Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter Nine
“Man is fond of counting his troubles, but he does not count his
joys. If he counted them up as he ought to, he would see that
every lot has enough happiness provided for it.”
—Fyodor Dostoevsky
“W
atch out,” the Englishman warned. “I was robbed in Patna.”
Benji leaned casually against the gas station wall, his arms burned from days walking in
the scorching sun. He was on his own life-affirming trek, walking across the whole of India.
I will repeat.
Walking. Across. The. Whole. Of. India. Either this chap was a total madman or a com-
plete genius. I must say, I never really figured out which one.
Benji had just bought me gas thirty miles outside the city of Patna, in the Bihar
province—my next destination and the site of his robbery.
He looked around the barren station, where a bored attendant sat at a window selling
empty plastic bottles filled with gasoline and occasionally with water. After his happy little
tale of getting robbed in the town I was heading to, he reminded me why theft in India wasn't
something to be angry over: “Always remember that there is someone out there less fortu-
nate than you. Less healthy than you. Less lucky than you.”
Benji slipped his sunglasses back on and adjusted his heavy backpack. I thanked him for
the gas and wished that we were both heading in the same direction, but he was heading
north as I continued east, east across the world.
I started up Kindness One and tried to ignore his earlier comment: “I got robbed in Pat-
na.” Of course, outside of Kindness One and my computer, I didn't have much to steal. Then
again, that was pretty much everything.
Benji had also told me that Bihar province was one of the most dangerous places in India.
So far, I had been warned of many impending dooms without actually running into one. The
