Stories of getting stranded while traveling...

As luck would have it, I spend quite a few hours at various transit points. Such expericnes are often disappointing when they happen, but I think for a traveler they are an integral part of the journey and often make for some interesting stories.

Waiting in a Jeep

Waiting at another one now and with hours to kill, here is a recollection of a few more such incidents.

1. I vividly remember waiting at the various railway stations with my parents as a kid, it was a normal rather than an exception. One specific incident happened in Kanpur when I was waiting with amma to catch the train around mid-night. The train kept getting postponed and it was only in the wee hours of the morning when we could finally board. The memories are cold.
2. Spending the night at Istanbul Airport, after missing my connecting flight to Milan. After getting a thorough blasting on phone (thankfully cut short after all the money on the phone got exhausted), I slept on the cold steel chairs trying not to miss my next early-morning flight. I had a book to read, and a few more companions in other chairs, but none friendly enough to talk. The multiple phone alarms helped me not miss the morning meeting my with my next connecting flight!
3. Mumbai station as a big group of NIDians returned from Mumbai to Ahmedabad after the CII-NID Design Summit. We scrambled from one station to another as our beloved Kranavati Express changed its departure point, finally had to wait for almost half a day to get on-board.
4. Another cold night was spent at the Venice Railway station. The plan was to catch the connecting train to Florence, but we couldn’t make it and had to spend the night at the station sleeping on the news-paper and devising innovative ways to pee. The next day at Verona and Como was spent happily enough though.
5. Another long wait was at the Naples Café and later the Railway Station to catch the train to Rome. After a fantastic day in Naples, the night was long and tiring and I had to really struggle to keep myself awake. I spent most of my time scribbling on my notebook, and writing weird poetry.
6. Waiting at the New Delhi’s new swanky T3 terminal to catch my flight to Ahmedabad. The high-voltage drama following the delay in the flight departure, made the wait memorable.
7. I had to spend hours even on my return trip via Istanbul. This time I met up with numerous Pakistani immigrants (some legal, some quasi-legal) making a trip to their homeland from Spain. Spent almost ten hours with some of them, listening to their stories from Spain and fears of their return to an unstable Pakistan.
8. Another extremely long and unexpected transit point was Sonemarg on the way to Srinagar to Leh. A bridge had collapsed and all the traffic had stopped on the highway. Spent the day waiting around the hills and exploring a near-by glacier, while the night was spent sleeping in the chai-wallah’s house. Made some extremely memorable friendships over the many chais that I had that evening especially Ka South Korea) and Chrsitine (Germany). A long post on the stay shall come later in my series on Kashmir.
9. Another long and extremely cold transit point was Tejpur. After procuring the inner-line permit in the evening, I spent time till the next morning at the bus-stand to take me to Tawang. The wait was phenomenally cold.
10. Sticking with cold waiting, there is another one in Paris. I was in the foulest mood ever that day and the night was as bitter and cold as it could be. Sometimes bad memories stay longer than good ones.