The toy train at dawn — Darjeeling, second time around

I woke at 4 a.m. to catch the first toy train from Ghoom. The cold was that particular Darjeeling cold that smells of woodsmoke and damp pine. At Batasia Loop the mist parted for exactly ninety seconds — long enough to see Kanchenjunga turn pink — and then closed again as if it had been a private joke between us. I drank chai at a stall where the owner remembered my father from a decade ago. "Same nose," he said, refusing to take money. I cried a little, then laughed at myself for crying. There are places you visit. And there are places that visit you back.