The usual - transdimensional logistical scheming

Going somewhere always starts with a story of getting there. Often it is an adventure in itself. If Frodo had taken the straight flight to Mordor and ridden a cable-car up to the Mount Doom, the story would have been over in two pages. Comfort and excitement are not friends.


My personal quest of getting to India started a long way back with all kinds of last-minute logistical problems such as not having any money; then having money but no visa; then having barely enough time to get a visa (and considering all the considerable neighbouring countries with an Indian Embassy); then telling all my friends that I'll leave Montpellier tomorrow but failing to leave until the day after with the first flight to Brussels (because barely enough time means impossible in French, compared to probable in Dutch); then battling a bad flu all week and a half while waiting for my visa... which I got in the afternoon before the morning that my flight took off from Frankfurt to where I had to hitchhike first, having only 3 hours of daylight left. Inevitably, as a bonus track, the visa application center included the mandatory 15-minute scene of mobilizing their whole crew to go about jittering, looking for my lost passport even though everyone else seemed to get theirs back swiftly enough. Mr.Murphy has always had a special spot for me in his heart.


So there I was in summer clothes, shivering in the freezing wind on the German border at sunset, still about 300km away from the airport. To deceive my body into not dieing of exposure and to keep the spirits up I let out a continuous stream of improvised heart-warming songs in the lines of Pleeeeease, take me to wooonderful waaaarm and sunny Indiaaaaaaa, ooooo, Indiaaaaaaa! I felt like an opera superstar, shouting the lines at the top of my magnificent voice. I doubt that anybody could hear me across the roaring of the cars on the autobahn. Lucky them.


As always, shortly after my thumb went numb with cold and anxiety started sneaking in, I started finding awesome rides. First a nice gentleman handed me a map of Germany. From that moment on I could stop relying on the extremely sketchy map existing only in my head. Next I had a good laugh with two young fellows from Köln who pampered me as best they could and made a long detour for my benefit. Without even knowing how incredibly hungry I was, they forced me to accept a bagful of food, including sandwiches made by grandma the same morning. And lastly, they drove me to a petrol station and talked me into the car of a chatty heart surgeon who had worked as a volunteer doctor in McLeod Ganj - just where I was heading. I took it as a sign and vowed to follow it.


Et alors, after all this everything suddenly seemed ridiculously easy from the moment I stepped out of the Delhi airport, carrying precisely 7.3kg of luggage. A familiar mischevious grin erupted on my face and I was ready toEt alors, after all this everything suddenly seemed ridiculously easy from the moment I stepped out of the Delhi airport, carrying precisely 7.3kg of luggage. A familiar mischevious grin erupted on my face and I was ready to start my 2-months' survival experiment in this new, unknown corner of the world. I called it my very first real holiday.

But still I hadn't decided the direction to take out of Delhi - Varanasi? Rishikesh? Amritsar? - as late as when sitting in the New Delhi train station ticket office, flapping a half-filled foreigner's form in my hand where only the destination gap was unfilled. All my very first day in India I had a curious tendency to befriend old Western women. There I got hints from a nice Czech Parisian and surprise-surprise, found myself on an upper berth of the overnight train to Pathankot the same evening with Dharamshala-McLeod Ganj due the next day.