train travel

I love to travel by train. I HATE flying! I have taken the train in California, Taiwan, and Japan. The bullet train in Japan is amazing! It goes so fast that there is no need to fly. But you can't really see much of the countryside, it all goes by in a blur. In Taiwan trains the toilets are the asian kind you have to squat over. You don't have to flush it...everything just goes out through a hole in the floor. You can see the track going by underneath the toilet. Ok, maybe that's too much information! I'm now living in India, and hoping to take the train soon.

I have yet to go on a train trip yet. I have always wanted to. The fact is that here in the states train travel is not common at all like it is in other parts of the world. Truthfully, I don't know anyone that has taken a trip by train. I would love to go to Europe and travel by train though.

Yes, when I was a kid, my mum brought me to board the train to Ipoh. We went there to visit my aunty who was working there at that time. It was a 2 hour ride, but it's was totally new experience for a little boy like me. I remembered I was playing with the windows lever, and the window pane dropped and hit a young man's head. But he was not annoyed, knowing that I was just a playful and curious kid who didn't did it intentionally. After working in Penang, I have tried to travel home to Taiping once. It was not a good experience though, because of the railroad work, the train got delayed for 3 hours. I reached home at 1am in the mid night (it was supposed to reach at 10pm). One thing I like about train is, the freedom of going to rest room. Besides, I can wandering from carriage to carriage, when I feel bored.

Train is my favorite form of transportation. I like to look out of the window in the day time to see the passing scenery and sleep in a comfortable compartment in the night time. There is lots of leg room and I can get up from time to time to stretch my legs. I can walk up and down the corridor if I like. If the bus cost $20 and the train costs $30 I will choose the train to travel on. There is a train system in my home country but the fares are high. It is so modern that it has lost that magical chug-chug-chug sound that I so adore. I have heard it on trains in Eastern Europe that are old stock. I have traveled on trains in mainland Europe, Kenya, Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand and the USA.

Many, many years ago I traveled from Maryland to Chicago by train and it was a wonderful experience. I met a young woman around my age who was visiting the U.S. and we became fast friends. We hung out for a bit in the club car and made a lot of new friends there, too. The only problem was that we were having such a good time that we stayed up all night long and I was exhausted by the time I arrived in Chicago. I love the big train stations, too!