End of Day 5

This is quite a vivid memory of the trip - the only time I really felt in danger - and an interesting story that I wanted to include about the end of day 5.

After our sight seeing in Agra, before we ate dinner on the roof of the hotel, I walked back down the road toward the Taj Mahal with John Kim.  He was going to be my negotiator for exchanging the rest of my money.

We walked briskly, it only took about 10 minutes from our hotel to reach the Taj Mahal gate where all the tourist shops and money changers are set up.  The sun was slowly disappearing and the last of the tourist groups for the day we leaving.  Since we were walking toward the Taj unlike everyone else, all the shop owners were eager to get our attention. I believe I had mentioned earlier about how children and men would crowd around us and try to sell us their ware...well in this situation we received more than double the attention!  I'm glad that John let me loop my arm through his--it definitely felt dangerous.

We walked to two shops asking about their exchange rate, but John wasn't happy with what they were offering.  At this point, every time we left one shop for another, there was a crowd of 10-12 children waiting for us outside.  They were all crowding close and talking loudly, asking us to come to their father's shop.  We pressed on through the crowd of kids and as the sun dipped down a little more as we walked to one final shop.  (I knew it was our final shop because I told John I wanted to leave asap!)

So we finally step into the final shop and all the kids wait outside.  For the record, it's disconcerting when you walk into a narrow shop and the owners close the door behind you, but I suppose it was necessary to muffle the noise from the street.  We haggled and negotiated until we got the price we wanted for my money exchange--my hands were shaking with adrenaline when I handed over the cash. Whew, I was glad to have that done and ready to head back to the hotel for dinner.

Now it was completely dark outside.  Great.  The street wasn't lit very well and we still had a crowd of kids following us and pressing in from all sides.  There were no other tourists in sight and shops were closing.  John and I were walking briskly, so briskly that I was getting out of breath - but then again, that could have still been the adrenaline.  Now, in addition to all the kids, we had bicycle cart drivers pedaling alongside us, crowding us and cutting us off.  Finally we just hopped in one and told the man to pedal, just to get us away from the dark street with the crowd following us, and to get us to the hotel faster.

We started getting momentum and leaving the crowd behind us.  One persistent young man, probably 10 or 11 years old, with Taj Mahal memorabilia in his hands, kept jogging alongside the cart next to me.  I was busy ignoring him and praying he'd give up when I felt his hand INSIDE the pocket of my kurta (the long top I was wearing)!  My skin started to crawl as I realized that this kid was pick pocketing me!  I snatched a hold of his hand and stared him in the eyes as he grabbed his hand away and finally left.  He didn't seem guilty that he had gotten caught, merely annoyed that he'd run after us to no avail.  Thankfully I don't keep things in my pockets so he didn't get anything.

I was speechless as I sat there in that bike rickshaw.  And our poor driver, he was so small and pedaling as best he could, but our hotel was up a slight hill and he couldn't get the momentum to pedal up the hill and had to get out and walk next to the bike, pushing us up the hill.  (I tried not to let this affect my self esteem about being chubby.)  I told John that this poor man had taken us far enough so we hopped out, paid him, and walked the small way back to the hotel.

Whew!  All this happened in the span of 45 minutes.  I can't believe I almost forgot to include it!

When we arrived back at the hotel, we ate dinner and then loaded up to go to the Agra train station again.  Gosh I hated the train station.  Not only was it always crowded, and the staring worse than anywhere else, the children who beg there just break your heart and there is nothing you can do to help them.

Picture this.  We get out of the taxis and standy aside the vehicles while the men unload our luggage from the top racks.  As we stand there--a timid huddle of Americans--young barefoot children quickly approach us with their little arms extended asking for food or money.  Because we ignored them and avoided making eye contact, the children got more agressive in trying to get our attention.  They began to pinch our arms, just above the elbow and walk directly in front of our path as we headed to the station entrance with our luggage.  The reason we didn't help this children is because we were told that if we gave one or two children any food or money that it would cause a riot amongst the children.  Someone said, "unless you can permantely remove that child from their situation, you won't be helping them by giving them anything."  Like I said, heartbreaking.

Once inside the train station, there weren't as many children begging but rather cripples.  One man with no legs and a mangled arm was persistantly tapping on our feet and stayed within a few feet of us for more than 30 minutes while we waited for our train back to New Delhi.  It's hard to not do anything.  It's hard to realize that this is someone's livlihood.  It's hard to know that some of these people were deliberately injured in order to bring in money for someone else.  *Sigh*  I didn't like the train stations.