Grantourismo Travel Blogging Competition: April Winners

We had two first prizes for our April Grantourismo Travel Blogging Competition, thanks to RailEuropeUK, who threw a very generous gift of two European rail passes valued at £1000 into our pot of fantastic prizes. As the rail passes could only be given to a British resident, we decided to award our usual monthly first prize, a HomeAway Holiday-Rentals stay worth £500 in any property in the world, along with a Context tour voucher worth US$100, to the best entry from a non-UK resident. Second and third prizes, a Viator tour voucher worth £100/US$150 and an annual subscription to Afar magazine, went to the next best two entries, irrespective of where they resided. Here are the posts from our two April winners. Enjoy!

ON THE BAMBOO TRAIN IN BATTAMBANG

By Akila from The Road Forks, the non-UK winner (from the USA) of our April Grantourismo Travel Blogging Competition

I stared at my meager wardrobe that morning, discarding the dirty, frayed pants and the shorts that would not be considered modest in Cambodia, and settled on the skirt. I berated myself for that decision as splinters from the hard wooden shafts poked through the thin cushion during our journey on the bamboo train. The train is a bare platform of bamboo shoots attached to a four-stroke lawnmower engine laid on top of leftover military wheels and axles. Passengers sit upon the rickety structure mere inches from the ground as the train barrels along the uneven tracks at a heart-wrenching 40 kilometers/hour.

These trains were built in response to a need for public transport which, like much else in Cambodia, the government would not provide. Because the government had not repaired the train tracks wrecked by Khmer Rouge militants, the weekly train from Phnom Penh to Battambang often derailed or moved at a walking-pace, finally resulting in its closure in 2009. The Cambodians responded with an ingenious solution: a train system built on spare parts.

Within minutes of leaving Battambang, our lawnmower engine picked up speed and my skirt began flapping at my legs. I pulled the edge of the fabric tightly over my knees and held my hands in place as the train jerked over the thick metal ties. Tree branches lunged towards me and I brushed them aside to view the long expanse of the Cambodian countryside.

The sand-colored rice fields filled the sides of the railroad, empty and sad, save for a few roaming cows. A man standing in the field with a long rake looked up as our train trundled past him. Two naked children splashed water in a tin bathtub in the valley below while their mother hung laundry in front of the grass-thatched house.

My mind drifted past the bumps in the road and the deep blue sky. I wondered how I would respond if my government did not provide a good transportation infrastructure. Would I accept this as an inevitability or complain about the injustice or inundate my Congressman with letters? Or would I take actions to remedy the situation as best as I could as these enterprising Cambodians had?

Our train reached the station, a small hut in the middle of the rice fields, where our teenage train driver flung himself into a hammock. We purchased Coca-Colas from a wrinkled woman in a maroon sarong who offered us bags of peanut brittle and chips. She looked at us and smiled, separated by the wall of dissimilar languages.

An incoming train came from the other direction, crowded with seven passengers, two motorcycles, and three large Styrofoam containers. Our train driver leapt out of his hammock, dismantled our train, and moved the platform, engine, and wheels to the side of the tracks, allowing the other train to pass on to Battambang. A passenger laughed at our incredulous faces and waved. It was merely another commute for the Cambodians on the bamboo train.

IN WHICH MS FOGG AND PASSEPARTOUT MEET SOME NEW FRIENDS

By Monisha Rajesh from Around India in 80 Trains (on Monisha’s Blog), the UK winner of our April Grantourismo Travel Blogging Competition

Travelling great distances on Indian trains is like sitting in one long, cosy living room. Blanket-wrapped ladies feed kids from tiffin carriers, gossip passes between overhead berths and cross-legged I.T graduates play rummy on briefcases. Mobiles charge, laptops shriek bootleg copies of Three Idiots, and nappers snore behind curtained compartments, oblivious to the clamour. It’s a friendly confusion in which you can blend, or quietly observe.

However, after super-fast Shatabdis, comedy toy trains and the regal splendour of the Deccan Odyssey, only a clattering passenger train can take us from Trichy to Tanjavur – akin to jumping on the central line during summer rush-hour. But unlike the tight-lipped nods and snap of the Evening Standard, a fellow passenger will stretch out a gnarled hand to drop tiny bananas into your lap with a long blink and gentle head movement to the right, which means “that’s ok, you don’t need to give me anything.”

At Trichy our train shifts platforms and we belt across the track, climbing in then out of another train – almost tipping back out from the weight of overstuffed Karrimors. Leaping onto the platform with moments to spare, we spot two teenagers observing our frenzy with amusement before strolling behind with an air of suicidal nonchalance as the train barely grazes their backsides.

After scrambling for empty spots on the seats, floor and luggage racks, an elderly gent spies us lurking by the loo and with one quick wrist flick, tells the bench to shift up. The already-packed row slides along in sync, peering at us with coy intrigue, happy to share biscuits, water and banter. Our train stops at every station along the dry-roasted stretch of Farmville, collecting dhoti-wearing farmers, cackling sadhus and a fruit-seller who sits with one leg tucked firmly underneath him and a medieval set of lop-sided weighing scales over his shoulder. He has the sort of lithe, fat-free frame hankered after by twenty-something Londoners subscribing to Men’s Health – while in India, a happy, ghee-filled gut and several chins is the picture of health – despite the likely onset of diabetes.

On passenger trains, language is an issue, but a thumb to the mouth simply means “what’s your story then?” With a mix of appalling Tamil and for some reason, equally appalling English, I describe our journey to a team of office workers. Not one speaks English, yet they rummage through my logbook and flick through Passepartout’s photos, getting the gist of it. A youngster by the window leans in shyly, showing us our website on his mobile, clarifying any misgivings to the compartment, who cheer. They dump chubby-wristed babies wearing tight bangles onto my lap for photos and explain collectively that we should see the Tanjavur temple at sunrise. The whole fiasco is like a giant game of Give Us A Clue, but actually fun.

When we pull into Tanjavur, many hands reach for our bags, placing them deftly on the platform, before waving brightly through barred windows.

Definitely the most fun journey so far.

SECOND PRIZE was awarded to Jiffer Bourguignon, one of the Smash and Sniff cousins, for India by Rail: Going it Alone. (Jiffer also one third prize in the March competition.)

THIRD PRIZE went to Ant over at Trail of Ants for Me and My Mongol, about his journey on the Trans-Mongolian Railway.

You can find links to the other April entries in the Trackbacks and Comments at the end of the April Grantourismo Competition post. Click here for details for the May competition – this month’s theme is ‘Food and Travel’.

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