and ending up with the same direct train... as soon as she realised this she told me I had filled the form out incorrectly and she started helping the customer next to me. After four more attempts at filling out the form she finally accepted it (I only actually filled out two forms - the one that in the end she accepted was the same one she had turned down - I just gave it to her again without her realising)
Eventually she worked out that a if a man wants to get from point A to point B but there aren't any direct trains he can connect through point C (point C being a place nicely in the middle of point A and B)... five minutes later it had even clicked into place that Point A: Chennai B: Goa C: Bangalore, a few bits of data entered in and BAM - a result!!! I would be wait-listed...
It turns out that whilst India has a population of about a billion people they actually have the rail capacity of Luxembourg. The trains are apparently so few and far between that to actually get some of them you have to tell your mum to start queueing before you have even left the womb... it is however very hit and miss because some trains fill up randomly and with no rhyme nor reason why there was a sudden boom in tickets...
so we checked about 37 different routes to Goa through the most roundabout ways possible all of them either impossible (ending up spending 3 days waiting in a rice paddy in the middle of nowhere) or *Tada* wait-listed behind 200 other people - One pretty major part of the problem is that there is a quota on the amount of foreigners on a train. It's obvious though if you think about it - too many white people in one place - we might break out into an impromptu game of golf...
So in the face of hoping that 200 people spontaneously decide not to go on that new years holiday trip I just did what any sensible person would have done - I walked out, drove home, logged on, had a cup of tea and booked me an overnight coach ticket on the world wide web...
** Apparently a lot of you can't leave messages - if you click the title of the post it takes you through to the posts individual page where you should be able to leave a comment
But seriously I have also spent the last 17 days stuck inside of the local 'Railways of India' corp ticket office... This is due to me deciding i was much to cozy and lazy here so i have completely changed my January schedule. Originally this consisted of me going to a different boys town and generally hanging round Chennai a bit longer but I decided to something a bit different, how i do not know though - I have somehow conveniently forgotten to work that bit out yet... but one part I know have decided (as with every other backpacker in the entirety of south Asia) to head to Goa for new years... if you haven't heard it is famous for its parties (esp. new year and on full moons - the full moon this year happens to be on the 31st - double party!!), it also has some of the best beaches in the world and is within a days travel from me - or so I thought...
I was impressed with myself as i walked into the ticket office on the morning of the 9Th of November for being so organised and early in booking a ticket... the hour long queue seemed like minutes and I didn't even notice the incorrect English on the reservation sheet... then I got to the lady at the counter and handed in the sheet thinking how wonderfully simple India is...
I first got the impression that this wouldn't be so easy when the lady opened her mouth and started talking with one of the thickest Indian accents I have ever heard - and it didn't help that she was only whispering over what i was beginning to notice was a more of a mad angry mob than a queue. I told her that 'I wanted to go from Chennai to Goa - though not on the direct train but through Bangalore' this was because the direct train only leaves once a week and it was leaving to early... She promptly spent the next ten minutes trying to book me on the direct train , (O.k. - I know it would be very easy to blame me here by saying she probably couldn't understand my accent, but I had handed her a sheet with the exact itinerary of what I wanted) - when I pointed this out she then spent ten minutes undoing everything before typing it back in and ending up with the same direct train... as soon as she realised this she told me I had filled the form out incorrectly and she started helping the customer next to me. After four more attempts at filling out the form she finally accepted it (I only actually filled out two forms - the one that in the end she accepted was the same one she had turned down - I just gave it to her again without her realising)
Eventually she worked out that a if a man wants to get from point A to point B but there aren't any direct trains he can connect through point C (point C being a place nicely in the middle of point A and B)... five minutes later it had even clicked into place that Point A: Chennai B: Goa C: Bangalore, a few bits of data entered in and BAM - a result!!! I would be wait-listed...
It turns out that whilst India has a population of about a billion people they actually have the rail capacity of Luxembourg. The trains are apparently so few and far between that to actually get some of them you have to tell your mum to start queueing before you have even left the womb... it is however very hit and miss because some trains fill up randomly and with no rhyme nor reason why there was a sudden boom in tickets...
so we checked about 37 different routes to Goa through the most roundabout ways possible all of them either impossible (ending up spending 3 days waiting in a rice paddy in the middle of nowhere) or *Tada* wait-listed behind 200 other people - One pretty major part of the problem is that there is a quota on the amount of foreigners on a train. It's obvious though if you think about it - too many white people in one place - we might break out into an impromptu game of golf...
So in the face of hoping that 200 people spontaneously decide not to go on that new years holiday trip I just did what any sensible person would have done - I walked out, drove home, logged on, had a cup of tea and booked me an overnight coach ticket on the world wide web...
** Apparently a lot of you can't leave messages - if you click the title of the post it takes you through to the posts individual page where you should be able to leave a comment
Monday, 2 November 2009
Wow... It's really happening!
Hi and welcome to my pathetic excuse of a blog!
Ok - so most people who read this will probably know me... and be amazed that I have actually got this trip organized! This is my first post on this or any other blog so please bare with me!
In 2 days I am leaving my home in Belgium and traveling to the UK where I will board a plane to Chennai in India. From there my trip will start...
I will travel to India, Australia & the USA.
First things first, however - Chennai. The Boys Town is a charitable organisation that teaches young Indian boys the skills they need to suceed in trade and of course life... My big brother James went a few years back and really enjoyed it so it was top on my list of priorities for my trip... I am facinated by the whole of the culture and history of the country and really want to go and meet the people that live there. I dont want to do the Thomson package tour of India nor do I want to live in luxury. I want to live, eat and sleep like a local, I want to be at the grassroots of the country - actually seeing the real India not the 5 star resort India.
I have virtually no plans for this trip apart from my flights and no preconceived expectations of what may happen... It is to be a year free from School, a year free from Duties and a year spent almost completely out of my comfort zone! I will be living with my pack on my back, the shoes on my feet, and the road steching in front of me into the distance. my main contact with my family and friends will be this blog.
I will try and post once more before I leave but now I have to pack a solitary 70 liter backpack with everything I need for a year... good times!
Tim
x
Ok - so most people who read this will probably know me... and be amazed that I have actually got this trip organized! This is my first post on this or any other blog so please bare with me!
In 2 days I am leaving my home in Belgium and traveling to the UK where I will board a plane to Chennai in India. From there my trip will start...
I will travel to India, Australia & the USA.
First things first, however - Chennai. The Boys Town is a charitable organisation that teaches young Indian boys the skills they need to suceed in trade and of course life... My big brother James went a few years back and really enjoyed it so it was top on my list of priorities for my trip... I am facinated by the whole of the culture and history of the country and really want to go and meet the people that live there. I dont want to do the Thomson package tour of India nor do I want to live in luxury. I want to live, eat and sleep like a local, I want to be at the grassroots of the country - actually seeing the real India not the 5 star resort India.
I have virtually no plans for this trip apart from my flights and no preconceived expectations of what may happen... It is to be a year free from School, a year free from Duties and a year spent almost completely out of my comfort zone! I will be living with my pack on my back, the shoes on my feet, and the road steching in front of me into the distance. my main contact with my family and friends will be this blog.
I will try and post once more before I leave but now I have to pack a solitary 70 liter backpack with everything I need for a year... good times!
Tim
x
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