Some 30 odd years ago, oldgreytravel was not so old nor so grey and was in the middle of an epic overland journey from London to Sri Lanka. After 3 months on the Indian Sub-Continent, it was time to move on – this is an extract from my journal at the time. It reflects my personal views and experiences at the time. Any grammatical quirks are original and retained so as to maintain the integrity of the journal.
14 January 1982
We left Madras on Tuesday morning after a hamster-like breakfast – the last decent meal we are going to have for some time. The train down to Rameswaram must be one of the slowest in India – it seems to stop at every station, however small – and the 650km journey takes 24 hours to complete. Also, as our 1st class coach is unattended, our compartment is used by all and sundry, who seem to jump in and out at will. At night, we lock the door, first having to eject a policeman, and the corridor outside is full of Indians (second class ticket holders) who can find no other place to stay. At 6.30am, one of our fellow travellers goes to the toilet and leaves the door open – in they pile and plunge themselves down on my bunk. Consequently, I rise and sit staring out the window at the passing countryside. At 9.00, a ticket collector comes and ejects all the 2nd class passengers from our carriage. They go grumbling and complaining.
By midday, I have finished the Time magazine I have brought with me and resort to looking out of the window, day-dreaming. Outside, fields of brilliant green rice paddies with groups of brightly-clad women stooping and bending, harvesting the crop. The odd village and small town flashes past, but this area is not heavily populated, not like the north, and not so poor or dirty either. Around this time the train changes from electric to steam and the little specks of coal dust and soot fly back and through the window covering everything with a fine, gritty dust. The boredom is beginning to get to me – I should really never have to travel without reading matter again. Also, we are short of food because ants have overrun one of our loaves of bread.
The train arrives at Rameswaram at 10.00am. The ferry is to leave at 12.00 so we hurry to the ferry jetty, which in true Indian fashion is a mile away from the station down sandy, unmade roads – the rickshaw driver has to push his way through the worst of the sand. At the terminus, all is chaos. The ticket is purchased easily enough (money first having to be changed on the black market – there being no bank available – at an unfavourable rate) but the passage through customs is blocked by a mass of shoving, gesticulating and shouting Indians. Passage through them is made more difficult by the huge packages Indians seem to take with them wherever they go, they are just dumped all over the shed’s floor. Six separate groups of people inspect my passport, the last but one stamping it, the last checking that it had been stamped. It has taken an hour of constant hassle to get through.
Rameswaram is a shallow “port” and the boat is loaded by lighter – two wooden boats, crammed full of people and luggage, are towed out to the mother ship and then left there to unload. The boat returns to pick up two more lighters. It sounds efficient – it is not. We wait another five hours before the boat finally leaves at 4.30pm. By this time, we are hungry, thirsty and clear out of money.
The journey only takes 3 hours – after two, the Indians are up and forming a huddled mass around the exit area – 15 minutes before we dock, we join them. The point here is to get through customs and get on the train before the lower deck passengers are released, at present massing behind the barriers like caged animals. The process is quick and efficient – four officers in immaculate uniforms process the passports and the walk through customs is uninterrupted. On the station platform there is a bank, open and equipped to change our money – the train (to Colombo) is waiting at the platform, everything’s going smoothly. This couldn’t happen in India.
A slight hiccup at the booking office for the train mars the otherwise perfect landing facilities. A morose and obstreperous official refuses to sell tickets for about half an hour and instead shuffles around bits of paper and raises temperatures among those pressed against the windows. First one counter, then the other, are selling second class tickets and the crowd surges one way, then the other with each change in the weather. Finally, we have to book 1st class sleepers and what sleepers. Sheets and soft pillows, a private sink and mirror, a shared toilet and washbasin en-suite and all sparkling clean. Exhausted after 40 hours almost constant travelling, I fall readily asleep and wake refreshed about 7.00am to see the rich green paddy fields rolling past the window and groves of coconut palms and the occasional small railway station.
There is no longer any sea crossing between India and Sri Lanka. While the tone of this journal extract may seem somewhat jaundiced, it reflected my mood at the time after 3 long months travelling through the Indian sub-continent on a shoestring budget. Needless to say that time softened my experience enough to allow me to enjoy two more, month-long trips to the sub-continent, which remains, to me, the most memorable and fulfilling travel destination in the world
