The Tuk-Tuk Mafia
In which we run afoul of the taxi rank and take a train
The full series of posts from my India trip can be read here.
Our last morning on the cliff, I went for a run down into the villages. I had been feeling fine running in the heat, but suddenly got worried that I might be light-headed after a few miles. I was stopped at the gate of a railroad crossing, and I decided to turn around, but found my energy again as I pushed myself up the hill and when I got to where I had started, went past the road leading back to the hotel and went another few miles, running through the pack of feral dogs that seemed to be territorial of one particular stretch of the road. I got to the hotel and Gusztáv was at a coffee shop further across the cliff, at the black sand beach that Ali, our jeweller from the night before, had said was more interesting because you could see the fishermen coming in every morning. I showered and walked down and we had breakfast next to two Italian women and headed back towards the hotel to pick up our jewellery on the way and found ourselves again in a long conversation with Ali about gems and the gem business.
We had been sent train tickets from Bala, Bala who had played a central role in this trip — he was Chris's friend from when Chris did his fieldwork in India during his PhD and Bala had been charged with keeping Chris alive. The train to Dindigul, our next stop in the north and not Madurai as we originally thought, left Trivandrum at 11:35 and we debated going by train or taxi, but as things got later, we found ourselves rushing to pack up and pay and finally get the hotel to accept our credit cards. We called an Uber and a car with a driver called James was supposed to pick us up, although Gusztáv warned that James might not be able to stop because the men at the taxi rank were taking a very aggressive stance about certain cars stopping there. The car arrived and James turned out to be a middle-aged Indian man with a moustache. I went to put my bag in the back, but a man from the taxi rank came over, very angrily shouting at James and threatening him and James suddenly got back in the car and pulled away, while I said to the man chasing him off, What the fuck man, we're going to be late.
The taxi rank man was not interested in our lateness but we watched as James drove off and stopped just out of sight, aided by the Uber app showing where he was and how long it would be until he reached us. We ran after him and found him, but the man from the taxi rank was following us and chased James off again, Gusztáv and I, with all of our bags, running after the car, hoping that he’d get to the main road and wait for us there. However, the app, having so far offered us nothing but convenience was now suddenly less helpful: it showed that he had both not cancelled the ride and had started driving away from us. We got to the main road and debated what to do, watching James's little Uber car icon get about a half mile away and stop. I texted James, We're out at the main road and then Will you come pick us up and James texted back, come which was unclear I thought, did he want us to come or is he saying he will come. We decided to go after him, his car no longer moving on the screen.
We walked as quickly as we could with our heavy bags on our backs, not quite running, talking about what sorts of punishments the tuk-tuk mafia might inflict on James, and why he didn't know not to go to the taxi rank. The car stayed stopped when I looked down at my phone and we came around the bend to find James waiting for us in an old white Tata. We said breathlessly we needed to get to the rail station by 11:30 and James said okay. We piled into the back, realising there were no accessible seatbelts, as they were probably stuck somewhere in the seat, but also not wanting to waste any time to get him to stop and have us fish them out. James clearly understood the assignment and began driving very fast, although as we watched the app, it seemed we were not headed in the right direction entirely, he was taking us away from the ocean. He tore through small villages, past bikes and people walking and I suddenly worried that he would hit a child and we would be sat there, like terrible rich white men, having caused a completely unnecessary death for a completely unnecessary reason. I dug out my seatbelt and I finally got it, and then tried to get Gusztáv's but wasn't able to pull it out and he said, If I die, I die: I trust God and just as he said that we hit a bump and were jolted into the roof of the car.
James drove like this until in one village he veered left into a petrol station and Gusztáv and I swore under our breath in the back, we didn't have time for this, while James hopped out to fill the car. There were several young men filling up their scooters with petrol and then also two-litre water bottles, which one of them put in the storage compartment under their seat and rode off. James returned in less than 90 seconds and we were off again, finally back on the main road by the ocean, lined with churches and our phones got signals and the time ticked down from an 11:31 arrival to 11:25 and then finally 11:19. We arrived and thanked James and went into the station to find food and our train.
The train was departing from Trivandrum and impressively long. It started very slowly, so much so that people would be standing on the platform, but when it started to move, would begin to climb back onto it. The train had been my main interest for the whole trip, so much so that when Gusztáv suggested we hire a car instead and make our way slowly up through the mountains, I protested loudly. No, the train was a non-negotiable for me. We sat down after changing seats with several people and it was precisely what I had imagined, the old men sleeping on the benches and families and beggars and a man walking up and down the aisle selling biriyani. I had bought samosas in the station and ate them and immediately regretted it, thinking this was probably closer to street food, which I had promised myself I would avoid, than anything I’d eaten so far. We had been warned off the food on the train by lads on the beach who told Gusztáv the food was dirty, and I made Gusztáv promise that however long the trip got, and however adamant I was, he would not let me buy any food from the train hawkers.
They didn't check our tickets until an hour into the trip when the conductor came by with a tablet, which apparently had our names on it because as we stumbled looking for the tickets that Bala had sent us on WhatsApp, the conductor said something approximating Gusztáv and Gusztáv nodded happily, having been recognised, and the conductor moved on without looking any further. Two white men, two white names, that's all he needed.
The train would stop and everyone would get off until a whistle was blown and it would start again slowly. The hawkers wandered up and down the aisles selling tea and sundries and a mother and a little girl begging and then another man begging and singing and an old woman with a cane. When everyone got off to stretch their legs after about three hours, Gusztáv went out and was asked to take pictures with some of the guys sitting a bit further up in our car, and I said, We should go back in before our shit gets stolen, and he said, I don't think so, and he was right, no one was stealing anything, we were all travelling together. He got out again at the next stop and came back to the window with the bars on it and no glass and asked if I wanted Pepsi and chips, and yes I did, because in this country I drank Pepsi with sugar, and was unconcerned with the consequences.
They told us in Hyderabad that India is full of people and you begin to realise this the more you look around, that you are rarely alone, that you can hear and see people constantly outside or in the streets. I remembered how I felt safe when my parents were still awake after I had gone to bed and how I could hear them moving downstairs or watching TV and I always wished I would fall asleep before they went to bed, when it would be completely silent and I would listen to the cracks and hissing of the house settling in the night. Here, it's the same, even in the remote parts of the country, you see someone out walking from one place to another through a field.
The train ride began to come to an end as we got closer to Madurai and our little community started to dissipate: the woman with the small boy and her husband or father, Gusztáv and I couldn't tell which, holding the boy for most of the trip. The groups of six or seven men in their late forties or fifties sitting together and laughing and talking the whole way, with one of them wanting a picture with me when we stopped. The other woman, who was white, but not from the UK or US and with tattoos, who stood up for a long part of the middle of the trip even though there were plenty of places to sit. We avoided the train food, even though the veg biryani came by again and again and I kept telling Gusztáv to stop me, because I would order it and I would eat it.
We pulled into Madurai only a few minutes late and many people got off the train. We sat for a moment and then heard some commotion outside through Gusztáv’s window and I heard Gusztáv say, Oh shit. I looked out and there was a man who had fallen off the platform onto the tracks, passed out. He had fallen badly and was unconscious from what we could tell, with blood coming out of his face or head, we couldn't tell/ There were three or four men standing on the edge of the platform shouting down to him, seeing if he would get up. He didn't and no one did much of anything and Gusztáv and I briefly discussed getting involved before deciding this was absolutely the wrong thing for us to do. White men climb onto train track, hit by oncoming train locals knew to avoid.
Finally, two men climbed down to get him and pulled him up to the platform and laid him on the ground, but it was clear he was very much passed out. They were on their phone and the man was breathing, and they tried a bit to wake him up, pouring water on his mouth. Gusztáv said out loud to no one in particular, Oh Jesus, no, don't do that. Finally, a man in a police uniform and an amazing moustache appeared and asked some questions, looking down, annoyed, at the man who had fallen on the tracks. By now it was becoming clear that he was on drugs or drunk and was very dirty, his face and beard now covered in blood. Still, no one was very concerned and the police commandeered several men to drag him off, out of the centre of the platform to the edge where he was left again. Another police officer appeared, this one looking almost exactly the same as the first one, but about ten years older and they chatted and people passed. Then, suddenly the train was moving again, and we were no longer a part of that story.