Train to Agra

This morning we got back to home schooling. Then for lunch we headed to a restaurant called Saravana Bhavan for lunch. It has become a favourite. On the placemat they advertise a branch in Scarborough. We’ll have to check it out when we’re back in Canada.

We packed our bags for the train to Agra where the Taj Mahal is. The train left at four o’clock, and was only supposed to take two hours, but it was about an hour late arriving. The train was fine, but the scenery was at times appalling. The people are unimaginably poor. You see huts made from tarps, or corrugated metal. You see garbage everywhere. The strip of land next to the train was always littered with garbage, even as we went through more serene country and farm land. The poverty here is such a shock at times.

We arrived in Agra after dark, so it is difficult to say what it will be like. From all accounts we expect to be assaulted by beggars, and touts. They are always there around the tourist locations and the Taj is the most famous of them all. Some of them are organized into gangs. They take a young baby and come up to you asking for money for food. They then give part of their earnings to the leader and hand the baby off to the next person. I feel so sorry for the poor babies. In Cambodia there were children begging, and we were asked by the driver not to give them anything because it encourage them to drop school in favour of begging. I read the same for India. We will need to find some way to give to the community, but through a better means.

The weather is cool in Delhi and Agra. It goes to about ten degrees at night and we were surprised to see our breath a few mornings ago. During the day it is warmer, but only low twenties. I’m wearing jeans and socks again, something that we hadn’t been doing for the past few months.

CM