Terrible Train.

Despite our great train experience on Saturday, Sunday's journey convinced me to never again ride an Indian train.  After an hour and a half delay, during which we stood on the sweltering heat of the tracks, surrounded by flies, people lying on the ground and peeing on the tracks, and human feces piled on the rails, we boarded our "AC Sleeper" car.  We enjoyed a few minutes in a dirty yet manageable set of seats before being kicked out by the conductors.  

Our real "seats" were small compartments above the seats - basically where you'd put your luggage on a Western train.  The bed/seats were filthy, sticky, and windowless.  We couldn't both fit in one (the ceiling was so low, we couldn't sit upright), so we had to be in separate units the whole ride (and couldn't even see each other).  At one point, I used the bathroom.  It was just a hole in the floor of the train, meaning everything everyone dropped down there just fell onto the tracks.  No wonder the station smelled so bad.

The ride was only supposed to be 3 hours ... 7 hours later, we departed.  Stiff, starving, thirsty, sweaty ...

We fought our way through the Delhi train station, argued with cab and rickshaw drivers, almost got ripped off a number of times, and finally arrived at my ghetto hotel.  Booth was off for the airport within minutes.

You can only imagine how I cried like a baby as I waved goodbye to him - alone in a dirty room, hungry, exhausted, and wishing we had been able to spend our last day together.  Only three more weeks ...