We left from the Old Delhi Train Station.  But on arrival found that the train (The Brahmaputra Mail) was going to be 6 hours late!  At first we hung around outside near the main entrance where there was a whole crowd of students with their school colors and feather headdresses from Nagaland (furthest most North Eastern State of India) who had taken part in the National Day parade and were going to go back to Nagaland on the same train as us.  Then we spent the rest of the time sitting at an outdoor table of a 24 hour Café where there was a mime artist dressed as Charlie Chaplin and a guy in a big teddy bear (or something) costume with “Charlie” written on the hat or shirt.  There was also a portrait painter and later a temp. “tattoo” painter, whose services were free if one bought at least 100 Rupees worth from the café.  My friend Magendran bought some grub and then had his portrait sketched and then later had a scorpion “tattoo” painted in exchange for painting a scorpion on the artist.  We also met a Texan freelance photographer who was on his way to Nepal to get a new Indian Visa.  If he’s a voter I'm sure he’d vote for the Green party or the democrats at the worst.  Although, I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t bother voting.  He said he liked taking covert Pedicab drive-by shots of Muslim women in Old Delhi, since it’s the best way to do it unnoticed and therefore avoid a lynching.

The Train finally arrived at 2 or 3am.  On the way to NJP (New Jalpaiguri—the closest train station to Sikkim—we had 2^nd Class Sleeper tickets which was fine for the most part.  On the positive side, 4 of the 6 other bunks in our area were occupied by surpassingly beautiful young women from Nagaland, and there were more in the neighboring areas.  They were all devout Christians but some of them were “born again Christians” what ever that really means…  They didn’t have enough reserved tickets so they were two to a bunk, which made it a bit crowded but it was nice being surrounded by so many pretty faces and kind personalities!  On the negative side of things the whole 2^nd class section was very overcrowded with about 3 times as many people in there as bunks.  While I was sleeping the second night some guy tried to sleep down by my feet which robbed me of sleep!  It was the first time I’ve had to use an Asian style toilet to take a dump which wasn’t bad in itself; what was bad was that within 12 hours into the 36 or so hr journey the tap water had already run out in most of the carriages so one couldn’t wash ones hands properly anymore.  Although, luckily I had some disinfectant spray with me so it wasn’t a complete disaster!

We arrived at NJP in the early afternoon.  We checked on my return ticket but it was still in waiting list status so I refunded it and bought a lower 1^st class air-con sleeper ticket, which was all that was available as a solid reservation.  Then Magen got us on a taxi-jeep to Sikkim for the fair price of Rs150 each for the whole back seat for us and our luggage (normally they squeeze 4 or 5 people into a space made for 3).  By jeep it takes about 4 hours to get to Gangtok from NJP.  We were dropped off at the Bahá'í Center (or “House” as they’re called in India) were we thought we’d be staying, but we found out they were still having their Ruhi Institute Campaign at the Tadong Bahá'í School (also in Gangtok) and so there were a bunch of junior Youth and some older Bahá’ís staying there and so we also stayed there, since it's much nicer to be with other Bahá’ís and the facilities at the school are better than at the Center.