Under the radar

I wonder in how far traveling actually enables one to see the world through other eyes. Over the past months I have attempted increasingly to dig deeper. My solution: live as cheaply as possible.No hostels or guesthouses. Couchsurf, spend the night with somebody you met or put up a tent somewhere. Hitchhike, bike, walk, take the cheapest public transportation available. General Class, or GC, the lowest class in Indian trains, for example.

The passengers of the GC wagon at the very end of the train from Managlore down south to Trivandru were quite surprised when they saw me enter, but they smiled and I returned the head wobble. All Indians in this class and even one chicken, no tourists in here. The seats were full and a few people had been left to stand, but everybody was cheery. I steered towards a corner to find a place to lean on. A young man jumped up from his seat:
“Hello, Mr, please sit here.”
“No, don't worry, baba, keep your seat, I can stand, no problem.”
“Nono, please sit. Please!”
“Ok, but only if we switch later!”
“Ok then.”

We kept talking for the following six hours, about his family, my family, what we were both doing (he was a business student at the nearby university on his way home for the week-end), we shared food at the next stop and took photos together before exchanging e-mail addresses and saying good-bye since I had to change trains for the last few hours of the trip bit. I would have never gotten to meet him in one of the standard AC tourist buses. Not only had it been fun, it had been comfortable, too! Ok, the next train was more than densely packed with people sitting on top of each other, standing, some where sleeping on the luggage careers and for the last hour of the ride I had to balance on top of two seat backs, so that the tired but friendly father of two, standing next to me, could take my floorspace to sit down and relax, but whatever. You have to earn your experiences.