22nd to 24th December: Leaving Bodhgaya and the long journey to Khardah

We had left the visit of the Thai Buddhist temple and of the Archeological museum for our last day in Bodhgaya.  After check-out, we left our bags at the hostel under the supervision of a small rodent who just slipped under a pile of boxes when we entered. Reassured that our bags were in safe paws, we went out for breakfast at our favourite Tibetan restaurant. We tried a couple of Tibetan specialties such as the roasted barley porridge which was quite tasty and very filling (as I tried to fight off John's spoon), and walked to the Thai Buddhist temple.

The temple and the Archeological museum were unfortunately both closed, but for different reasons. The temple was closed during lunch time and would reopen around 2pm, whereas the museum was affected by a power cut. The last item on our program for the day was to go back to Mahabodhi Temple in search for some peace and quiet, away from the noisy streets and the touts. To our dismay, there were even more people that day, so we turned back. After a quick internet session to print our tickets and check the latest status of the train, we had lunch at the restaurant of one of the top-end hotels. It was very quiet, and offered a great retreat from the overcrowded city (although the food was nothing exciting).

The Thai Temple's rich and colourful ornaments were in stark contrast to the sober Japanese temples. Inside, monks were praying but people were still allowed to have a look.

The richly-decorated Thai Buddhist temple

Monks praying inside the Thai Buddhist temple

In the Archeological museum, our next stop, we focused most of our attention on the 2000 year old pillars and railings rescued from the Mahabodhi temple. They used to surround the temple and support the Bodhi Tree. Unfortunately, we had not thought of requesting a photo permit from the Delhi office to be allowed to used our camera inside… but this page has a picture of one that was taken to the V&A.

Our bags were miraculously intact when we picked them up from the hostel.  We tucked them up in an auto rickshaw and set off for a bumpy and exhilarating 30 min ride to Gaya (auto rickshaws are a lot of fun but it is hard to take your eyes away from the road given the hectic traffic). 

In Gaya, we checked into our "wonderful" hostel. It was pretty bad and I will thus spare you the details. I was really glad that we would only be staying for one night. It was not really pleasant enough to stay in for any longer than absolutely necessary so we quickly left to find an internet cafe and book train tickets for the next sections of our trip. Our train was then scheduled to be two hours late, which would mean waking up at 5:30am instead. 

There was only one restaurant mentioned in the Lonely Planet. Apart from another rodent visitor running between the tables (thankfully, we were wearing our walking boots), it was ok. It also had the advantage of being close to the hostel and in front of the train station. 

During the night, John went to the station to check the latest update about the train. When he checked at 2am, the train was scheduled for 7:30 am.  At 7am, for 9:50 am. And so on: 10:50am, 12:50pm, 2:30pm, 3:20pm…and finally, when we had almost lost hope, it arrived. It was 6:30pm and it was high time. It was getting darker and the rodents were starting to be bolder around us. The silver lining is that we caught up on writing posts for the blog in the relative comfort of the restaurant.

From 3:30 to 6:30pm, we had been sitting on the platform and had watched people go by. Two trains that had transported coal (imported from Australia apparently) stopped on each side of the platform. A few young kids rushed in the empty wagons and filled up their bags with what they could find, i.e., mostly coal powder. They were all covered in coal but seemed very satisfied with their loot.  Despite their black attire, they could hardly be distinguished from the rest of the street kids whose clothes were far from clean.

Fruit sellers on platform 2

Shortcut to enter the train

A little rodent

Kids picking up bits of coal

Another striking sight was those three kids looking for food among the rubbish thrown away by people on the rail tracks, and thereby competing with rats, crows and dogs. This was probably the most desperate act we had witnessed so far, and yet they went around in a routine manner.  

The train (the Rajdhani Express) was worth the wait: it was heated; we were given clean sheets, a pillow and a blanket; and most importantly, we could pull curtains to have a bit of privacy. Such comfort was well worth the price difference between the sleeper class and the AC 2 tier. Shortly after departure, they served some food, and we quickly fell asleep.

At last, the train arrived!

We arrived at Howrah station in Calcutta at 1:15am. Unsurprisingly, there was no sign of the Crawl Society representative who was supposed to pick us up. We called Crawl and found out that because it was so late it was unsafe to drive out to Khardah that night.  We thus hopped in a taxi in search of a room in Kolkata for the night. Most of the hotels in the touristy area of Sudder Street were booked. Thankfully, the taxi managed to find a hotel which had one last room. It was reasonably clean (and we were too tired to be fussy) and we had a good night's sleep.

In the morning, we had some trouble getting the hot water to work but John was not going to give up, so the reluctant staff finally let us use the shower in another room. The Crawl representative met us in the hotel lobby and we hopped in a taxi not quite sure to where we were heading.

After an hour's drive through destitute neighbourhoods, we arrived in the friendly town of Khardah, a northern suburb of Kolkata. Boby, a permanent member of Crawl, showed us around the flat. We dropped our bags and walked to the school where around 20 kids were gathered for a Christmas party. We received a very warm welcome as "uncle and auntie", which quickly dissipated our tiredness after the long journey of the day before.

We sat with the kids on the rugs laid on the ground to watch the various performances. First, younger kids recited some English poems, which was really sweet. Then, came the turn of older ones who sang and danced. We managed to avoid embarrassing ourselves too much and declined dancing but performed our best "We wish you a Merry Christmas".

In the evening, we felt quite lazy and had some ready-made soup and pasta for dinner, which was not tasty but very quick. It took us some time to adjust to the hard wooden beds, but we finally fell asleep and were feeling reasonably rested at 5am the next day, ready for the first Crawl Society project.