I Survived My First Sleeper Train

JUNE 22, 2017 -- DELHI TO VARANASI

And it really was quite deightful. Let’s start with some qualifiers: I was in an air conditioned car, in a compartment with 3 other women on my trip, with a nice view out the window, and friendly neighbors. Given all of this, the 13 hours I spent on the train from Delhi to Varanasi were actually quite nice.

The train itself has several classes. If you pay a lot you get AC and a 4 person compartment with doors that close. At the other end of the train, the cars have bars over the windows so the air can come in while the windows are open (to be honest, I couldn’t actually see if there were windows or just openings in the car trains. In the lowest class cars, there are no beds and no assigned seats. People just seemed to pack in, with some deciding to sit on the platforms at the end of each car, next to the open doors. Before our train left the Delhi station, we watched a few folks run after another train and hop into the open compartment doors.

My sleeping quarters were an air conditioned car that was divided into 8 or 10 compartments, each of which slept 8 people. During the early part of the trip, everyone sits on the bottom bed, using the middle bed, which is folded away, as a seat back. For a couple of hours we chatted, ate some snacks, and drank chai served by vendors who walked down the aisles with paper cups, tea bags, and large kettles of hot water, milk, and sugar. Delicious! Other vendors made the rounds, as well, offering soup, chips, and chow mein (this last person was very insistent on trying to sell us chow mein; he always made sure to chat us up for a minute or two each time he passed, ensuring us that the food was of good quality and he was a trustworthy server). At one point a uniformed man came to our bunk and has us (read: only the white foreigners) sign waivers saying we had read the sheet he passed around about train safety, which boiled down to don’t take food from strangers and make sure you keep track of your food so you are not poisoned or drugged and robbed. Needless to say, it was not a warning we needed, and we were happy to abide.

After about 2 hours, it was time to get ready for bed. We hitched up the middle berth, which was hinged to the wall and suspended by metal chains hanging from the top bunk. With everything set up, our compartment had 3 beds on each wall, plus an additional 2 across the aisle. We were each provided with a clean set of sheets, a pillow, and a blanket. After locking our packs to the train and jamming our day packs into the corner by our heads, we shimmied into our beds. We had between 2 and 3 feet of space between our bed and the next one up. Once the beds are set up, there is no more room to sit, which is just as well since it’s worth trying to get some sleep on an overnight train.

In the morning, we were woken up to the cries of vendors selling chai, which we sipped as we looked out the windows. We were well into the countryside at this point. The green was a welcomed site. Every so often the landscape was dotted with small villages and some cows roaming around. The openness was a nice change from the craziness of Delhi. But, even here, it was ever more than 2 or 3 minutes between villages (by train travel time).

The toilets are worth mentioning. At the end of our car were the bathrooms (luckily a door separated us). Squat toilets require aim, which can be a difficult task if you are not used to it. As the train jossles around, it becomes a moving target. While the bathrooms were quite clean at the beginning of our trip, after only a few hours it smelled like a barn. In the morning, after 12+ hours of journeying, I decided it was best to wait it out until the hotel (a wise choice).