Monisha Rajesh travels the world in 80 trains in an impressive, intrepid inter-continental journey, criss-crossing Europe and Asia twice, and going around North America solely by train. Having done the same in India a few years ago (and also written a book about that), Rajesh is an accomplished pro at train travel.
With her fiance Jem, Rajesh first travels around Europe, then goes from Moscow to Mongolia on the famous Trans-continental Express. From there, they swing down across China to Vietnam to Thailand and down through Malaysia to Singapore. Then, they come back up to Thailand, where they fly to Japan, travel across the country by train, and fly across the Pacific to Canada.
Things get really interesting in Canada since not many people write about traveling across that vast country and the US by train. Rajesh and Jem ride the Canadian train from the Pacific to Toronto, then take a train there to New York, where they use a monthly pass to take AmTrak down south to New Orleans, swing west through Texas to California, then go up to the northwest. They then fly back over the Pacific to China, where they visit North Korea on a special cross-country train journey. They then return to China and travel across it properly to Tibet and Xinjiang. From Xinjiang, they cross to Kazakhstan before heading all the way back to Moscow and then Europe. Their final leg is on a luxurious Orient Express from Venice to London.
You might have noticed that the two traveled from Europe across Asia, then to North America, then flew back to Asia, then went back in the reverse direction that they had started from to Europe. The reason they did this is to ride enough trains to make up 80 as specified in the book title. Since South America and Africa don’t have decent train networks, these were omitted and so Rajesh and Jem traveled across Asia twice.
It’s not all train travel as Rajesh visits atomic bomb survivors in Japan, goes to the infamous River Kwai bridge in Thailand which World War II prisoners were literally worked to death by the Japanese to build, and goes to look at the terracotta warriors in Xian, China.
The North Korea segment is unique as Rajesh and Jem don’t just join a tour (the only way foreigners can visit the country) to Pyongyang, but they, with their tour group, ride a special tourist train that takes them to other parts of the country.
In China, the two take the train to Tibet, then to Xinjiang, which some people would know are home to two minorities that are heavily oppressed by the Chinese state and in danger of having their respective cultures wiped out. Through furtive conversations and observations, Rajesh does well to convey the menace of the state and the exploitation by Chinese Han in these areas, which stands in stark contrast to their natural beauty and unique but endangered cultures.
Certain parts go by really fast as the two don’t spend much time in a lot of places, but the meat of the book is in what goes on in the trains. Rajesh and Jem talk to a lot of fellow train travellers, ranging from friendly and inquisitive Russians to haughty pensioners to bickering couples and even a young American runaway. Rajesh doesn’t pull any punches on some of the people she runs into, but she is also self-deprecating enough to refer to herself as a “weirdo hovering outside the door with a notebook and a pen” at one point.
Geographically, the entire journey wasn’t exactly “around the world” as the Atlantic was not crossed, but for literary and travel purposes, Around the World in 80 Trains is a fantastic and fun read.
