Bengfort.com

When forced to travel by train for 32 hours in a hard seat, it is necessary to have a strategy. A strategy for comfort, a strategy for boredom, and a strategy for sanity. Step one is to make friends with your neighbors so that they help you with your bags and give you snacks, and will make sure that no one takes your seat when you get up to use the bathroom. My strategy for making friends was being as helpless and incompetent as possible. My seatmeat was a young girl who worked in a factory in Shanghai and was traveling to her hometown in Xi’an (a 22 hour ride for her). I was pleased that she was small, friendly and quiet. Across the aisle was a Muslim woman with two small daugthers. Another plus, women are more friendly, motherly, and don’t smoke. Directly across from me were two male youths, who were sharing one seat, switching places to stand every hour or so. In the other seat across from me was a woman who promptly put her head down on the table and didn’t speak to anyone. (Here I should mention that the train had three seats on one side of the aisle, two seats on the other, the seats facing each other with a small table in the center). I zeroed in on the youths and the factory girl for being my most likely comrades. They helped me shove my humongous bicycle bag under the seat, when I made a rather realistic show of being unsure where to put it. I also told them it was my first time in a hard seat, and they did small things to make sure I was comfortable, such as giving me the window seat (my ticket was originally for the aisle seat) and giving me the most room to lay my head down on the table. They also shared their snacks of peaches and sunflower seeds, and I in turn shared my wet wipes, and gave up my seat from time to time so both of the youths could eat sitting down when they were ready for a meal. Give a little, get a little, that is always the moto for train rides in China.

The other strategy is managing your time. When to eat, when to use the bathroom, when to read, when to sleep. As using the bathroom was such an ordeal (since you had to fight your way through the crowds with standing only tickets blocking the aisle), I drank water on a timetable so I would only have to get up to use the bathroom a maximum of five times. Sleep of course was impossible, so instead I had to doze or meditate. I had two iPods with me, one borrowed from a friend, so I could tune everything out for the entire train ride without worrying about battery life. My strategy for staying sane was to go into a zenlike trance, keeping my head down and my earpods in to keep the sight and sound of the craziness around me at bay. My boss at the Consulate, upon hearing of my insane train ride, had also given me a gift of minty oil that was supposed to be used for alleviating headaches, but worked like a charm for masking the smell of unwashed masses. I applied it to my wrists and temples about ten times during the ride, and it worked for the most part to help me forget that the train car I was in was just a few degrees better than a chattel car. I made it through the night, which I rightfully reckoned would be the hardest part, and spent the next day reading my kindle. Andy called a few times and told me with surprise that I sounded chipper. I probably was just spaced out. In the last few hours of the train ride, I felt that I could re-engage with the world, and took my earpods out to walk up and down the aisle (as best as I could) and converse with people. I got up, and tried to wake up my sleeping feet. I looked down at my ankles and nearly screamed in horror. My feet and ankles had swollen to nearly three times their regular size! If you had seen just my feet, you might have thought I was a three hundred pound woman. I had some serious cankles. Really freaked out, I called Andy, who did an Internet search and told me it was a symptom of dehydration, and that I should drink more water and do some ankle exercises. I did, but they didn’t return to normal for another day. But, in the end I survived the 32 hour train ride with my sanity and most of my body parts intact!

Six hours later I picked up Andy’s dad and his dad’s girlfriend from the airport, and 12 hours and 130 km later I exhaustedly but happily wrapped my arms around Andy in a small town called Gonghe, from whence we would start our bike adventure the next day!

(And in case you were wondering, I went ahead and spent two thousand kuai on a flight back to Shanghai, there is no way that I would ever, ever, ever, do that train ride again! You only need so much character-building exercises in your life)