Well, that was fun

Apart from just about everything, and the fact that at nine of the evening, we still have about eight hours to go.

To be fair, it started out ok. Our lovely host tuk-tuk’d us into town (in part, admittedly, because thanks to the idiot’s shenanigans we didn’t quite have enough to pay the bill). But that bit was fine. We paid the bill, and didn’t have to wait long before a bus came to take us the 40 minutes or so back to the main north-south road junction where we were to take the ‘luxury’ – which is to say AC + guaranteed seats – bus down to Colombo. Ok, we had to stand all the way, but we’re both fit & healthy so 45 minutes standing holds no fears. Hence the cheerful expressions above.

The bus was due at four, but we’d been told to get there for 3.30, so we duly turned up not long after three – long enough to have a rest and a cool drink before getting to the bus stop around 3.15. 3.30 came and went, we waited on. It was very hot, but we at least had some shade. Four came and went. By ten past the tension was definitely creeping in. Quarter past, I rang. The bloke I spoke to was apologetic, spoke poor English, but did manage to convey that the bus was now due to reach us at 4.30. We waited on.

4.45, and we were getting a tad fraught. Many Columbo buses had passed us – regular buses – all crammed to the gunwales. But still no sign of our ‘Express’. I rang again. No answer. I rang again. The phone rang for a good while, then a voice said hello. This bloke’s English was worse – but just enough to convey that the bus had gone, and there were no more today. Then the line went dead.

The next ‘regular’ bus turned up 15 minutes or so later. It was full, but not as bad as earlier ones. We could at least get on. Woop, as Ellie might say, woop. That was about the extent of the good news. We stood, hanging off whatever rails we could reach, buffeted on all sides by fellow standers. After 45 minutes or so, the conductor made a young chap stand up and surrender his seat to Virle. He didn’t lok thrilled, but complied. The conductor’s word is law. I managed to bag myself a little corner just inside the door, and that’s where I stayed for perhaps another hour. Strange thing: we made a number of stops, at each of which more people got on, but no-one, as far as I could see, ever got off. Fortunately I was out of the worst of it, thanks to my little corner.

Still, after the hour or so (plus the original 45 minutes) my hip was starting to grumble, and I was not upset when, a young woman getting off, the conductor assigned me the seat. (Having failed to twig that she was getting off, and believing that the conductor was implementing a Virle-style swap, I at first insisted that she keep the seat, prompting a bloke of perhaps 35 to attempt a coup, at which I baulked, grabbing the seat with no further messing about. I should coco, innit.)

And that was about as fun and exciting as it got all day: another two hours or so of at-least-seated discomfort. In my case compounded by two companions: one, a geriatric somnambulist on my left, who spent the entire journey asleep, apart from waking up 173 times, each time for five seconds, before returning to splaying legs, slumping into me, looking to loll onto my shoulder, then coming round again, for five seconds, rinse and repeat; t’other a decidedly unnerving chap who was Virle’s companion across the aisle, and who, every time I turned to say something to her, leaned forward slightly in his seat so as to fix me with an intense and somehow malevolent stare as though he thought it was him I was addressing, and he didn’t think much of what I had to say. And I mean every time. Being looked at very intensely, with a furious expression, 27 times, from no more than a metre, certainly added to the fun of the whole experience.

The final run into Colombo was further enlivened by repeated slows-to-a-crawl, which did little to relieve the nerves – we’d left plenty of time to spare, and even with the day’s absurdities, were pretty sure time wouldn’t actually be an issue. Turned out to be yet another of the idiot’s little bonuses to our holiday: every petrol station we passed had a queue of up to a hundred scooters, tuk tuks, cars and other vehicles, blocking our side of our rush hour road for hundreds of metres at a time, ongoing traffic overtaking at the pace of a sclerotic snail. Joy.

Finally reached Colombo with an hour and change to go before our train – enough, thankfully, to grab a quick biryani before getting aboard. To find one of the seats assigned by our booking occupied, and the other non-existent. Managed to find a chap in a uniform, who, after demanding tickets from a few other travellers and clearly ending up as nonplussed as us, simply said ‘sit here’. Which we have done. To begin our journey through the night (arrival scheduled for 5.30) in seats whose discomfort belies their First Class status, and bodes ill for any chances of sleep. As my mother used to say, using an expression which I believe may be biblical, and which has served me well through the years, ‘This too will pass’.

The video, from the final run into Colombo, ain’t much. But it beats being there, believe me.