Blogger blocked in China

Dear all, unfortunately the Chinese government has decided to block access to my blogger.com <http://blogger.com>  and facebook in the whole of China. I have, therefore, been unable to access my account and update my blog. My apologies for those who have visited regularly, looking for an update. 

I will try to circumvent this issue by "blogging by proxy" while in China: I'll send out updates by email, to be posted to my blog back in Europe. So expect to see regular updates to my blog again real soon! (although it will, unfortunately, be impossible to include pictures - I'll add them when I get to Mongolia).

Zàijiàn from Xi'an, China

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Day 4: Kolkata to Raxaul

I take a taxi from my hotel in the Salt Lake district to downtown Kolkata,. I’m dropped off at Park Street, supposedly the most famous street in old Kolkata. It might be the rain that forces me to stay within a 1 km radius of Park Street (it’s monsoon season here in East India), but I’m not very much impressed by the city. The traffic is not as bad as I’d thought and the poverty here is not much worse than I’ve seen it in other places in South-East Asia.

Taking a taxi in Kolkata during monsoon season

I spend some time at a little Indian café, enjoying a nice Chai tea and make my way to a bookstore across the street. I have a little browse in the Lonely Planet for Kolkata, and find out there’s actually not much to see in this particular area… unfortunately, I will have to make my way to the train station in about 1 hour, so there’s no chance of going to another part of town. I buy the first book in Stieg Larson’s Millenium trilogy: “ The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” and settle down in a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant for some lunch. I have a delicious Chicken Marsala and some of the best Naan bread I’ve ever tasted!

I get in a taxi a about 2pm and ask the driver to take me to Howrah station. Howrah is Kolkata’s sister town on the other side of the river. It will take almost 45 minutes to cover the 10km from Park Street.

Howrah station, is the largest and busiest railway station in India. When I get there, I have about 1 hour left before my train to Raxaul departs. I enter the station and am greeted by, I estimate, 20.000 to 30.000 fellow travelers, all looking for their train. I walk around for about 20 minutes, checking out the station and buying some supplies for my 18-hour journey: four 1 liter bottles of water and 4 slices of Walnut-Dade cake. 

Girl in the streets of Kolkata, selling food

Once I start feeling too dehydrated I notice a sign for the 1^st class waiting room. Although I don’t have a 1^st class ticket, I manage to get in (the guy at the door seems a bit confused by the ticket I printed, and decides to just let me in). The waiting room is airconditioned, and it’s very nice to cool off a bit (it’s about 35 degrees in Kolkata today).

After 20 minutes, I make my way to the train, the 3021 Mithila express. I’m in coach A1 (one of two air-conditioned coaches), seat/berth 30. The train looks quite old, but everything seems to be in working order. My fellow passengers are not in the mood for a conversation, so I spend much of my time reading my Stieg Larson book. (I don’t have a window seat, so there are sadly no pictures of this train ride… (the sun goes down two hours into the trip anyways)

My bed is to the side of the train, top bunk. There’s no window to look out of, and the bed itself is rather small: 180 x 50 cm… As I sleep with both backpacks in my bed, the space becomes even more cramped. I manage to sleep for about 3 hours that night.

I’m awoken around 6am by local tea vendors making their round through the train, shouting “Chai!, Chai!” As most people stay in their beds until the train arrives at Raxaul, at 10am, there’s not much for me to do then read… before we get to the border with Nepal, I have finished all 550 pages of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

The train pulls into Raxaul station, the final destination of the Mithila Express at 10am in the morning, I get off and now need to find my way to the border with Nepal and somehow get to Kathmandu before nightfall.

Namaste from Nepal,
Steven

What’s on my ipod today? Miike Snow: Black and Blue

Journey totals: distance (%) - time (km/h)

Train:    2639 km  (13.20%) -      54 hours     (49 km/h)

Taxi:         90 km  (00.45%) -      2.5 hours    (36 km/h)

Ferry:          2 km  (00.01%) -     0.5 hours       (4 km/h)

Car:             0 km  (00.00%) -        0 hours       (0 km/h)

Plane:    1800 km  (09.00%) -        0 hours       (0 km/h)

Total: 04531 km (22.66%) -  0059 hours (76.8 km/h)

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Day 3: Bangkok to Kolkata by plane

I finally board my Kingfisher flight IT0022 to Kolkata at 00.30am. Looks like I’m the only tourist on the flight. We leave promptly and the flight is nice and smooth, I have seat 1A so have some extra legroom. It will take about 2 hours to get to Kolkata. I talk a bit with the guy sitting next to me, he’s about my age and is returning to India from a business conference in Bangkok. He’s a ‘business coach’ which apparently is something like a strategy consultant for startups and SME’s, so we have something to talk about.

Get into Kolkata International Airport at 3am in the Morning, Thai time, last night. Am completely exhausted. Immigration is a breeze, an my backpack is one of the first to hit the luggage belt. For a city this big (xxx million), the airport is really small and very old. I adjust my watch to Kolkata time (GMT +5.5, we’re 1.5 hours behind Bangkok) and walk outside to find the stand for the pre-paid taxis closed at 8pm.  Guess I’ll be grossly overpaying for my taxi…

I Am directed to the domestic terminal, as I’ve been told there’s an ATM there, as well as a pre-paid taxi counter that’s still open. After a 5 minute walk, I find the ATM is there, the taxi counter is not. I get enough cash to make it to Raxaul tomorrow and ask one of the armed guards outside the terminal where I can get a reliable taxi. He thinks for a second or two and then calls out to one of his friends across the street. The guy has an actual official taxi, and after showing him the address and a little bit or bargaining I get in his car.

The drive to the hotel is not more than 20 minutes and I arrive there at 2.15am Kolkata time. I register and go straight up to my room. The room (306 on the third floor, not much of a view) itself is pretty decent and clean, it has two single beds and a working air-conditioning unit. I fall asleep at 2.30.

I wake up at 7am as the room service guy knocks on the wrong door. The breakfast he’s carrying is for 307. Now that I’m awake (I asked for a 8am wakeup call anyway), I decide to take a shower, get dressed and go explore Kolkata a bit before I catch my 15.45 intercity express train to Raxaul on the border with Nepal. Before I leave, I quickly run down to the reception desk to get a 77 rupee internet card and upload this update to my blog.

I was too exhausted to take any photo’s at the airport (Bangkok or Kolkata) last night, my next post will have more pics…

I’m off to explore Kolkata, next update will come from Kathmandu, Nepal!

Phir milenge from West-Bengal, India!

Steven

What’s on my ipod today? Seven days in sunny June by Jamiroquai

Journey totals: distance (%) - time (km/h)

Train:    1946 km  (09.73%) -      36 hours    (54 km/h)

Taxi:         60 km  (00.30%) -         1 hours    (67 km/h)

Ferry:          2 km  (00.01%) -     0.5 hours      (4 km/h)

Car:             0 km  (00.00%) -        0 hours      (0 km/h)

Plane:    1800 km  (09.00%) -        0 hours      (0 km/h)

Total: 03808 km (19.04%) -  0039 hours (96.4 km/h)

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Day 2/3: Butterworth to Bangkok by train

Wake up late this morning, my alarm clock failed to go off… it’s 11am (guess I really needed to catch up on some sleep) and I have to pick up my train ticket to Bangkok before 12 in Butterworth…

After getting dressed in a hurry I need to look for an ATM to get to money to pay for my ticket. I pick up some delicious Nasi Padang on my way to the port and enjoy my Malay breakfast on the ferry from Penang to Butterworth. Once on the other side, I have 5 minutes left to the train station and collect my ticket. Make a mental note to buy a cheap alarm clock at the airport in Bangkok as a backup for the alarm on my phone.

Leaving Penang by ferry

As my train is scheduled to leave at 14.20, I have about 2 hours left before I need to board. I decide to take a quick look around Butterworth. It turns out to be a very industrial town with several refineries and a sizable port. Georgetown (main city on the Penang peninsula) is much prettier, am glad I stayed there last night.

Get back to the train station with about 30 minutes left; spend my last Malaysian Ringits on supplies (provisions for a 22 hour train trip: two big bottles of water, a box of Pringles and some take-away Mee Goreng) and wait for my train to be announced.

Get up to go to my train when I hear the announcement in Malay. Am already to the door of the waiting area when the English announcement informs me my train has not yet arrived and will be delayed by 30 minutes… walk back to my seat (am sure I provided some amusement for the Malay waiting with me at the station)

My train to Bangkok ready for departure

Have a nice seat on the train (coach 10, seat 18), although backward facing an even seat number means I’ll have the bottom bed, which is very much preferable over the top one as it is about twice as wide. Luckily, the train has power sockets and I’m able to charge both my laptop and my phone. Once my laptop starts working again, I start working on my pictures and gather some thoughts for my next blog update.

I am about one hour into the journey when it becomes apparent that the two seats I assumed were for two people are actually supposed to accommodate four. The train ride becomes quite cozy for the next three hours.

My cabin on the train

Have a little chat with to girls who join take up the two seats opposite me. They’re on their way to university for their last semester before graduation. Take some time to tell them about my trip and show them on the map where exactly Holland is located. We find some common ground, as they’re both business admin students. Neither has ever left Malaysia (although their university is only 15 minutes from the Thai border). Nevertheless, they’re quite proficient in English so the conversation is quite lively.

After the students get off the train right before the border, the train is almost empty. The steward drops by to hand us our immigration forms and notifies us we’re about 10 minutes away from the border. After some inquiry, I find out the train is normally packed but with the recent troubles in Bangkok there’s a lot fewer people traveling there now. (the Friday train even got cancelled, guess I have to be lucky mine’s running as scheduled).

View from the train in Malaysia

Immigration on the Malaysia side is a bit tricky as I didn’t get a stamp while leaving Singapore, takes about 5 minutes to make the officer understand what happened. Thai immigration is a breeze, and less than 10 minutes after getting off the train at the border, I’m back in my seat, a cold big bottle of Chang beer waiting for me…

After enjoying a quick dinner (vegetable fried rice), I have a very pleasant conversation with three fellow travelers: a German student who has just finished an 8 month backpack adventure in Asia, a Mongolian foreign official who has been seconded to the Bangkok UNESCO office, and an American musicology scholar from New York who has lived in Malaysia for the last six years researching local song and dance of maritime tribes on the border between Malaysia and Thailand.

We talk a bit about his research and his travels in the region over the last 24 years (his first trip to Malaysia was in 1986) He tells me his research is centered around a (nearly) deaf violinist by the name of Abu Qasim who was responsible for spreading a certain type of Malay music (originating from Penang in the 1930’s) all the way up to Phuket in Thailand. (if you ever win a game of trivial pursuit with this little fact, please send me an email…)

Go to bed around 11pm, finish reading the National Geographic I bought in Singapore (this month’s edition has a wonderful feature on Greenland) and go to sleep around 11.30pm. The bed is quite comfortable, at least 1.20m wide and exactly 1.93m tall (measured against my 1.94m …)

Wake up around 7am in the morning, set my clock to Thai time and figure out it’s actually 6am… spend an hour or so looking out of the window, watching the Thai landscape flash by as the sun is slowly rising. Guess the locals also rise at 6am as every village we pass is more lively than the last.

View from my cabin as I wake up...

It’s around 8am when I get dressed, collapse the bed into two benches and take my seat for the remaining 3 hours of the journey. I spend some time experimenting with my camera’s sequential shooting ability, taking 240 pictures of the scenery flashing by at a 1 second interval, which I intend to process into a short movie once at the airport.

The interval movie

Around 11am the train pulls into Bangkok’s central train station. It’s an old building, neither ugly nor beautiful, that could definitely use some renovation effort. The station itself, as well as the surrounding area is swarming with people. I’m quite used to Bangkok’s crowded streets by now and it feels refreshing to be in a big city after spending 22 hours on the train.

Me in my cabin...

Make my way to the airport around 12, only to find out that my 4.35pm flight to Kolkata has been delayed until 23.50pm due to a strike at the Kolkata International Airport. I’m a little frustrated I’ll have to spend so much time at the airport today, at the same time relieved the flight didn’t get cancelled as I would have missed my train to Raxaul tomorrow.

Still four hours to go before I can check in and go through customs as I receive an email from my hotel in Kolkata informing me they’ve kindly given my reservation away to another guest… guess I will have 

to go look for another hotel when I get to Kolkata at 1am in the morning. There’s nothing like a good challenge I guess… ;)

Sawatdi from a rather boring Bangkok Suvarnabhumi International Airport, Steven

UPDATE: will be spending the night in Hotel The Sojourn in Salt Lake City... (I'm not kidding, that's actually a neighborhood in Kolkata :)

What's on my iPod today? Bob Marley: Don’t worry, be happy

Journey totals: distance (%) - time (km/h)

Train:    1946 km  (09.75%) -      36 hours    (54 km/h)

Taxi:         40 km  (00.25%) -         45 min    (67 km/h)

Ferry:          2 km  (00.01%) -         30 min      (4 km/h)

Car:             0 km  (00.00%) -        0 hours      (0 km/h)

Plane:          0 km  (00.00%) -        0 hours      (0 km/h)

Total:  01988 km   (10.00%) -  0037 hours (53.5 km/h)

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Day 1 - Singapore to Butterworth by train

Woke up way too early this morning (at 6.30!), finished packing my bag and got in a taxi to Singapore's Keppel Road Railway Station.

Packing for a 6 week trip

After buying some last minute supplies (cashew nuts, water and dried mango's), I went through Malaysian immigration before boarding my train. I'm in first class today (both to ease into this whole 14 hours in a train thing, and out of necessity as there were only first class tickets available), carriage N seat 3A.

My train out of Singapore

Really nice to see Singapore from a different perspective as I'm leaving the country today (have left by car, bus, plane, boat and on foot before, never by train). After about 30 minutes we reach Woodlands Checkpoint where I need to get off the train to go through Singapore Immigration. Once back into the train, we cross the water into Johor Bahru, Malaysia. My trip has now officially begun!

Singapore's Woodlands checkpoint

After leaving Singapore, the train takes about 6 hours to reach Kuala Lumpur, where we have a short stopover, unfortunately underground, as new passengers board the train. (in total there's about 20 stops between Singapore and Butterworth. 

Onboard the No 2 train from Singapore to Butterworth

All in all it's a very rewarding, but also exhausting, first day. Lots of new impressions and beautiful scenery (a train ride through the jungle really is something special), but I clearly need to get used to spending (half) days in the train. 

View from the train somewhere between KL and Penang

Tomorrow will be the next part of the trip: from Butterworth to Bangkok in 22 hours by sleeper train. Once in Bangkok, I'll have 4 hours to get to the airport and board my flight to Kolkata... let's hope there's no delays along the way!

Greets from Penang, Malaysia!

Steven

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