The Next Train on Platform 2

Day 13.

It's possibly, nay likely, that train travel is addictive: I'm certainly hooked! These journeys have been deliberately made so that we have not shuttled about on the more convenient planes, buses and taxis. Being conveyed by publicly available slow-wheeled carriages down long distances of track is somehow better (but maybe not more graceful) than other forms of transport. There's often more to be seen and better economy to be had by rail. It appears the Malaysian clientele (and we haven't spotted any Malay trainspotters yet) isn't much different to the great en-bussed, but even for them it feels quite good to be going a little slower without the worry of reckless overtaking, stifling traffic jams, the weather or indeed anything other than the ever-changing view. Of course, nothing has broken down and I'm not commuting...

The 'ekspres' from the romantically-entitled Butterworth to Ipoh at the foot of the Cameron Highlands would, in many western countries, be considered an unsatisfactory journey. The train's general state of repair and attention to crucial matters of health and safety certainly leaves a little to be desired: the doors to this, the 2nd-class carriage, do not close -indeed, they cannot without a key. This has the treble effect of negating the air conditioning, of allowing the majority of the juvenile passenger's carriage-end smoke to escape and, when going through bends and the doors are wildly flapping, of making anywhere near the exits quite dangerous places to be.

Not that anyone, least of all the Malaysian Railways staff, appears to be the slightest bit worried about it at all. We're moving in the right direction, aren't we 'Mr Lah-de-dah-Western-Standards'?

It reminds me very much of traveling in Britain by rail in the mid-70s, except those trains were dirtier and the horse-hair stuffed seats were much less comfortable than these much-more modern, individualised and 'would probably-have-been-first-class-back-then' variety. The toilets exude a certain piquance and the interior is a bit on the grubby side, but there's very little graffiti -"Al Hafiz loves Aisha" is scratched on the window sill, but otherwise not one naughty rude word or slanderous reference to a football team is anywhere to be seen!

Like many-a railway throughout the world, 'KTM Intercity: Seamless Travel' appears not to have received sufficient continuous investment. Is there ever enough dosh from passengers alone to keep the old stock rolling? From the mid-20th century, new lines that have justified their investments have become a bit of a rarity and old lines need constant repairing. No matter how much rose-tinted sympathy we may have expended on them, the truth is railways simply do not made enough money on their own to justify the massive amounts of government spending that has kept those publicly-owned wheels a-turnin'. So why keep them? If the roads were suddenly taken away it would be a different matter, but other than in cities state-owned railways are run on national pride, as political necessities and as demonstrations of a whole lot of public sentiment.

Railways are shared experiences. As a kid, I used to half-hate/half-love going to the toilet on British Rail trains, the method we employed to get to Hastings, Margate, Teignmouth, Bath, York (and the historic attractions and museums of London on Sundays). I would fearfully open the well-scrawled doors of the toilets expecting a ghastly mess of human effluence, spent fags and grease-proof toilet paper to be revealed. Most times it would be boringly functional -merely a bit smelly- and I would content myself with looking down the little inspection hatch in the floor to see track and sleepers speeding past. Sometimes it was a jackpot, a horrific disaster of nauseating filth and I would return to my seat happy to report distasteful childish tales of nasty things wot I had seen -surely enough to put you off your Mother's Pride cheesy sandwiches and thermos of milky tea.

As we travel through the Malaysian countryside, between millions of acres of palm oil plantations and jungly limestone crags, it is clear there is a great deal of work being done on the line's improvement and extension. New bridges, mounds of earth and stones, drainage, new stations gantries and access points seem to be next to the track the whole journey. Whichever company gets the fencing contract alone will be sitting pretty for years! The new high-speed railway line being built will link the major cities of this rapidly-developing nation. It is likely this will mean that a newly-boosted rail freight transportation system combined with shorter journeying times will help create a real alternative to the over-used road network. The immense political and financial investment is, therefore, obviously future-bound. Big projects like these create lots of jobs now and further down the line...

So the smoke-filled 2:30 from Butterworth to Ipoh with its broken doors and smelly bogs may be around for a little while longer, like the myriad of tin shacks farms and mud-grey buffalos it whizzes past. But when it inevitably gets finally shunted and left to rot at a nameless rail yard, it is likely most folk will be far too happy enjoying the new smooth-running railway pride of Malaysia to shed any tears.