Journey of Confusion
The train station in Szeged, Hungary isn’t that big. I got there nice and early for my 6:30am train, and with some minutes to spare I managed to snap off a few pictures in the soft dawn light.
When 6:29 rolled around, though, I started getting worried. There was one train on the tracks, but it was going to Budapest, whereas mine was heading south across the border to Subotica, Serbia. But where was it?
Confused, I asked a train engineer, and he pointed to the locomotive that I had photographed a few minutes earlier:
Wait, that’s the train? Yep. Forget wagons, this little rickety engine was it. I hurried on board seconds before it departed on its slow journey south.
Now, I didn’t stay in Subotica. I waited a few hours there, then connected to another train to take me to Novi Sad (as it turns out, one of the coolest cities in eastern Europe). It was a long and slow journey, though, and I promptly fell asleep.
It’s hard to describe my surprise when I woke up, looked out the window, and saw this:
Oh my God, I’m back in Iowa! was my first thought. Flat land and corn as far as you can see. The similiraties in landscape were uncanny.
Of course, when our train stopped to let this one pass, it didn’t feel nearly as Iowan anymore:
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Gotta love those little trains!
Here in Romania, cars are always stopped along the road, people out mingling with one another. I once asked if there was an accident, they laughed and said it’s just a train coming. Ten minutes later a one or two car train passed by at a jogging pace.
Were there many other passengers? When I rode in one, it was otherwise empty and I was able to go by the driver and get some great photos…then we hit a dog.
Ah, in my case the little engine that could was packed to the brim. Not to mention so slow that a dog could have been sleeping on the tracks, woken by the train starting to press against its fur, and casually gotten out of the way unharmed. Urg.