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| Chips with my lunchtime sandwich: talk about portion control!! |
I worked in the hotel yesterday morning, and in the afternoon headed to Ludhiana. The hotel driver, who took me to the train station, and I remembered each other from my last visit; to celebrate he added an extra degree of excitement to the drive by showing me photos of his wife on his phone.
At the train station there were X-ray machines, where people were feeding their bags through. It's very common to have to have things X-rayed, so I (thinking I was assimilating beautifully) dutifully fed mine through and went round to the other side of the machine to discover that (very unusually!) there was no one approving the bags - and, in fact, plenty of people weren't getting their bags X-rayed at all. Just when I think I'm figuring out India... Then I went up an escalator to the platform overpass (displeasing a porter when I undercut his "cheap price" by pointing out if I carried my own bag I'd save even more money!) and hiked down some stairs to find myself on the platform very near to where I'd started on the escalator. Perhaps Delhi railway station is better signed in Hindi than it is in English.
Laing's Law of Railway Platforms states that you will always walk to at least one, and possibly both, ends of the platform before you find where your carriage will arrive. A corollary to LLRP is that this is an excellent way to stretch the legs and railway platforms are generally very interesting - and flat, which makes the people-watching more fun when hauling a suitcase.
If your reference point for arriving anywhere by train is Patna at 10pm then everything else (outside Delhi, Mumbai, etc I assume) seems quiet. My Punjabi colleague, B, (who studied in Ludhiana) thought the station was heaving; I thought it was Sunday-night quiet. I'm looking forward to seeing something of the city with B over the next couple of days!
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| Corridor of mirrors on the left to the hallway; mirrored bathroom on the right. Shiny! |
The hotel is very pleasant, and they clearly got a good deal on mirrors - it's all grey walls, grey mirrors and grey marble in the rooms. It's a bit offputting to see so many Alixons but the upside is it's easy to do my hair, put on makeup, etc. No hiking to the tiny mirror dangling over the lavatory here! There are no mirrors on the ceiling though - it's Not That Sort Of A Hotel ;-)
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| Strangely fascinating... |
I crashed last night and skipped dinner. Unwinding in my room I discovered yesterday's sport was the NY marathon live on TV. It made surprisingly riveting television to watch very fast people run 42 km as I lay on the bed.
One of India's finest gifts to the world is the tikka masala corn chip! I have only just discovered them; they should be a global phenomenon.
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| How's that for an unexpectedly arty shot! Ludhiana at dawn from the top floor gym |
No walking outside for me this morning, and apparently sunrise is later here than in Delhi (we are further north). I found the gym on the top floor of the hotel, and the exercise machines facing out. I was looking forward to watching Ludhiana wake up but was too early - only got a glimpse at the end. I'll just have to sleep in tomorrow and try later!
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| Ludhiana waking up... |
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