monday morning: chennai train station

The bus pulled into Chennai exactly when they told us it would - 6am, and the autorickshaws are zipping around the city before the morning traffic starts. We have a few hours to waste in between the overnight bus we just took from Kodaikanal until our train to Kolkata departs. The sun has only been up for an hour and I've already bought bananas (note: I eat bananas now - really!), eaten masala dosai, and lost one of my blue Roos (sad!)

farewell blue roo

I'm beginning to get used to living like this: constantly moving, sleeping on buses, roaming around totally foreign places I had never even heard of until recently, telling cab drivers I don't want to go anywhere, and no, I don't need a room, even if it is 'cheap price!'. While walking to our new friend's (Sir James of Skipper and Ellen) rented cottage in Vatakanal on Saturday night, to eat dinner in their 'dining room', I had the feeling that I really had no idea where I was: I knew which direction I was walking in, I knew how to find their cottage, but in essence, I was on a mountain path in a remote area of south India, with a Nick and a flashlight, which we were eagerly using to scan for monkeys. This is a little different than spending my Saturday night deciding if I should take my bike or get a ride to the bar. Dinner was fantastic, dal and eggplant curry prepared by the woman who rents the cottage to them. Although we were still hanging out with Westerners (the British), it felt like we were peeling away at least one level of the tourist scene.

And here we go, in one hour we will board the two day train to the north, traveling up the eastern coast. I really don't know what to expect from Kolkata - probably everything that a big city usually has (pollution, crowds, slums, traffic). Kolkata is described as the 'intellectual capital' of India, and I am looking forward to its many bookstores. We'll walk around, eat north Indian food (farewell abundance of 'Pure Veg' restaurants), pick up some major city supplies, and book a ticket to Darjeeling, where we will tackle the Himalayas.