Riding Motorcycles Without Helmets

15 July 2009 This morning started at about 4:30am, we left the house a little after 5am after waking Kelly up since his alarm didn’t. It took a little searching and some luck to get a cab this morning- apparently rickshaw drivers are hard to come by at 5am- who would have thought!? Thankfully our guy was driving down the road our direction with nobody inside- we were thankful to get him and didn’t argue with the Rs. 250 price to take us to the Delhi Railway Station. We get to the station, find our train- the Shatabdi Express, and are wowed by the luxury and the amount of white people! We discovered the key to how foreigners and the wealthier Indian train riders ride, they ride in the AC car! Seriously this thing was nice (in comparison to second seating non AC). It was clean, and had individual seats- the kind of seats you sit in on a tour bus. They came around with newspapers, bottled water and tea w/biscuits! Man what an extra Rs.600 can get three people! The train, being an express train, got us to Mathura in just over an hour. The train station in Mathura…haha where to begin! Well the only thing that swarmed more than the drivers were the flies- literally 20 flies on Sadies backpack…and about 10 rickshaw drivers at any given time encircling us. By no means was this the dirtiest train station that I have been to here but it was the worst. It was small and smelled of urine- everything smelled like urine, there was no escaping it! I still can’t get over how men just urinate everywhere here- and there are TONS of naked kids running around everywhere. Anyway we try calling our contact that is suppose to meet us there and Kelly’s phone wont work, we go to the phone stand, that’s not working either, a ricky driver calls the number for us and we tell our guy that we have arrived. Being a combo of poor cell reception, language barriers and the overwhelming experience, we decide to head towards the gates of the station where all of the cars drive in because you can’t miss three foreigners standing on a median can you and after all he would be there in 2min because the office is within walking distance. 45min and a million ricky drivers harassing us later, they finally find us. Apparently there is more than one entrance to the place and we should have stayed in the station’s lobby (funny because I feel like I had made that argument/suggestion)…annnnyway they found us, we do the 5min walk to the office and sit. The branch office is well very different from the corporate office that we work in, but it works and we even made a new mouse friend there too! Lol After relaxing for a bit and meeting some people, we hopped in a mini-vanish bus thing and headed out. It was a quick trip and I didn’t get too car sick which was good considering the roads were being built…it was a bumpy ride. We got to the 1st village and met the education kiosk owner. It was a small room with three computers. We sat down with our Drishtee guy and the kiosk owner’s Dad (the owner was away for the day), who is apparently a very rich farmer in the village. At this point it is maybe 10 or 11ish and apparently classes don’t really start until 4pm so I chilled while Sadie and Kelly asked questions. I really had no questions, between Drishteepedia (the wikipedia site I’ve been working that has ALL info on Drishtee) and not having a project that directly involves the villagers, I really had nothing to ask so I just sat and absorbed. Per usual everyone was very nice- they brought us water (well water- not sure how clean it is soooo I opted out of more quality time with the porcelain bowl) and chai (tea) with milk from their boofellow (buffalo) …I’m not one for Indian tea- I don’t really like sugar and milk in my tea but this was actually pretty good! After talking for a good while we walked around the village. Needless to say they don’t see many foreigners so people were staring and coming out of places to watch us. We stopped at a math and science school and a Drishtee FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) Kiosk. After that it was back to the car to head to another village. The next village was much larger but the kiosk was quite small. At one point there were at least 15people in a room probably ½ the size of my bedroom at home…clearly it is necessary to check out the foreigners (and take pictures of them)- and I mean really who can blame them we’re a pretty cute bunch (and by cute I mean we were already pretty grimy by that point lol). We sat and chatted with the owner for a bit- there weren’t any students there because it was still early in the afternoon which means they are at their regular school (think of the kiosk classes as more of an after school program or enhancement) and on top of that apparently today was a holy day so fewer people would be showing up. After that we strolled down the street to another Drishtee FMCG Kiosk and were literally surrounded by at least 20 people and more on lookers…it was almost like having an entourage- always thought I wanted one until that moment lol after that, back to the office, then to a hotel down the street for lunch which was quite tasty. After lunch we headed back to the office…with nothing to do and 6hrs to kill until our train back home. Somehow Kelly convinced our guy to get some other guy to let him borrow his motorcycle for Rs 200 for the afternoon to go around in. So I hopped on back of our guy’s Vespa and Sadie and Kelly hopped on the motorcycle w/Kelly driving. Not gonna lie, I felt safer with the guy who lives in India vs. Kelly who I would trust driving in the states but here driving is a whole nother level of crazy! We drove around town, and to the outskirts to this really cool temple. It is 9 stories of white marble- sadly I left my camera at the office thinking I wouldn’t need it- this place was pretty impressive. On the way back to the office we stopped at another massive temple that is dedicated to all religions- it isn’t the religion that matters but more the golden rule if you will (in a nut shell). It was pretty fun spending the afternoon riding around! ☺ Once we got back to the office we sat down and Sadie and Kelly PASSED out in their chairs…I wasn’t tired- 4hrs of sleep and I wasn’t tired! What’s wrong with me!? So I just listened to my iPod, checked some email and read the NY Times online and then finnnally it was time to head back to the nicest train station in the world. We were about an hour early to departure time and so we chilled on the platform w/our guy and the beggar kids tugging at our clothes while watching rats run across the tracks. Finally out train arrived- the Taj Express (same one we rode to and from Agra)…we were once again on in the second class seating area- at least this time it wasn’t packed like last time; although this time it felt like the longest ride ever and I felt more filthy and grimy than our last adventure… my hair grimy and sticking out of the ponytail in every which way, dirt lines in the creases of my arms, dirt caked onto my face…feeling like a million bucks! After about 2hrs we made it to our stop, argued with ricky drivers and made it home. It’s nice to be home. On the way home Sadie and Kelly were discussing how much of an eye opening experience it was and how after seeing the villages the train no longer phased them…I don’t know what is wrong with me because I don’t feel any more enlightened than before.  The beggar children tugging incessantly at my clothes is sad, but even as sad as it is, I don’t feel that I have any different kind of an outlook on life than I did before. The village really didn’t phase me either- it’s a poor village, what do you expect? Perhaps it’s because I’ve seen a lot of this already in China so I get it and it isn’t new to me- although the massive scale of poverty in India far outweighs the amount I experienced in China. I don’t know it just didn’t phase me- the world is poor, we live in a country where thank God we grew up not having to live in abject poverty, but overall the world is poor and it is not going to change. Thankfully we get to work for a company that is helping these people and is trying to tackle huge issues like poverty and the problems that come along with it, but we will never be able to save everyone, and I’m happy I get to do what I get to do to help; but the poverty no longer really phases me- it just is what it is. Maybe that is a cynical look at things or maybe I’m heartless but currently that is how I am feeling…perhaps yoga tomorrow morning will clear my head a bit and I won’t be so calloused- though perhaps a little callousness is a good thing because without it I’m not sure how one would survive staring thousands upon thousands of impoverished people in the face everyday without going crazy.