En route to the hills

Thousands marched for a new state of Gorkhland.




The train from Kolkata was clean and comfortable, except for the passengers: a woman had 2 small children which she was plying with sugar and caffeine - when she ran out of coke, she gave them sweet tea. The younger was still in nappies. So, predictably they squealed, screamed, shouted, cried, climbed, ran, jumped on the seats and made themselves a considerable irritant to all the passengers until they finally gave out after 11pm. We ordered dinner, but gave up at 10:30 and went to bed without. Unfortunately in Kolkata I picked up an unwelcome hitchhiker in my gut and remained awake all night. A passenger gave us some invaluable advice and suggested we stay at the retiring rooms at the railway station at Siliguri. Enormous room with 15 foot ceilings and very clean - $3 each. The only down side is the occasional VERY loud locos tooting from very close proximity. Our plans here are so fluid that they are sploshing about. We read in the paper the other day (you could check Times of India website) about some agitation at Darjeeling; riots, teargas, lathi charges (that means the cops mercilessly beating people with bamboo sticks) and a lock down of businesses. Hmmm, maybe we should go to Plan B. So we arrived at Siliguri and checked the place to obtain permits for Sikkim; ah, closes every second Saturday for some reason, maybe (this is India after all), as well as Sunday. So now we are thinking to go back to Plan A and go to Darjeeling anyway although there is more agitation planned for Monday apparently. We can just keep out of the way, and I read the ATMs will still function. I don't know if we are at higher altitude here - the train didn't seem to climb, but the weather is far more agreeable than Kolkata. I would have liked to have gone to Belur Math and Dakshineshwar up river a short distance, but it was just a bit too hot to do that. Another time.