In Transit!

I thought two hours to get the thirty kilometers from Rishikesh to Haridwar, where I was to catch a train to Delhi, would be plenty of time. Turns out I was wrong by two minutes. After riding in three different rickshaws and sitting in an Indian traffic jam while a road construction crew paved a precious ten foot stretch of road, I ran through the entrance of the railway station to see my train pulling away from the platform a few rails away. The first time a train had been on time, possibly ever. Fortunately there was a bus station nearby and I was able to hop on one that would arrive at nearly the same time as I would've by train. The driver, thinking he was being nice, let me ride shot gun. Seven stressful hours later, after proving we had the loudest horn on the road and at one point literally driving into oncoming traffic for a few kilometer stretch to reach a restaurant on the opposite side of the center divider, we arrived just before midnight. At that point I didn't want to wake up the next day and think again about navigating public transport, and there were no hotels in the area around the bus station, so I took a shuttle straight to the airport. The guard at the entrance wouldn't let me in the terminal because my flight wasn't leaving for thirteen hours, so I was sequestered to the visitors lounge until I was able to check in. I slept surprisingly well there though. It was a quick flight to Kathmandu, where upon arrival they wouldn't let me leave the airport because my visa had expired the day before. They didn't know what to do with me, so just had me sit and wait for somebody to come along who did know what to do. That person never came, and it turned out all I had to do was pay five bucks for a transit visa and I was able to go and get my things I'd left at a friends' house. What was supposed to be plenty of time to relax and pack up my things and say goodbye to the family I had stayed with my last week in Nepal turned into barely enough time to hop in a cab, grab my things, say a quick bye, and head back to the airport where I rearranged my packing job on the cement outside the entrance. An overnight flight brought me here to Hong Kong, where I arrived early enough this morning to take a train into the city and walk around for a few hours, enjoying a ferry ride across the harbour and finding an authentic noodle and veggie dish. Now I sit leisurely and wait for my plane to begin boarding, then twelve and a half hours later I'll be home in L.A., surely missing the chaos that comes with life abroad.