Chengdu to Lhasa train 1/18/2010

I think there is a certain part of everyone's imagination that fantasizes about train rides no matter where or when. The great train trips across Europe, the Trans Siberian railroad, Darjeeling Limited, the Australian line from Sydney to Perth, the old rail system that no longer exists in the US, the newer Amtrak lines like the one that goes right down the California coast and don't forget the Hogwarts Express. They all spark a kind of childlike excitement. You know having our own compartments, falling asleep to perpetual motion of the locomotive, reading in your bunch by flash light, station announcements, cart food, dining cars, strange and/or friendly travelers with stories to tell. Of course this is the kind of experience I expected as I entered the station to take the Chengdu to Lhasa high altitude train. But right away I knew there would be a whole lot more then what I expected. I had seen the few pictures available online showing the cabins and the train amenities but it was really nothing like that and they didn't do justice to the reality of the Chengdu- Lhasa train experience. Right away as I entered (or tried to enter) the train station just the number of people was stupefying. Yes, stupefying. It was packed like sardines (yeah think Japan/ NY metro during rush hour) from the moment you entered the station until you finally got on the train and laid down in your economically sized bunk. If one didn't have claustrophobic tendencies before the train station they would have had them by the time they left (if you made it out). The train was nice though. Once I found my way to the correct car and got to my bunk, hosting up my stuff to be stored at my feet things felt so spacious. Little did I know that that spacious feeling would eventually fade by the end of the two and a half day train trip. The train has three types of passenger cars; 5-6 of the cars have a five seats across configuration holding at least 60 people each, 4-5 of the cars have a six bunk per cabin configuration holding maybe six cabins each, and only 2 cars have a four bunks per cabin configuration holding six cabins also. There were bathrooms and hot water spouts at the end of each car and one dining car. The rest of the train was off limits and what I can guess was either used for crew or freight. The hot water spouts were very useful for filling instant ramen soups, tea, and water bottles. The dining car ended up being a hang out spot for young Tibetans between service times and a mix of helpful and interesting characters. They would come and play cards and have drinks and snacks. I sat across from a fun group of teens and a Tibetan thanka painter (religious paintings of deities and saints) during one dinner. The Tibetans ended up helping me order because the menu was in Chinese and the wait staff only spoke Mandarin. The food was a great surprise. It was delicious, and this could have been because the group I was with waited a day to eat in the dining car (thus our standards could have been lowered since we dined the night before on instant ramen). However, in reflection I do still think it was good. But more on food, well food carts that is. Food and other carts established a kind of culture on the train because there were so many and their various types. The food carts ran from your simple fruit cart with apples, oranges, bananas, and some tropical fruit to full meal carts with rice and a choice of two meats, tofu, and at least one veggie. But not to end the carts section of this blog without mentioning the cart lady and man. There seemed to be only one lady and man who ran them. I mostly saw the cart lady but there was a man too. He pushed the, what I like to call Misc. cart with your knick-knacks like cheap slippers, cards, cups, etc. I can't remember all what the cart had on it but it was always really full, just packed with things. I have to admit the slippers were very tempting and we actually ended up buying a cup/ container. But the best part of the trip was can you guess?...Not the economically sized bunks. There were actually three sizes of bunks in the six person cabin. The bottom bunch being the most spacious and as you go up to the top bunk both the price tag and personal space decreased. I spent the two nights on the train freezing because the top bunk seems to be where the AC hits first before it cools the rest of the cabin. With cold air blowing on me unable to sit up or even attempting to sit up without taking a good blow to the head, I can't say sleeping was the best part of the trip. And to add to that fun, the second night was full of deafening banging due to what appeared to be a broken or frozen train wheel? Now to the best part, the best part of the trip was the people we met on the train. We shared our cabin with a Chinese family, a man, woman and a little boy. The little boy was really cute and we ended up having a lot of fun as he became obsessed with taking pictures with my camera. The family were good sports as the group I was traveling with was not the quietest (this includes myself). Not to mention, I would have to essentially do a pull up in the doorway of the cabin followed by carefully placed steps on their beds in order to get to my bed. We ended up spending a lot of time towards the end of our trip with that little boy and two other little girls. It seemed that it was common to just let your kids run free on the train once it started moving, so we ended up playing cards (the game war) with the boy, and this one little Tibetan girl and her Chinese friend who only spoke Mandarin. We also taught them some English and the one girl spoke Tibetan with us. The other passengers in the cabin next to us also talked with us in some English and a lot of hand gestures were performed between us. But the most interesting and charming was a Tibetan soldier in the Chinese Army who was coming home for the New Year after being away for 5 years. He had been training in Chengdu and learned Chinese over that period and really missed his family, his girlfriend and the food from his home town. I could only really relate to him on the topic of food because I've never been away from home fro five years!!! (Coincidently, I ran into him the day after we arrived in Lhasa, girlfriend at his side, during the few days he was staying Lhasa before he went to his village.) What an amazing man he was and you could actually see the anticipation building in him as the train got closer and closer to Lhasa. We were all standing and looking outside the window together as we hit Lhasa and when we saw him see the Potala for the first time after all the time he had been away we could feel his joy it so radiated from his whole person. Overall the trip really made me appreciate the beauty of the Tibetan plateau. As the train left Chengdu and the landscape progressed from urban cities and graffiti to grasslands, sheep, yak, and frozen hilly horizons, I was thankful that I had the company that I did and the amazing opportunity to study in such a breathtaking part of the world.