The train plays it fast and loose over the tracks. My head bounces on the pillow all night long. From my top bunk I can touch the three walls of my berth. Every time I open my eyes there is a cockroach crawling along one of the walls. I tell myself that it is the same roach, and that he does not have a multitude of brothers, yet he keeps changing sizes.
It seems as if I am the only woman, and for that matter foreigner, on the train. I am definitely the only one in my present car. More disconcerting than that, no one seems to have the slightest idea what I am doing here. They are--or appear to be, entirely perplexed by my existence. I am supposed to reach my stop Pankot at 7:20am and I am wondering if I will know it in any other way than at 7:20 the train will stop. It has occurred to me that this is not like missing Back Bay and instead getting of at South Station, which I have done on occasion. If I miss Pankot, I am in Kashmir and very nearly in Pakistan. I have arranged, and classically overpaid, for a car to take me the remaining three and a half hours into the mountains. I am excited for tomorrow, to meet the people I have been in contact with, to see the beautiful scenery, and to find my new home.
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