More Indian adventures

My Indian colleagues believe I have the worst luck. This may be the case but before I came to India I would say I had above average luck for the general populations and average or below average luck for an Irish person (I do believe Irish people are luckier – I know it’s not scientific but science would have you believe there is no such thing as luck which is not the case either).

Today, I went with a Russian colleague (Olga) to the train station as we were taking the evening train to Chandigarh. On the way to the train station, another colleague (Jake) telephoned me. He was already in Chandigarh:

Jake: Hi, Helen it’s Jake
Me: Hi Jake, how are things in Chandigarh
Jake: not so good
Me: why (expected to hear complaints about the team or problems with hotel booking)
Jake: the hotel is on fire
Me: pardon?
Him: they’ve evacuated us all and we are all waiting outside. So maybe you want to change your travel plans
Me: is the fire engine there?
Him: not yet
Me: maybe

We spent the next 20 minutes driving to the train station as I called the Taj hotel central number to ask them if I should cancel. They didn’t even know there was a fire and unhelpfully said they couldn’t reach anybody at the hotel (da, it’s because they’ve all been evacuated). I also tried to see if tickets were available for the next day but the ticket office closes at 2pm on Sundays.

Upon reaching the train station we sought help from many of the railway employees. They were spectacularly unhelpful. After talking to 4 separate people (each of whom acted as though he was doing us a massive favor by agreeing to talk to us), we discovered:
The ticket office is closed.
The ticket office which is open will only take bookings for trains leaving in the next two hours
Nobody can help us until 5.40 in the morning (2 hours before the train)
We can get a refund of 50% of the ticket price but only if we cancel today
We would have to wait to cancel
The cancellation policy is not clear

As each ticket cost 820 rupess (about 20 euro) we decided to be extravagant Europeans and shake the dust of Delhi railway station from our feet.

On the way back from the train station Jake calls again
Jake: Helen, it’s comical now.
Me: why
Jake: They are throwing stones to break windows
Me: why
Jake: because the fire brigade do not have axes. They are taking big stones and trying to break the windows. They’ve tried to break one window four times now.
Me: any sign of controlling the fire
Jake: apparently all the sprinklers went off in the rooms so the fire is under control apart from the lobby. Of course this also means all my clothes are wet!

Various other phone calls follow. Eventually Jake and another colleague who decided to travel despite the fire are booked into another hotel in Chandigarh. I may travel tomorrow or I may not – I suppose it depends if my Indian colleagues have more success with the Indian railway staff than I had!

Really, you can't amke this stuff up :)