Ghost Train to the Eastern Star

by Paul Theroux

  Looking for onward train tickets, I went back to New Delhi Station and found the international booking hall. In the past, as in Amritsar, I had paid an Indian to stand in line for me. But this was well organized— not much of a line, and I could pay in dollars. A proportion of railway seats were now set aside for foreigners, as a way of stimulating tourism, which in India is relatively small. The state of Hawaii has more than twice as many visitors (seven million) as the whole of India.

  Seeing my application, Mr. Sharma said, "You're the writer."

  "That's me. Back again after many years."

  Leaping to his feet, he said, "How can I offer you service?"

  "Just looking for trains."

  I showed him an itinerary that would take me through old India, new India, poor India, India of the miracles, India of the maharajahs, India of The Great Railway Bazaar: Delhi-Jodhpur-Jaipur-Bombay-Bangalore-Madras-Rameswaram, from north to south.

  "Please meet Mrs. Matta, my boss."

  Mrs. Matta was a middle-aged woman in a blue sari. She sat at a desk in a back office that was furnished in the Indian manner: a full Pending tray, a cup of tea, photographs of smiling children and a framed one of the prime minister, a wall map of India showing all railway lines, and a shrine to the elephant-headed god, Ganesh, with a flickering vigil light in a yellow dish.

  "Famous writer," Mr. Sharma said. "Back again."

  Mrs. Matta offered me a cup of tea and the visitors' book, saying, "Please add your name. Write comments. Mention your satisfaction, if you please."

  I wrote, India works because the railway works.

  I had believed that on my first visit; I still believed it. Because of the vast network of Indian Railways, I could go anywhere in the country. I could sleep on the train in comfort; I could eat on it, read a book, write my notes; I could talk with anyone. There are buses in India, there are taxis and limos. But as Kuldeep had told me on the train, The pity of India is the bad roads ... It can take hours for a simple journey. There were many new airlines, but delays were a certainty, security checks were awful, and the airports were like garrisons, full of soldiers and impatient passengers, overcrowded and understaffed. Because they were an institution, Indian railway stations were well organized and efficient. And in India the train was the only way of being sure of leaving on time and arriving safely. The trains are slow, some people say, but in India being in a hurry is foolish and deluded—and often bad manners.

  With a handshake from Mr. Sharma and an approving head-wobble from Mrs. Matta, I left the booking hall with all my tickets, chits, vouchers, and supplementary fare receipts. The clutter and dusty pillars and uncomfortable chairs in an Indian office are no indication of its effectiveness. Out of the chaos of receipt books, carbon paper, flickering computers, and fat files tied with faded ribbon arises decisiveness and clear results, even if you can't read the writing and your fingers are smudged with ink from handling them.

  I marveled at what I was able to accomplish in a morning in Delhi: the train tickets I needed, the very notebook I was looking for, some medicine for my gout (no prescription required in India for indomethacin), and the hottest ticket to be had, a seat at the England-India test match.

  ***

  I HAD MANAGED SEVENTEEN years of exile in England because I had not been an Anglophile—Anglophiles don't last long in England, and my detachment had kept me from being a cricket fan. I do not know the rules of the game, much less the subtleties, yet bowling, batting, and fielding are easy-to-appreciate skills, pleasurable to watch. Most of all I wanted to go to this cricket match because it was the event of the week and because I wanted to see fifty thousand Indians in one place.

  I was glad I went. Cricket matches in England are famously sedate, characterized by limp hand-clapping, a yelp or two, the crack of the bat, the thump of the ball on the pitch, and now and then the bone-breaking sound of the collapsing wicket. But that was a world away from the pandemonium at Ferozeshah Kotla cricket ground in north Delhi—howling spectators, Indian flags, loud whistles, horns, flutes, trumpets, chanting. The Indian cricket crowd (so I learned) is noted for its barracking—hooting at errors, screaming at questionable calls, and the occasional display of racial insensitivity, shouting "Monkey! Monkey!" (Bandar! Bandar!) at black players on the British or West Indian teams.

  The man in front of me had made a large Indian flag into a poncho and was wearing it. The man next to him was blowing a bugle. Everyone was howling. I had arrived after lunch. India had batted 209 and the sides had changed. It was England's turn to bat, and they had to better that score. They scored 124, with two of their best batters.

  The fan next to me, Vikram—"Call me Vicky"—told me this. He was nineteen and had called in sick at work like everyone else—Delhi businesses were quiet and understaffed as a result of this match. I remarked on the size of the cricket ground.

  "It is capacious," Vicky said. Another of the pleasures of India is hearing such words in casual conversation. "That is Pietersen. He was hero of the Ashes series last summer."

  "Is he any good?" I asked.

  "Power in hands is there. Timing is there." Vicky was looking at the other end of the pitch. "That is Flintoff. He is great batsman."

  "So England has a chance."

  "I think not. We have resourceful bowlers. See Bhaji Singh. He is magnificent."

  But the English batsmen were getting hits. Vicky translated the Hindi chants: "India will win!" and "Blue is shit!"—the English uniforms were blue—and "Bhaji-Bhaji-Bhaji!" The whole stadium was roaring, though some scattered claps accompanied a good hit from Flintoff. Even the most raucous soccer fans had nothing on this screaming mob, and the cricketers themselves, in celebration of a catch or a score, hugged and rolled on the grass of the pitch.

  "It's a big day," I said.

  "Cricket is God in India," Vicky said. "More than God."

  And he went on narrating the match for me: "See, careless half-controlled hoick off full toss ... Ah, good catch in deep mid-viket ... Flintoff tried an ill-advised sweep off a straight throw ... He is out. Leg before vicket ... Harbhajan will be Man of Match ... See, player in crease."

  "Is it a sticky wicket?"

  "A dicey pitch, you can say."

  To the cries of "India will win!" I began to think that this was a manifestation of the new India. The vast stadium, the unanimous denunciation of England, the huge crowd, and the confidence. It was also the commercial crassness of the new century, the uniforms with advertising patches stitched to them.

  "India can win," Vicky said as the afternoon wore on. "We have to take five more vickets."

  Pietersen lofted a strong hit into the upper tier of the stands.

  "That's a six-plus," Vicky said.

  But another of his big hits was caught at the boundary by an athletic fielder.

  "Fare-thee-well!" Vicky shrieked.

  The new batsmen faded fast: caught, blundered, leg before wicket, and soon it seemed certain the victory was India's. Assured that the match was in the bag, Vicky addressed other matters: Did I have children? What was my job? Did we have cricket in America? Did I like India?

  Satisfied with my answers, he turned back to the match. And now I could see that India would win and that in a matter of minutes fifty thousand triumphant cricket fans would be stampeding out of Ferozeshah Kotla cricket ground, looking for pale ferringhis like me to taunt with their victory. So I ducked out, hurried past security people, steel fences, metal detectors, and ranks of cops holding lathis—long sticks for beating back a mob in what is known as a lathi charge. All these tough-looking men had gathered at the exits.

  I was not the only person in a hurry. A stout, well-dressed Indian man in a white suit was steering his wife through a metal detector. He could have been a magnate, she a maharani. She set the detector buzzing, but she was waved on, towards a waiting limousine with a liveried driver—she was slow, heavy, trying to keep up with her tubby husband. She wore bangles, a thickness of necklaces, and dangly e
arrings. The diamond in her nostril was as big as an acorn.

  Outside the stadium, I could still hear the crowd. In a class-conscious country riddled by divisions, the whole cricket mob chanted as one, as though it was more than solidarity—an expression of self-esteem, joyous and assertive, pleased with itself, like a hoarse gloating echo of Amar Singh, who had said to me in Amritsar, "We're a big power now."

  That evening, as if on cue, an American woman entered the lobby of my hotel with her husband, and I stepped aside to let them pass. They had just returned from a sightseeing tour of Delhi, which would have included Humayun's tomb and the Red Fort and the Qutub Minar and the sight of many Indians who had not shared in the country's economic miracle. Another reminder that traveling in India is not for the faint of heart, the woman's eyes were red from weeping, and she was sniffling, dabbing at her puffy eyes. She glanced tearfully at me, then looked away, muttering, "I don't care. I'm not going out tomorrow." Then, half actressy, half sincere, but certainly upset: "Walter, it breaks my heart to see those people living like that."

  NIGHT TRAIN TO JODHPUR

  THE MANDORE EXPRESS

  I KNEW WITHOUT BEING TOLD that the train to Jodhpur would be leaving from platform 16; it was obvious from the look of the waiting travelers. Most of the world dresses alike, in blue jeans, T-shirts, and sneakers. Rural India is one of the exceptions to this worldwide sartorial monotony, and Rajasthan remains outstandingly itself, self-possessed and multihued. At Old Delhi Station it was possible to see from the clothes of the women on the platform that they awaited the Mandore Express to Jodhpur.

  Where else would they be going, draped and painted like that, dressed in yellow and red saris, russet shawls fringed with gold embroidery or ocherous borders, long saffron wraps, winking veils, heavy gold jewelry, ropes of knuckle-sized beads and heavy bangles, feet and hands painted with henna, the age-old plumage, brilliant and colorful? They were people of the vast desert state of Rajasthan, where the houses of Jodhpur are bright blue, the façades and palaces of Jaipur are pink, and men's turbans are crimson. As though to distance themselves from the dusty hues of their surroundings, Rajasthanis are emphatically adorned. But this is true of desert dwellers generally, for whom gold jewelry is wealth, and whose remarkable sense of color seems a guarantee against ever becoming indistinguishable or lost.

  The Mandore Express was an overnight train to Jodhpur—where I'd never been before—on my route to Jaipur, which I had written about long ago. Jodhpur is a city of weaving and furniture making, traditional crafts, and these included copying antiques. Indians know Jodhpur as a producer of deceptive fakes that are sent to all the markets and bazaars and to credulous museums abroad—terracotta, porcelain, brassware, statues, idols, swords and daggers. Jodhpur also had a Vatican-sized maharajah's palace that had been turned into a hotel, and the maharajah still lived there—rode polo ponies and rejoiced in the nickname "Bapji."

  Fish-glued to the side of the train was the manifest, a list of passengers and berths for second class AC. I found my name, but before the train drew out of the station I saw some vacancies in first. I appealed to the conductor to upgrade me. He took my money, made out an excess-fare receipt in triplicate, handed me a sheaf of chits, and showed me to a four-berth compartment. Two people had already seated themselves: a young man reading Debonair magazine and opposite him a young woman braying a mixture of Hindi and English into a cell phone. The fierce-sounding woman had the humorless beaky face and cold eyes of a shrew. She was an example of how physically ugly a person's face becomes in the middle of delivering a loud complaint; she was a gargoyle in horn-rimmed glasses.

  While she howled, Rakesh, the man opposite, told me he was a salesman and exporter of shawls and scarves. He was going to Jodhpur, where his cloth was printed and dyed with the vivid Rajasthani colors.

  "I come on this train every few weeks," Rakesh said. "It's the best way. I arrive early in Jodhpur, do a full day's work, and head straight back on the night train. This saves me from having to pay for an expensive flight and a hotel room."

  He then offered me some of his food: spiced chickpeas, a bag of cashews, some obscure dumplings and deep-fried fritters.

  "Must I repeat?" the young woman said, her eyes flashing. "I am on train. And I am furious. They are all against us! Three ministries, three secretaries. Finance Ministry is worst."

  A scratchy reply from the phone had her scowling again.

  "I don't give a fig! We must be strong!"

  More babbling had her rolling her eyes and scratching her hairy arms.

  "You did not see memo? It was audacious!"

  I smiled, impressed, because I could not remember ever having heard the word "audacious" used in conversation by an English-speaker in all my eavesdropping life.

  Then she began to sound like a field marshal: "But we can win! We must prevail! We will regroup. We will respond in kind. Never mind, I tell you!"

  Clicking her tongue, she drowned out the reply.

  "Enough, enough. You can find me in Jodhpur on my mobile," she said, and silenced the thing with a stabbing finger.

  It was an amazing display of unselfconsciousness. I often think that people shout into cell phones in order to warn any casual listeners that they are to be reckoned with; that cell-phone screaming is more a show of aggression to eavesdroppers than for the person at the other end of the line.

  As a wanderer in India, I was grateful for anyone or anything that came my way as I went about casting strangers for roles in my narrative. Here, purely by chance, I was in a compartment with a sympathetic salesman who offered me food and with a hairy troglodytic woman shrieking abuse into her cell phone.

  "Do you mind?" she said sourly, twisting her beaky face at me. "I've had a long day."

  She meant that the bench I was sitting on was her berth and that she wanted to turn in. I had been assigned the upper berth. This was one of the niceties observed on Indian Railways, especially in mixed compartments: I had to climb into my berth. It was early evening, and we had twelve hours of travel ahead of us, but she insisted on sleeping. Still, it was wonderful how by taking the train an idle traveler like me could penetrate to the sleeping quarters of a middle-aged native woman and (if I wished) could look down and observe her snoring and scowling in her dreams.

  I obliged. I crept up the ladder to my berth and began reading Christopher Hibbert's fluent and well-documented account of the Indian Mutiny of 1857, The Great Mutiny. The uprising (bloodthirsty Indian troops) and its aftermath (bloodthirsty British troops) comprised one of the most violent racial convulsions in Indian history, yet the narrative was full of life and unexpected pleasures. An English notable and resident of Delhi named Thomas Metcalfe "could not bear to see women eat cheese," and sent them out of the room to satisfy themselves with their cheddar; and Lord Macaulay summed up his low opinion of Indian achievements by saying, "Medical doctrines that would disgrace an English farrier. Astronomy which would be ridiculed at an English girls' boarding school. History, abounding with kings thirty feet high, and reigns 30,000 years long. And Geography, made up of seas of treacle and butter."

  In the darkness, the train rattled fast through the cool desert night, clanging on the rails. I slept, seeming to rotate, like a person undergoing what a science-fiction writer would call "matter transfer." In the morning, seeing the foul-tempered woman again, yawning fangy and open-jawed like a jackal, I was reminded of another description in Hibbert's Great Mutiny, of a woman "with large, dark and unforgiving eyes."

  But, this being Rajasthan, I was treated to a ravishing early morning sight. We were drawing into a station where a stunning young woman, a purple sari fluttering around her slender body—a woman of movie-star beauty, great glamour, and poise—walked lightly on pretty feet past me on the platform, carrying a basket of fresh tomatoes. I got out to get a better look. I watched her cross the platform to another train to sell tomatoes, and then a smiling old woman approached me with a pitcher of milky coffee, poured me a cup,
and I stood there in the golden morning, uplifted by all this. The train whistle blew and we were off again, and, passing the sign Please Discourage Beggars, I returned to my compartment.

  The shawl salesman was still asleep, but the grouchy woman was awake and sitting, facing out the window, her back to me. The rattle and clatter of the train crossing the desert contrasted with the scene: the lively sound, the vacant landscape. Skinny trees here and there like dead saplings stood in the rubble and dust of flat empty India.

  I peered past the woman and said, "This is lovely. After Delhi, the great emptiness."

  "It is not empty at all," the woman said.

  "It sure looks empty to me."

  "There are people everywhere, if you would look."

  I was looking, but there were none.

  She laughed, forcing contempt through her impressive nose. "You think it is empty. It is not empty!"

  Believe me, it was the edge of the Marusthali Desert, in sun-baked Rajasthan, and it was empty.

  But she said, "It is intensively farmed. It is all cultivated."

  "Some of it is," I said, seeing some furrows raked into a gully and some stalks of withered grass, perhaps wheat.

  "All of it is! Don't you see?"

  This was a very irritating woman, a scold, who at seven-thirty in the morning was shrieking in contradiction.

  "What's that, wheat?"

  She snorted and said, "These people would not be so stupid as to plant wheat. They plant something that needs less water. They cultivate millet."

  "I see."

  "And those trees that you are ignoring. They hold the nitrogen in the soil. They are beneficial."

  "I see."

  Attempting a tone of haughty condescension, she merely sounded rude, and her rudeness was comically like self-parody. What she said could have been interesting, but her nagging tone made it abusive. I suspected the reason was that this Indian woman had assumed that she would be sharing the compartment with one other person, the shawl salesman, and what she found was a third person, a big tattooed foreigner from beyond the pale, glaring at her through sunglasses and scribbling in a notebook. Her intention was to make me feel unwelcome, and I mentioned this in my notes, adding that this was to be expected in the new robust and assertive India of peevish caste-obsessed bureaucrats.