Reflections on the Journey-Day 10

Saturday, August 8 & Sunday, August 9:
Views from the train

Up at 3:45 am (after getting to bed around 11:30 pm) to get to the train station to start our trip home.  We will have traveled by planes, trains & automobiles on this journey.  The train will take us to Bangalore, where we will stay the night and fly home on Sunday early in the morning.  Next time, we will know not to sit near the bathrooms, as they did not smell at all good when the train was stopped.  Some women and their children got on about halfway through the trip, and we were able to communicate a little with them.  They were on their way to Bangalore to visit & stay with one of the woman's mothers.  They offered us some of the food they had brought with them, and even offered to have us stay with them in Bangalore, which unfortunately we had to decline.  It would've been quite interesting, I think.
   Had a great lunch at the hotel in Bangalore, a normal shower (yeah!!!) and a too-short nap, before we went shopping for souveniers.  Met up with the Kalavai team in Bangalore; it was great to see them again after a week and swap stories.  It really struck home that we are not in America, as they checked our vans for bombs (mirror on the end of a pole) before we were allowed on the hotel property, and after we returned from our shopping/supper trip (now it was evening), we had to walk thru a metal detector (like at the airport) to enter the hotel.  To bed about midnight, and up around 2:40 am to get to the airport.  Had a nightmare about packing and not being able to fit everything in my bags to take home. 
  Long flight from Bangalore to London, a 5-hr layover in London, then another long flight home to Chicago.  Good food on the plane, watched several movies/TV shows, British Airways is great!  Got home ~2 am on Monday morning.  Took a few days to get over jet lag & get caught up on my sleep. 
A long trip, an adventurous trip, an awesome experience I will never forget!