Getting from Point A-B ( the final part of a Kashmir story)

After Srinagar, I end up flying to Jammu to catch a train (I have yet to buy a ticket).
The swarms of people at the train station is a really beautiful image, that is until I realize that I have to stand in that line... I decide to play the lost tourist card and head straight for the head of ticketing office.
-You're not supposed to be in here
-Oh? Um, can you help me get a ticket.
-Go stand in line
-But I don't know what train to take, I need to go to New Delhi today (its true, I don't know which train to take!)

After a complicated procedure involving filling out a form with my name, age, and gender (to identify me on the train), he hands me a ticket for 300 rupees (6$) for a 2nd Class Non-AC sleeper cart, with reserved bench. I ask him if there are any seats in the A/C cart (figuring this may be more comfortable), he says "You don't need that, and its double the price". I figure, "oh, well I guess this must be fine then, what with wind and everything". I mean, everything is cheap in India, this is pretty much the price of 2 meals, so I'm sure it'll be fine.... Sure...


I get to Tara's the next day, covered in a disgusting combination of sweat (most of it my own), and dirt (most of it from my bench), and smelling of the urinals at the end of the cart. She tells me that I had actually bought a ticket to what Namrata (Tara's younger sister) charmingly calls the "cattle cart".

The train pulls up, I look at the one cart with no lights on, I pray silently "Please don't let this be my cart", knowing that it is. I stand in front of it, trying to decide whether or not to enter. I stood there dreading for a good 10 minutes. The first moment inside the cart, I inhale the fragrat smell of crap (bathrooms next to the door of course), which invades the whole cart. I find my seat. There are 2 numbers above the bench, that must mean that I have half a bench to sleep on. Right...
Then 3 guys sit next to me.
AW CMON!
Then 1 of the guys leans close to me
"My friend, where are you from?" "where are you going:" "are you married?" "No? Why not? You have a girlfriend, no?" "whats your girlfriends name?" "why is she not travelling with you" "May I have Canadian souvenir of this conversation? Canadian money?" "whats your phone number in Canada?"
I invent a story about my "girlfriend" who is travelling through Europe while I travel across India, we will meet in Turkey and then get married on the isles of Greece.
I didn't actually, although I should've...  Instead, he tells me about his life, while squeezing ever closer to me.
I can't believe that I'm going to be on this train for 12hours.
He is a soldier, posted at the Kashmir border, and is going home to Jaipur to see his wife. He sits closer to me still (The way he looks at me has me convinced that his wife and him don't have very good intimate marital relations) (The way he relates to some of the other male soldiers has me convinced that he doesn't have very good marital relations). Then the guy on the bench above lets his feet hang down. He is barefoot and strategically positioned so that his feet block my view of the rest of the cart. Probably a good thing.
All I can think is: 12 hours....
I take out my book and pretend to read. This works, he looks away. Then he looks back, takes my book from me and starts looking at it, showing it to his friend (see prior post about the close relations between soldiers and monkeys). My book was rifled through several times during that night, not once with my permission...
12 hours....
I just noticed that a baby has been crying this entire time.
12 hours...

And then, the Deus Ex Machina. A man who I totally ignored in the train station ended up in the same cart as me. He comes up to me and says "is this your seat?", I look at him, feeling helpless, "Yes"- I wonder if he's going to try to squeeze in too... He says "Then why are these 3 people sitting here?", and I say "I don't know, aren't they allowed?". He looks at my ticket, and then starts yelling at the guys next to me in Hindi. Next thing I know, I'm alone on my bench. I thank him profusely.
And the feet? The conductor came along, and yelled at the guy saying something along the lines of "You have a whole bench and you stick your feet in people's faces!"--- I can only assume that thats what the conductor said as the result was the dude moving his feet out of the way.

I lock up my pack. I pull out my newly bought sleeping bag (I had an intuition before getting to the train station that I might need one), and sleep on top of it with the window open. Best sleep ever. Once you embrace the smell, the crowded space, the sweat, and the utter crazyness of it all, everything becomes alright. The train rocks you to sleep. Through the isolating music of your iPod, you hear a distant lullaby of "Tea, samosa" as the "wallas" move past you throughout the night.

The next morning, I'm awoken by the many people who decide that despite the sleeping person, the bench is now public property. They squeeze onto the bench one by one until we're a cozy 5 on the bench. Of course, the train's last hour into Delhi is from 9-10am, so caters to commuter traffic. Its alright though, because there is nothing quite like looking out the window of a train and admiring the passing landscape. As confining as a train should be, the moment you look in the other direction, everything opens up.

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A moment from Delhi:

I was in an auto-rickshaw today. These are 3 wheelers with motorcycle engines, riddled with dents, no actual windows or doors, that weave through traffic like its nobody's business. It's as if a Montreal driver were suddenly told: Here's a vehicle that you can scratch up, and feel free to ignore any moving objects--- bike paths and sidewalks are also viable routes if the traffic is too intense, beware of angry pedestrians; hit them before they hit you. As we sped through (and I literally mean THROUGH) New Delhi traffic, I thought to myself "I know this feeling, I've felt it before". Its not fear, what is it... OH! It's the Indiana Jones ride at Universal Studios!!!
Conclusion 1: the next Indiana Jones movie NEEDS to have an auto-rickshaw chase scene..
Conclusion 2: Replace all theme-park rides with auto-rickshaws.
Conclusion 3: Must spend day in auto-rickshaw.
Conclusion 4: If Delhi had snow, this would be crazy-mad-awesome fun.
Conclusion 5: I want one.