Amritsar...not where we would have picked to get stuck

Though Amritsar's Golden Sikh Temple was stunning, reflecting off the surrounding pools and being visited by thousands upon thousand of devout pilgrims on a daily basis, Amritsar itself was nothing to write home about it. We visited the temple at a couple of different times during the day to glimpse how the sunlight changes it's appearance and decided one day in Amritsar was enough...so we thought.

As we visited the holy temple, there was some trouble in Austria, where a Sikh guru from Amritsar was shot and killed. Apparently the logical response to this is to begin an uproar in and around Amritsar where riots broke out bringing all public transportation into and out of the state of Punjab to a halt...fun. We were stuck.

OK, let's back up a bit...we didn't actually know we were stuck due to the situation just explained. We initially didn't get on our morning train (which turned out to be canceled due to the aforementioned incident) due to the violent illness that put both of us in the hotel bathroom for hours upon hours. M awoke around 6AM to begin her puke rally while P slept in 'til about 8AM before she began hers. After taking turns staring down the face of our porcelain friend for a few hours, it dawned on us that we can get our tickets refunded and book the next day's train outta Amritsar. P was finally stable enough to walk outside to bring back water for our dehydrated selves when she noticed not a soul on the streets (VERY odd for India). We later hear the state of Punjab is basically under strict orders to shut down between the hours of 12 and 5PM due to riots. RIOTS?! And here we thought our worst problem was our need to be within 5ft of a bathroom at all times. We learned that our train was cancelled and an automatic refund would be credited to our account, but as for the connection we were going to catch in Delhi onwards to Udaipur, that would be up to us to visit the "station supervisor" to arrange a refund.

To make a long story short, the next day, we felt OK to venture away from a bathroom, so we visited the "station supervisor," who proceeded to shout at us about "our problem" and how a refund cannot be granted because we didn't risk the dangerous streets of Amritsar and get to the train station at the time of our train to ask for a refund. SO...because of that, we have to file for god knows what and trust this man on his word that our money would be delivered to our address in NYC in 3 to 5 months...hahaha, yea ok. Why an urge to vomit all over this man and his 6 man posse didn't overtake M's body, we're not sure, but we were surely ready to rip him to pieces. Fortunately, P, the calm, composed one of us 2 managed to re-explain our situation multiple times in hopes for a different answer from this evil man, while M sat back turning different shades of red as she held it all in. We finally gave up and signed our ticket over and kissed our money goodbye, but who knows...maybe we'll get a check in the mail from India Rail around December and this excititing story can be retold over Christmas and Hannukah dinner!

After 5 days of hanging out at the hotel, which luckily had cable TV and English channels (whoo!!) we were free from the state of Punjab. Now our only dilemma was how we'd make it to Mumbai in one and a half days instead of the 4 we alotted...