Travel Day From Hell

I'll get to my adventures in Nepal, but for the moment, I'm going out or order.  This post starts with the end of Kathmandu.  I was trying to find a bus to the border, the southern border this time insead of the eastern one.  The travel agencies were screwing me around, giving me bad info and trying to rip me off. I found a post on the net about booking a shared jeep, which I did, it was cheaper, faster and safer than a bus. 

 

We get to about 4 kilometers from the border and the guy tells me this is it, I need to take a tuk tuk to the border, I inform him that no, I paid for a ride to the border. At this point, I'm the last passenger and the guy's lazy and I'm not having it, so we go back and forth and he takes me to the border.

 

Your supposed to be able to get a shared jeep or a bus to the closest place with a train or take a bus to father locations.  I was completly discombobulated.  I first jumped into a jeep, but they wanted me to ride with my bag on my lap and I jumped out.  Then I got on the bus that would take me to the town with a train station, but it wasn't leaving soon enough so I got off.

 

I went to the only place you can book buses at the border and decided to book a bus to my destination, Lucknow, instead of taking the very real chance of not getting a train.  I get on the bus and just as it's leaving the guy who sold me the ticket comes and sits next to me, another guys walks up and asks for my ticket and demands double of what I've already paid, an extra 10 bucks. I say no, ask for a refund and to get off the bus.  The bus is speeding away at this point and these two guys are blocking me it.  I ask again for a refund and to get off the bus, they come down to about an extra $2 bucks, I say no, let me off.  The second guy starts getting angry and rips up my ticket.  He tells me I can get off the bus, but without my bag.  So I get up, pull my bag out from under him and start saying in a very loud voice, "Please let me off the bus, your being very rude!" over and over again, eventually they let me through and I get to the front of the bus, which has gone about a kilometer by now and ask the bus driver loudly to stop the bus.  He does.

 

I get off the bus and start walking back towards the border town, the second guy jumps off the bus and begs me to come back.  I go back and get on the bus, but I'm paranoid as hell at this point.  People come over and sit next to me, telling me that they are on my side.  One guys says, "Don't get off the bus, at any stops it's not safe for you."  I travel agent from Lucknow comes over to offer any help I'd like.  I don't trust any of them.  I decide that I'll get off at the train station with the travel agent.  We get off the bus at the train station.  Arun, my new travel agent freind, you can find him at www.tornosindia.com, helps me get a general ticket and talks the ticket guy into letting me stay in a sleeper birth.  It all works out, we get to Lucknow with my spirits restored.

 

Until I figure out that sometime during all the mayhem, I lost my camera and 2 months worth of pictues.   Grrrrr.