16. Footnotes to the Foothills

Fig 16-1: The State of Indian Door Lock Technology

Outside the window this morning, there is a horn tooting¹. Outside the door, there is a dog barking². Across the room, Jecca is blowing her nose³.

This is Darjeeling, people, and it certainly is quaint, but it is also very cold. Although two hundred meters lower than our previous perch in the southern hill station of Kodaikanal, it is nonetheless colder and more beautiful, perhaps due to the fact that it is lodged way up in the Himalayas--essentially between Nepal, China (Tibet), Bhutan, and Bangladesh--and not some tropical southern latitude. Rumor has it that if you hike to the right spot, at the right ungodly hour of the morning, you can see the sun rise behind Mt. Everest (8848 meters), just over the shoulder Mt. Khangchendzonga (the runner up in the Ms. Himalaya Contest at 8598 meters). I'm sure that I'll report on how beautiful it is if we ever get up early enough to see it.

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1. The Horn: The horn that toots belongs to the "Toy Train" that you can take from Siliguri Junction Station in New Jalpaigari, up the side of the mountain, into Darjeeling. Truly, this is as cute of a train as the title implies, with a real coal burning Thomas the Tank Engine look to it, although it takes a staggering nine hours and 300 Rupees ($7.50) to complete the same task as the bus that we took for a mere three hours and 60 Rupees ($1.50). The only catch with the bus, however, is that there is no hopping off at the station to use the bathroom, so if you didn't use the bathroom in New Jalpaigari, and you drank a lot of water on the night train from Kolkata, then odds are good that you weren't really able to take in all of the scenery, and even the abbreviated three hour trip was far, far too long.
   
2. The Dog: Darjeeling, like the rest of India, supports a healthy population of feral dogs who live in the streets (or on beaches or paths, regional geography permitting) and do charming things such as eat garbage and run around barking at each other all night long, and occasionally thrashing one another within (at least what sounds to be) inches of their lives. Now, don't mistake my intention here; I like dogs running about, and while some are old and beaten looking, there are plenty of cute little puppies, and even more cute crotchety old dogs lying around. Some have homes, some have collars that would imply homes, and some are clearly of the urban wilderness, though all seem to be surviving regardless of their circumstance. Actually, this being a country that (largely) holds all life as sacred, even the street dogs, the most part, are all fairly well taken care of, and generally good natured when it comes to the presence of passing American backpackers.
   
3. The Sniffles: The movement from hot beach to cold hill station to hot city to freezing mountain outpost has been tough on our health, and both of us are sniffling and sneezing and covered in so many--though never enough--blankets. Perhaps due to my delicate constitution, I've been sick for a week now (I was done in by the cold nights in Kodaikanal), while Jecca, either being more hearty than I, or due her readiness to wear a winter hat at night ("Your head is a chimney," she keeps telling me) has only been sick since the tail end of our time in Calcutta. Either way, what we both have seems to fall under the general heading of having a cold, and doesn't generally impede our daytime activities, but rather, it translates into a lot of sniffling and sneezing when we're trying to sleep, just between the hours of the night when the feral dogs start barking at each other, and whatever hour the Toy Train starts tooting its horn again in the morning.