Commuter Chaos

Another one for the books my friends.

On Tuesday morning at 9 am, we left Hikkaduwa after a tearful goodbye with our friends who we had spent the last two months hanging out with. Boarded an (airconditioned!) bus for Colombo for three hours (which seems like six in Sri Lanka...public transit could still use some work there), then another one hour bus to the airport before catching an hour and a half flight to Chennai.

No problems.

Arrival in Chennai in the scorching heat and humidity, the dust coming up in clouds around our feet, the air full of incense and smoke and the smells of chai and chappati.

A ten hour layover in Chennai during which we decided that our top priority was to SLEEP. 12:30 Wednesday morning-slash-afternoon, after a delicious sleep on an almost clean mattress in an almost respectable guesthouse, we headed to the train station. Destination: Hampi.

Now those of you who have been to India will know that when you take a train or bus here, generally the departure time is reliable. The arrival time, we were to discover, is not.

The plan was thus: 6 hour train to Bangalore, three hour layover, 12 hour train to Hospet (E.T.A. 10:30 in Hospet) and then a 30 minute rickshaw ride to Hampi to round it all out.

Totally reasonable.

Except as you can imagine, that's not quite how things turned out. After all, this is India.

The train to Bangalore was uneventful - as we headed north the landscape moved from desert browns and greys to monsoon greens, and the earth changed from dusty beige to fertile red. Hundreds of Indians wearing every colour of the rainbow swirled around us, young boys selling tea and toys weaved down the aisles calling out their wares.

The layover in Bangalore was equally calm and collected: paneer butter masala and roti for dinner, a quick toothbrushing at the sink in the back of the train station restaurant, and then we headed down the tracks to look for our spots on the overnight sleeper that was to take us twelve hours north to Hospet.

We boarded a typical sleeper train wagon, wading through a sea of peanut shells, plastic wrappers, mud and unidentified liquid to get to the thin blue plastic 'mattresses' which would be our home for the next 12 hours (allegedly).

16 hours, zero food, one bottle of water and eighteen thousand million kilometers in the pouring rain (yes it rained all the way from Bangalore) later, we finally pulled into Hospet train station in the middle of what appeared to be a moonsoon storm.

Pushing our way through a sea of ruby reds and pinapple yellows, children screaming, rain pouring down and wind howling, Sandy managed to barter our tuk tuk down to a reasonable rate to take us the final 30 minute stretch to our new home on Hampi Island.

Or so we thought.

Arrival in Hampi Bazaar, the rain soaking our tropical travel outfits (we were SO unprepared for foul weather, my toes were prunes by this point), our rickshaw driver had some bad news.

"Full river. Closed. No going possible to island tonight. Better you stay here."

Hells no. We came this far, we're not giving up cause of a stupid river. Duncan was on the other side of that km wide stretch of water and we were DETERMINED to get to him.

So we hopped back in the rickshaw to drive 50 km around to the other side of the island. Supposedly it could be done.

"But must take care. Cyclone."

Cool.

Driving through a cyclone in a three wheeler, wearing a tank top and flip flops.

2 freezing cold, rain soaked hours later, we arrived at the bridge across the river. And by bridge I mean washed out road that now blends into the river completely.

Panic at the disco. What on earth were we supposed to do now?

Suddenly out of a nowhere a jeep came screaming by.

"STOP!" we screamed, as I hurtled myself out of the tuk tuk and into the cyclone, chasing after the vehicle.

"Please please please can you try to take us across?" I asked, the rain plastering my already soaking wet hair to my cheeks. "We'll pay, we'll pay!"

So Sandy, myself, our two backpacks and two small daypacks clambered into the trunk of the jeep, trying to wrap our bodies around spare tires and empty crates, and crossing our fingers that the crossing would work.

Nope.

Two meters in, the jeep reversed.

"Not possible. Must go back Hampi"

So we got out of the trunk and back into the rickshaw, and drove another two and a half hours back to where we first started in Hampi Bazaar.

+24 hours of trains, 5 hours in a three wheeler, cyclones, landslides, washed out roads and a (hot!) shower later we were finally at a destination....even if it wasn't our intended one.

Welcome to India.