A mediocre badass

The last two days have been a series of humbling lessons in the fact that a.) I'm not as much of a badass as I think I am and b.) that I'm not a complete wimp either.

Badass claim #1: Of course Lalu will come with me on the train from Patna to Bhojpur:

Radhika, Seema and I bought train tickets from Patna to the town in Bhojpur District where our project is based. Unsurprisingly, our train was over three hours late, so when we'd had enough waiting, we decided to hop on the next train that came by, which we thought would stop in our town. We guessed wrong, so we ended up overshooting the town and needing to take a local train to backtrack. And, since we didn't have a seat, we stood in the entryway to the train car (best view in the house).

This was an adventure in and of itself, but it was made quadruply so by the fact that I was dragging Lalu and Radhika and Seema were carrying our brand-new (and really heavy) printer to set up our field office. On the back-tracking train, we were crammed in with all these other passengers and suitcases and the ground was soaked with some unnameable orange liquid, which Lalu alternately rolled around in and then covered me with when I had to pick him up when anyone tried to get past (approx every 20 seconds).

It actually was pretty fun and we had spectacular views out of the open doorway I was 4 inches away from, but next time, I keep my official seat.

Badass claim #2: I'm not so uptight that I can't leave my dog unsupervised for one day without some major crisis happening.

We went to see a health camp in a village today, which meant many hours of travel and hanging out in a village, so I decided to loosen up a bit and leave Lalu at the sort-of hostel where our field staff are staying, with his best friend Mani Pandey to play with. Unbeknownst to me, Lalu decided to go exploring in the neighborhood. Thankfully, Nikhil came back in the afternoon, discovered he was gone, roamed through the town until he found Lalu, and brought him back. And Lalu hadn't just wandered off - Nikhil found him tied up in someone else's yard. Lalu is the friendliest dog ever, and this guy apparently appreciated that Lalu was sweet, clean and healthy, and decided to take him in, out of the kindness of his heart. So Nikhil had to thank the guy for "rescuing" my dog, and then convince him to give him back. I'll owe Nikhil for the rest of my life, and from now on, Lalu stays with me at all times (turns out I'm uptight for a reason).

  

Ok, so maybe I'm not as badass as I'd like to be, but I'm also now living half the week in a rural town, transporting my adopted street dog with me, eating at dhabas (roadside stands) and generally confusing the absolute heck out of all the people living here. And Nikhil is always here to pull me out of a pinch!