Sleeper Class

I had a 10:40pm departure time for the overnight train to Udaipur. There are many different classes of tickets for trains in India but when I went to buy my ticket the previous day I just took what the guy sold me and figured it would be fine. I thought it seemed awfully cheap...just under $6 for a 10 hour train ride but I do like a bargain so I went with it anyway. When I got to the station and saw the other "sleeper class" cars and the state of the station itself I was starting to think maybe I should upgrade. But the line at the reservation counter was crazy so I had to go with what I had and figured it was all a part of the experience of travelling in India. So I waited at my platform and spent as much time as I could walking around with my bag because as soon as you sit down you become an easy target for people asking for money.
When I finally got on the train I realized that I was stuck in a middle berth, but fortunately of the 8 beds available in my section there were only 3 occupied. So I settled onto a bottom bunk with my bag behind me and was very glad I was short and Canadian. It was cold enough in sleeper class to occasionally see your breath since the windows don't close properly and it was going down to about 6C at night. It was managable but without a sleeping bag it was a chilly night.
I passed the first part of the night chatting with a guy from Saudi Arabia who was travelling in Jaipur and he showed me all of the pics on his camera of where he'd travelled and pics from home. There were photos of a muslim festival that had taken place in Saudi where there were guys that would put knives through their skin and walk in a procession. I'm not just talking about one or two knives either. There was one guy that had dozens of knives (steak knife size) pushed through about a half inch of skin in rows all down his arms and legs and even on his chest and stomach. This may sound graphic but it's no where near as bad as having him zoom in on the camera over and over again so I can get a really good view. It still made for some interesting conversation though and was a good way to pass the time until I was ready for sleep.
I didn't sleep all that well, in part because of the cold but also because I was worried about sleeping through my stop. I didn't have a lot of confidence that someone would wake me up when we arrived in Udaipur but I set my alarm and hoped for the best. I woke up early in the morning and passed a bit more time trying to get a good pic of the mouse that had been running around between the bunks all night. I named him Chester and actually did get a good pic. (Mom, I know you love hearing about that).
Overall, I'm glad I did the sleeper class train and it wasn't really that bad but for future reference...bring a sleeping bag in the winter in northern India if you want to travel really cheap.