My name is Clara and I am a train nerd. I've taken the train around Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan, India, Sri Lanka and, most recently, England and Scotland.
Most people I know don't "get" train travel. Why would anyone choose to take the train for three days to get from Singapore to Bangkok, when the Thai capital is less than three hours away by plane? And who wants to spend their holidays trying to line up complicated train schedules rather than sit back and relax?
Train rides seem romantic in books and movies. But in reality, they're a whole lot of nothing. The train is slow. It's boring. There is no Internet. Sometimes, there's no food.
In the age of the one-click check-out, train travel is anathema to most, but the inefficiency of train travel is exactly why I love it. It forces you to pay attention to the most mundane things.
Food is always a highlight of any long train journey. On a 20-hour train from Bangkok to Padang Besar, I was fed a hearty Thai spread for dinner: At 6pm, an attendant smartly folded down my seat table and laid out a nine-dish banquet complete with tom yam soup, green and red curry with a choice of protein, salad, fresh fruit, and cake. After a food-induced night's sleep, I woke up to a similar breakfast as the train chugged towards the Thai-Malaysian border. It was 20 hours of pampering for just under 1,000 baht ($38).
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