And your list of more beautiful stations than VT includes? Kipling's dad did the carvings on the inside.
But India is the Indians. Anyone who doesn't get it has no soul. Go and hang out with some sadhus or street kids. **** sight more fun that this backward little island. Can't wait to get back.
Also, I'm not sure that suggesting those whose only refuge from the relentless ghastliness of everyday life is a sort of stoic/ascetic mysticism or children consigned to grinding poverty as exemplars of all that's best about India is exactly convincing me of its merits, either.
Its a pretty ****ing horrible place by most measures. Gut wrenching poverty to the point of starvation set against a backdrop of obscene wealth and the veiled notion that it is all our fault.
WES has been to Bangalore which in my experience is about the best place to visit.
Oh, I had to take issue with a bolshie Indian bird the other day who was blathering on about my colonial privilege and how it was only right that 'white men' be made to pay for the sins of empire. I pointed out that my ancestors were starved and oppressed by the Brits quite as much as hers and you don't hear me moaning about it. She said that was because, as a white man, I was still benefitting from imperialism. I pointed out that, as the child of a rich, English-speaking Indian family who was earning a very nice living in England by writing stuff in English, so was she.
After about an hour of back-and-forth, we agreed to differ.