Silīguri Junction, India / nancy lehet / rtw / why cant we all just get along?

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why cant we all just get along?

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Silīguri Junction, India
26° 43' N 88° 26' E
Feb 05, 2007 07:48
Distance 39km

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why cant we all just get along?

Text written in: English

a few nights ago in darjeeling an asian guy told me in broken english about 'some strikes that shut the busses down to nepal'. huh?!

best I could tell from him, maybe it'd last a couple more day but his info was super sketch. there's a petrolium strike in kolkata so I assumed this finally hit northern cities. I knew the strike was ending, so figured he had old info and by the time I got there it'd all blow over.

so I said goodbye to a (still!) cloudy/rainy darjeeling & hopped a jeep back to silliguri. in the jeep, I met an awesome australian girl - teaching in china the past 2 years, traveling the past 4 months and was weeks away from going home - she was so excited! her positive energy made another jam-packed jeep ride complete with blaring hindi pop and an insane driver passing on switchbacks in thick fog into something completely enjoyble.

by the time I got to my hotel, I was feeling a vibe about india I'd never had before. was I really getting used to this place? did it just atke this long to get comfy? could I actually end up missing this?! or.... was I just damn happy to get out? as if I needed an answer, within minutes my happy-vibe was crushed, tho its not 100% india's fault this time.

turns out the 'strike' has nothing to do with kolkata pertrolium, its protests in southeastern nepal. here's the deal: now that the maoists have 'won' a legit place in government, the SE regions are pissed they didn't get more power with the deal too. they were aligned with the maoists all these years ("we want some respect too!") and now feel they got short changed in the results. blocking highways is the best way to get government attention (for sure not through your elected officials) so who knows how long til the govt reacts. lucky me.

at this point, theyre protesting the heck out of major cities in the southeast - exactly where I was supposed to go. been going on for 15 days with no end in sight. no reliable border crossing are open (except one in the far west ). even if you got across, no reliable busses. and definitely NOT running on time (heard of tourists doing 40k in a rickshaw cause the bus couldnt get through).

oy. are you shitting me?

sucks I'm trying to meet up with peeps for treking (it really doesn't, but you know what I mean) or the delay would be no big deal. but now i feel a sense of urgency to make this problem go away.

over dinner, I list options to keep my brain from exploding. there are like 7 bus/train/plane combos to get from A to B. ironically, the one good border crossing goes through an indian city with it's own share of problems - protests, a girl that got raped by the police, trains from kolkata set on fire, etc etc. well, that sure makes me feel good....

but for once in my life, I decide to throw money at the problem and pick the safest option (was thinking of you mom :). as much as I know none of this violence is directed at tourists, seems it's pretty likely I'd at least be affected by it (delays, stops etc). since I'm trying to meet peeps, I need something reliable so option #7 it is: train to kolkata, fly to kathmandu.

and ya know what? it all came together! took 4 hrs running around siliguri in the rain getting reservations/money/tickets but I got what I needed. and in the end, I get to kathmandu a day earlier and with no torturous nepal night bus. and no protests, or delays, or pissed off protestors. whew.

and best part of all? 'throwing money at the problem' only amounted to $130US. I absolutely love cheap countries...

(sush if you're thinking "but this would never happen in the US...")

and below are a few picks from the hilltop temple in darjeeling - an absolutely magical place of hindu & buddhist temples all loaded down with prayer flags. clouds were stuck in the trees the day I was there - just added to the overall amazingness of it all. and then the monkeys came out. superb send-off from d-town.