vacation: THE TRAIN (part 2)

ok, so as this second part of the train story begins, we are still in beijing, and we haven't actually set foot on a train yet. =)

in the morning after our additional unexpected night stay in a hotel in beijing, the driver came to pick us up around 11 AM to take us to eat lunch. we ate lunch kind of at a giant food court at an indoor mall, where you can walk around and choose what kind of food you want, and then sit at tables. except it wasn't open in the middle with all the seating there--the seating was around the sides, and all the food was set up like a maze in the middle, and there were so many different kinds...it was kind of overwhelming. and imagine that we are already tired to begin with from the craziness of the previous night. but eventually we all chose food and were able to sit down together. and it made me happy that we had one giant bottle of juice, and all five of us (besides the family) just all drank straight out of the juice bottle. there were no cups and buying individual drinks is more expensive. =)

after lunch, just a few of us (charis and the dad and i) made a mad rush through a department store to stock up on food since we were going to be heading up a mountain where we knew food would be ridiculously expensive. we bought a bunch of apples, bread, spam (of all things...), and water to add to our food suitcase, which had been more depleted that we thought it would be because of unforeseen events, and also because we just like to eat. we felt really rushed in the department store, because who wants to miss a train two days in a row???

we got to the train station in plenty of time though, and made yet another pile of our luggage and sat down to wait.
i think we had to wait pretty much an hour. and as we sat there, we talked about our standing tickets and what we would do to endure the 17 hours. we would all get on the train at the car where we had the one sleeper ticket (our driver was able to get us one sleeper ticket and 9 standing tickets), so we would be together. then we could sit in the dining car and play cards, and if worse came to worse, four of us could sit on a soft sleeper bunk and sleep while other people stayed up, and then we could rotate who got to sleep. it would be doable...crazy...but we would work it out.

before we entered the train station, our driver kindly bought us a bunch of little chairs to sit on!
they fold up to be flat, and then you unfold them and set them anywhere! very convenient. and they are quite strong and stable too. for certain people.
seth was the only person who couldn't really sit on one. i think he bent one. but the driver only bought us 5, it would have been a bit heavy to carry ten of them around anyway, and probably not necessary.

during this time, the mom and dad of the family with us discovered some chinese people who were trying to sell some extra hard sleeper tickets they had! so we bought two hard sleeper tickets so that we would have a couple more beds.

when the time came to head to the platform, we made sure to all stay together, and we all gathered in front of the car where we had the one sleeper ticket--except the mom and the youngest boy--they went to the car where we had the hard sleeper tickets. the rest of us waited on the platform to enter the soft sleeper car. when we got to the door and showed our tickets to go in, they would only let the person with the soft sleeper ticket in though--people with standing tickets had to go to a different car. so we left seth with the soft sleeper ticket since we didn't want to send a girl alone, and the rest of us went to the car that had a giant crowd of people standing in front of it waiting to get on! we slowly made our way towards the door of the car and they let us on. inside this car, there were seats in rows like regular non-sleeper train, and then many many people with standing tickets standing in the aisle. there were so many people in front and behind us that we didn't know how we would all fit. but over the course of 15 minutes or so after we got on, we slowly moved forward through the narrow aisle of the car (with our luggage) until we were in the middle of the car. while we are inch by inch moving forward, with our luggage, trying not to jab people in the face who are sitting in seats, and barely having room to stand, much less move forward, a man pushing a snack cart, which is nearly the same width as the aisle starts moving down the car. we are appalled!! who is going to buy snacks at a time like this?? how is he even going to make it through the car?? but by lifting my suitcase above my waist and holding it next to me, and leaning up against seats, the cart can *barely* squeeze past me as i am standing in the aisle, and in this way the snack cart makes it down the aisle. oh my.

eventually the people filtered in enough that we were mostly towards the front of the car. charis and i are leaning against a wall and some chinese people are right next to us on either side, and in front of us. my suitcase is between my legs. alissa, betsy, and the rest of the family are behind us a ways, in the aisle. in front of us, there was the water container where people could come to get hot water for drinks or noodles, and there was a guy standing inside that little area with the giant really hot water container, because there was no where else to stand! every now and then, people would come down the aisle, pushing past the standing people, somehow (it really seemed like there was absolutely no room, but somehow they would make it past), towards the very end of the car, past us, at which point they had to stop, because the end of the car was the entrance to the dining car, which was locked. a bunch of people were standing and sitting on the floor in the area between cars right in front of the door to the dining car, mostly loud men, but some women too.

oh, somewhere around this point, the train actually starts to move. we've been on the train for 20-30 minutes already, which seems like a very very very long time! 17 hours left. at this point we begin to realize we have some phone and bag issues again!! the dad has his wife's bag, and so she does not have a phone! seth doesn't have a phone either, so we can't call anyone that is beyond the locked door to the dining car in the sleeper section. we are alone. and locked in!! maybe we've learned for the future...always carry your own bag anyway? somehow i think that will still not always be adhered to. while we are realizing these things, and that it doesn't look like we will be able to just go sit in the dining car whenever we want to either (we hear rumors that the dining car will open at 5 PM...or 6....or 7...), the men sitting and standing at the very end of the car by the locked door start becoming louder. we can't understand them, but it's clear that they want to get in the dining car, and whenever someone who works on the train walks past or is in view, they start talking to that person. when a train worker doesn't appear for awhile, they men appear to be trying to get inside the dining car on their own, though the door is locked.

somewhere around this time, i see through the window of the dining car door, the mom walking towards us!! a train worker comes, squeezes past the loud men, and unlocks and opens the door just enough to walk through into the dining car and then closes it again. we can see him and the mom talking on the other side of the door, but can't here them. the dad passes her bag over to us, and charis starts to hand it and her own phone (for seth) to chinese people to pass down to give to the worker standing at the door. i take it all from charis though, and shove through all the standing and sitting people to pass the bag and her phone on to the mom...beyond the barrier... we don't get to talk to her, but she receives the bag and phone, and i text her to tell her to give charis's phone to seth. we are now connected to the sleeper-people!! ridiculous text messages between me and charis and seth ensue...

after charis and i get over the craziness of the situation and the fact that every chinese person who can possibly see us around all the people is pretty much watching our every move, we decide that we can't just stand there. so we start playing cards. there is one game we know that doesn't require any cards to be laid down besides a draw and discard pile, so we play this game by each holding our hand of cards, i put the draw pile in an easily accessible pocket of my backpack (which i'm wearing on the front of me so i can lean against the wall), and the flat surface of my outstretched hand is the discard pile. of course, plenty of people were already watching us. at this point, most of the people lose interest in general (after all, it's a 17 hour train ride), but a few of them start watching us more closely as we are playing cards. so of course charis notices that the guy who is standing next to the hot water dispenser is looking over her shoulder and watching which cards she is playing, so she starts to show him what decisions she is making and why. the guy next to me is also watching closely, and offers to hold the discard draw piles for us!! so we play another hand like this, with one man acting as the table, and the other man watching charis closely. the man holding the cards for us is also watching me closely. after that hand is finished, charis deals these two men in, and she holds the cards for us!! so now i am playing cards with two chinese men, standing on a K train (the slowest train in china), with 16 more hours to go!!

unfortunately, we didn't get to finish the hand of cards, but fortunately it was because the dad had put us on a list for any extra sleeper tickets that become available, and three had become available!! so we quickly end the card game and put away the cards, because three of us are going to get to leave the standing car! but...we have to decide who. there is me, charis, betsy, alissa, the dad, and his older daughter, and middle son. such a weird decision...to decide who gets to sleep in a bed and who gets to stand...for 16 more hours... after a bit of discussion, the decision seemed pretty clear though, based on who we thought needed to get out of the crowded standing car the most, although i was tempted to make an argument that it should be me!! we decided that it should be betsy, alissa, and the middle son, even though betsy and alissa were non-committal about it, and we were all doing ok, the conclusion was that charis and i would do ok for longer, and i would've felt guilty going without charis anyway. =) [the theme of guilt will return later in this story.]

after they leave, the novelty and craziness of the situation is beginning to wear off. we both take out books and attempt to read standing up. i think i read a few pages in a couple hours... around this same time, the chinese people are settling in too, and many of them pull out cigarettes and start smoking. unfortunately, the end of cars is often the place where people feel that it is ok to smoke because they are not in the middle of all the people. however, in this situation, there is nowhere that is not in the middle of all the people. so the majority of people smoking are basically right next to me and charis. i'm covering my face with my c.s. lewis book and charis is burying her face in my shirt. we add dramatic coughs, but none of this fazes anyone--they continue smoking, off and on.

finally, 7:00 PM comes, the *real* time that the dining car was going to be opened, so the four of us left in the standing car (me, charis, the dad, and his oldest daughter) hurry into the dining car as soon as it is opened, and we get to sit down at a booth together. we have to sit in the closer side of the dining car--apparently the far end is reserved for people that come to the dining car from the sleeper cars. they seemed to divide the car by an invisible line in this way so they can keep track of who came from where. we tell the mom and seth that we are there, and eventually they come to join us. in the meantime, we order some food (you can't be in the dining car without ordering food), even though dining car food is really not that good, and we eat it as slowly as possible. it is becoming more and more apparent that our freedom on this train is quite restricted, as the holders of standing-only tickets.

when seth comes, charis and i decide we will go back to the sleeper car with him and leave our luggage with him and sit with him there, since he has that entire soft sleeper to himself. so he walks down the aisle of the dining car and we follow right behind with our luggage. but as we approach the end of the dining car, two train workers step in front of charis and i just as seth passes them, and blocks our way! seth continues on, and charis and i cannot go beyond the end of the dining car. one thing is becoming clear: standing ticket people clearly have entirely different functions and abilities in the society of the train than sleeper ticket people. we start to formulate some sort of plan about who is going to sleep when--how some of us will stay in the dining car until later, while some people sleep, and then in the middle of the night we will switch so that the people who have been standing can sleep for awhile. it's still ok though, because eventually i will get to sleep, even though it's not too much.

but then it begins to become clear that staying in the dining car during the night is not an option. the train worker people are telling us that the dining car will be closed at 8:30. our nice thoughts of playing cards and being together are all entirely dispelled. this is the point where the situation starts to become stressful to me. we will have to return to the standing car at 8:30. but *then* the train workers, as we ask them about switching, tell us that switching is not possible--we can't switch now and then switch again later. we can't switch in the middle of the night. so basically, whoever goes back into the standing car at 8:30 is staying there and not coming out. this is when i really really begin to feel stressed out--this means that if i go back in the standing car, i will probably get not sleep at all. not being able to sleep if i want to is probably one of the most stressful things that could happen to me. (choosing not to sleep is an entirely different matter.)

the train workers tell us that we can switch once, if we do it now, before they close the dining car, and after that we cannot switch again. we discuss it and come to the conclusion that the youngest son, being an official child, will be allowed to sleep in the same bunk with his brother, so either charis and i can take his adult sleeper ticket, and then the other can take seth's sleeper ticket. so seth, the dad, and his eldest daughter valiantly resign themselves to going to the sleeper car for the duration of the train ride (12 more hours to go). they are still on the list to be upgraded to a sleeper ticket if one opens up. but for now, they have to march through the dining car door and have it locked behind them, while charis and i freely, with our newly switched sleeper tickets, walk past the train workers that previously stopped us to the freedom of the hard sleeper section. such a weird feeling to have been physically barricaded before, and then, because of a change in a slip of paper, to be able to walk freely, unimpeded by train workers and very crowded crowds of people. by the time we were in the bunks, it was pretty much 9 PM, and the lights in the hard sleeper are turned off at 9:30. as we try to actually wind down to sleep, we are feeling immense relief to be stretched out, to have space, to not be locked in, but also guilt...because there are still three people back there locked in, and one of them took our place! i don't know if i can think of any other time that i've felt that guilty. i let someone take my place, fully knowing what they were going into. i woke up multiple times throughout the night, wondering if the others were sleeping, wondering if they were able to get a bed, and everytime i woke up asking that somehow they would be able to get some sleep.

side note: it takes around 10 minutes to walk the entire length of a 16 car chinese sleeper train. the standing car was in car 5, dining car in car 6, seth's original soft sleeper (now delegated to the two boys) in car 7, charis and i ended up with tickets in car 11, and everyone else who had acquired sleeper tickets through the various described means were in car 16. so much for being together!

and since this is super long, the rest of the train story will actually have to take place in yet another post!!