Delhi & Agra

Tim has just sent the following through....

The Journey
Leaving Bangalore at 10.30 on the Monday evening, Nandu and I started on our journey to Delhi. This would be my longest train journey ever, being 36 hours in total, and to honest I was dreading being stuck in sleeper class carriage, with no A/C in the cramped conditions. I had travelled back from Chennai with Raj once, but that was only for 5 hours, and the prospect of ‘living’ on a train for 2 days didn’t really appeal to me that much. But, as with a lot of things so far in India I have had to adapt and just get used to the conditions and persevere throughout.

It turned out that the trip wasn’t so bad after all and it went surprisingly fast. Nandu and I spent a lot time talking and playing card games. I remember on specific game lasting an hour and a half (leaving me with a headache). The journey also gave me chance to catch up on reading, ‘If you want to walk on water, you have to get out of the boat’. We didn’t interact too much with the people in our compartment, mainly because they were speaking Hindi and another language which Nandu and Kashmiri (which Nandu couldn’t understand). Any sort of talking was quite casual and the sort of small talk which I generally dislike, but you’ve got to start somewhere eh?

Some of the scenery from the train window was great and the further we travelled north the hotter it got in the train, with the wind outside actually burning you if you stuck your hand out the window. Unfortunately we had booked the side berth bunks, which meant that being tall it was very cramped for us, and had to sleep curled up most of the time. It wasn’t too bad though.

On the morning of arrival in Delhi, I had expected the train to come into the station around 7am. Unfortunately I had miscalculated the actual arrival time, waking up too early in readiness only to find that it actually arrived at 11am. Another few hours didn’t matter however with 32 already under my belt.

One thing Raj had warned me about Delhi, was that everyone would hassle you and never ever take no for an answer. Be it auto-rickshaw drivers, bicycle-rickshaw drivers, taxi drivers, shop owners, restaurant owners, travel agents...etc. Absolutely everyone wants business from you and also being a foreigner, in their minds there is more prospects to get more money than then usually would. This really got on my nerves throughout my stay and I found myself getting increasingly frustrated and stressed with everyone. Nandu also found it difficult because walking around with me and not having a typical Indian haircut or wearing typical Indian clothes; he was also regarded as a foreigner. I came to learn a phrase from Nandu in Hindi which meant, ‘Look, I’ve already told you once, don’t you understand me?’ This was extremely helpful when people wouldn’t take no for answer.

Day 1
Upon arriving in Delhi we had many worries already on our shoulders. Before we left I had given some money to Santosh to book us some tickets home to Bangalore on the June 15th. Santosh however wasn’t able to be book any tickets, so we had to spend a lot of time in Internet cafes, agonisingly trying to find tickets home. This was stressing both of us out as there seemed to be no hope.

Another task we had was to book tickets to and from Agra for the next few days so we could visit the Taj Mahal. We had found tickets available online which we were pleased with, and so made our way to the nearest travel agent to book the tickets. Even this proved to be a headache as all of the places we went to said there were no regular tickets available and only expensive ones. This was a classic example of people trying to cheat us. We went to a few different agencies and failed to find an honest one where they weren’t trying to take advantage. Eventually we ended up in a long queue at the railway ticket office. Even though it took time, we were much happier to wait and pay the actual cost quoted on the net, than pay over three times the price buying them from some dodgy travel office.

So far this journey had been full of obstacles and stress upon arriving, and guess what; things seemed to be getting worse. Before leaving Bangalore I had booked to stay at a Youth hostel on the net. It seemed reasonably priced, clean and with a/c. Getting to the hostel however and booking in was prevented because; we found out, the airport immigration hadn’t stamped my passport upon arrival! This meant that I wasn’t officially (on paper) in the country and they couldn’t accept me at the youth hostel because I had no proof of how and where I entered the country. This worried me a lot and I became even more anxious about the strange place I was already in.

This began our search for a hotel that would accept us. Taking a break for lunch in an air conditioned restaurant calmed us down a little, but neither us of had much appetite and accidentally ordered too much food. The restaurant we visited had good food and service, but it was more expensive than usual. After lunch we found a hotel that would accept us, but which was much more than I had expected to pay. I thought about it and because of my stressed state and the fact that I was tired, I decided that we would stay just for one night and then make our way to Agra and find a cheaper place. The hotel actually wasn’t too bad and the a/c made the room feel like a fridge. This was great because the temperature outside was more than 45 degrees. CRAZY!

So our first day in Delhi had been spent mainly trying to find hotels, book train tickets and stress out about things over which we had not a lot of control. We did find time however to take a short walk to the main shopping area in the city, in which we found a HSBC so I knew where I could draw funds when needed. In the evening we retired to the hotel room early because our train to Agra was at 7am the next day.

Day 2
Getting up early, paying the hotel bill (being surprised and cheated on a 12.5% luxury tax. What the hell is luxury tax?) Catching an auto to the station, in which the driver tried to cheat to us out of more money but I just walked away and making our way through a packed station to the train on time. In fact we were early, which allowed us to relax and put our feet up whilst enjoying a cup a tea before enduring the cramped conditions of the journey. It took about 4 hours to get to Agra and I was sat next to a 10 year old Indian boy who was very smart. We spent our time playing noughts and crosses, paper-rock-scissors and giving each other maths sums to do on paper. The other half of the journey I spent listening to my i-pod and talking to Nandu.

Getting out of the station to Agra we were bombarded by taxi and auto drivers wanting business until we eventually got to the pre-pay auto stand where we could get into the town for a fair price.

Travelling towards the town the auto guy brought out little books filled with recommendations and reviews of his personal tour guide service. People from all around the world had written short comments about his service in English, French, German, Portuguese and other languages. I was quite impressed with all of these comments (reading quite a few) and he asked us if we would like him to take us for a day’s tour of all the sights in Agra, including the Taj Mahal, the ‘Baby Taj’, Agra fort and other sights. He said he would do all of this for Rs. 700/- (under £10) for both of us and I agreed. Nandu had his reservations and was convinced that he wasn’t all he seemed to be.

The auto driver’s name was K.K. and he was probably the ugliest guy I had ever seen. Unshaven, about 50 years old but looking older, extremely bad teeth and breath with old remnants of chewing tobacco stuck in between them, partially black, grey and ginger hair and wearing the dirtiest shirt I’ve seen for a while. He seemed nice enough though and spoke good enough English.

He took us first to a hotel which he recommended; we said that we didn’t want to spend more than Rs. 1500/- a night, but he took us to this hotel anyway. It seemed nice enough and I managed to bargain the clerk down to a price that was more reasonable. Nandu still thought that we were paying too much, but the room was nice enough with good a/c. The hotel food and facilities were quite expensive but we didn’t really have any plans to use them as we would mostly be eating out and spending our time sightseeing. After settling in our room, we met up with our ‘guide’ and embarked on our tourist’s adventure of Agra and all its wonders.
Itmad-ud-daulah ‘Baby Taj’

This monument or ‘tomb’ was like a smaller version of the Taj Mahal, hence people calling it ‘Baby Taj’, in fact it was built some years before the Taj. It cost Rs. 120/- for me to get in and Rs. 10/- for Nandu. Even the local people in Agra didn’t recognise Nandu as being Indian and so he had to show his identification everywhere for him not having to pay the foreign tourist prices.
‘Taj Views’

K.K. had said that he would take us to many different place in Agra where we would be able to get different views of the Taj Mahal. This seemed like a good prospect and would save us a lot walking. We managed to get a lot of different photographs, including one from the back side of the Taj, managing to get it’s reflection in the water.

Craft shops
He took us to a place for lunch, which Nandu said would be very expensive and was right. There was a lot of other foreign tourists here also and it seemed like the place where all the auto driver guides took their fares. I offered to buy K.K. lunch, which later on we found out was a mistake, because lunch was in fact provided for him free of charge from the restaurant as well as him getting commission for him bringing us to the restaurant. We were slowly becoming aware that K.K. was getting much more out of us than we had first thought.

He took us to three craft shops which were literally right next to each other, and he received commission from everyone one we went into, regardless of whether we bought anything or not. He never told us this (why would he?) but we learned from other sources, that this was the case.
Carpet Shop – This shop had a workshop where we could see how the rugs were made on the loom. It was made clear that everything had to be hand crafted in Agra because if there was a factory the pollution would destroy the precious Taj Mahal. This made sense and I admired everyone sense of preserving their historical heritage (and they depended on the continuing tourist trade to survive). Part of me however couldn’t help but think that they might have just imported goods from elsewhere, but that may be just my sceptical side coming through. The rugs and carpets ranged from small wool and cotton mats, to beautifully designed and crafted Kashmir silk patchwork rugs. The price differences were vast of course and we were free to bargain and barter to a more agreeable prices. I only bought a couple of cheap mats as momentums to bring back home.

Marble Shop – In the entrance of this shop there was a demonstration on how the marble was crafted and polished. It looked like agonising work and when having a go at sculpting the marble myself, it proved to be true. I did think however, these guys had probably been doing in for years and were used to the tough marble. The display room was full of ornately crafted marble table tops which, I have to say, were not to my taste. I did however spend time looking at the chess boards and how the pieces had been sculpted. I didn’t really want to buy anything from this shop even though the salesman was pressurizing me into buying, showing me anything and everything. “No, I am not interested in marble tea coasters, thank you!”

Jewellery Shop – This jewellery wasn’t very interesting and he didn’t really seem very authentic even though he insisted it was a family business that had been passed down for generations. Everything looked good but to be honest I wasn’t interested in jewellery. He did manage to fleece me on some bracelets. ‘Apparently’ they were 92.5% sterling silver; even though I bargained him down in price I still think I got fleeced. They should make a nice little gift for someone back home anyway. He talked with us about the different stones he used in work, showing us loads of examples. Even though it was nice stuff I wasn’t really interested so left quite quickly, I had a bad feeling about the place anyway.

Taj Mahal
After all of the shops that our guide insisted on showing us, we eventually got around to seeing the Taj Mahal. This was after all the main reason for coming to Agra and I can honestly say, if all we saw was the Taj, I would have been more than happy. This 400 year old ‘love monument’ is to put it bluntly, BREATH TAKING. I found that every time I saw the Taj I had to stop and look and just think, WOW! It cost Rs. 700/- to enter and only Rs. 20/- for Nandu. Being one of the 7 wonders of the world it was built by this bloke (whose name I forget) to commemorate the death of his favourite wife, whom he must have loved a lot, and had planned to build another version of the Taj, for his own tomb, but using black marble instead of white. Was he a little bit crazy perhaps? Just walking around the gardens of the Taj and taking time to take everything in was incredibly relaxing. I remember having it as one of the things to do before I die; visiting the Taj, and I can honestly say the whole experience and place was incredible. We left the Taj after taking loads of pictures and as the sun started to set. We were extremely hungry, tired and hot from our day of tourism that all we wanted to do was chill out, grab something to eat and watch the cricket.

Day 3
Waking up at a reasonable time, Nandu and I decided to try and find some cheaper accommodation. When coming to check out however the clerk, a Punjabi guy with a massive beard and turban, argued that the agreed upon price was for 2 nights stay and that if we wanted to leave early we had to pay the full price. This began another round of debate and bargaining.
After this we found a reasonably cheap place to have some Puri for breakfast and to think about the plans for the day. In the restaurant we found out that the guy serving us was Tamilean and was very friendly and helpful giving us lots of advice about where to stay and how to successfully survive in Agra without being cheated too much. If only we had met this guy on the first day! Nandu felt so relieved at meeting someone from where he was from and they talked for ages in Tamil, with me interrupting constantly asking, ‘What is he saying?’ This guy took time out of his day to help us find cheap accommodation and also gave us the names and numbers of some contacts in Delhi of people who would be helpful and honest, like he was. He seemed like a really nice guy as he took time out of his working day to help us out. We gave him about 30 bucks for helping us, which I didn’t think was much at all, but Nandu explained that he probably only earned about 5 bucks an hour where he was working.

After settling into our new hotel room, which was really just a fanned room with a bed and a shower, costing Rs. 400/- for the night, we embarked on seeing the rest of what Agra had to offer.

Agra Fort
This fort was absolutely huge and the photos I had don’t really do it justice as to how vast it is. I all of the areas in the fort were open to the public you could probably spend the whole day getting lost. Unfortunately all of the interesting looking parts were closed to public, including things like the walls, the dungeons and some of the many palaces within. Still, the parts that we did get to look around were great and I really enjoyed reading all of the history about it. This was the main fort, apart from the Delhi Red Fort, that functioned in Medieval India and was used as the command point for the whole country for many of its Rulers. I kept thinking, ‘My Dad would have loved to spend time looking around here’. The place was truly majestic and I kept trying to imagine what it might have been like when the fort was fully functioning in its original time period. I would have loved to have spent more time looking around and reading about the history, but there was more to do and see today so we had to move on.

Sikandara
This place was another huge tomb, although I’m not really sure who for. It had 3 massive entrance gates to the grounds (just like the Taj) and in the grounds were found loads of wildlife; peacocks, deer and monkeys. This was a beautiful place to walk around and just relax in, being quite similar in its surroundings to the Taj apart from having less people and therefore less hassle. The main tomb went underground this time into a huge chamber only lit by one flaming chandelier. Walking around the back of the tomb we found some scaffolding going up to the roof terrace and I was so tempted to climb up and see exactly what they were keeping from public view. But the prospect and likelihood of being caught and spending the rest of my days rotten in an Indian prison for defiling their sacred heritage was to prevalent in my mind to ignore. Me and Nandu had running joke about which ever of us dies first, then the one still alive had to build them a tomb exactly like this to commemorate his life. We agreed that making a replica of the Taj again for each other would just be too greedy, so this sort of tomb would suffice. What idiots!?

The rest of the day was spent looking around the town, going in different craft shops, being bothered by tonnes of rickshaw drivers and having dinner at pizza hut (I’m afraid I’m still struggling to eat Indian food all the time). Getting an early night in our new hotel room seemed like the best of ideas because we had to be at the station at 6am. However, due there being no a/c and the fan not working due to constant power cuts, neither of us got a very good night’s sleep. The cold shower in the morning was really appreciated (something which I would complain about in the UK) and after checking out at 5am we made our way to the station by auto. This completed our visit to Agra and the Taj Mahal and although everything about the attractions was fantastic, I was relieved to be going somewhere else. Perhaps I’ll come back here one day with different company...

Day 4 (Back to Delhi)
Our fourth day began with a four hour train journey back into the central station in Delhi, drinking lots of tea and having chance to write up some thoughts in my journal. In the seats opposite us three Indian gentlemen were having a heated discussion about something or other. I asked Nandu what they were saying, but he couldn’t understand. It obviously was important to them all because they all gave their opinions very furiously and in a manner I wouldn’t really want to argue with. It was really interesting to watch and to my surprise they all shook hands with smiles after the journey and parted with good will. I couldn’t help thinking to myself; in the UK this would’ve probably ended in a fight.

Arriving back in Delhi our first task, yet again, was to find somewhere to stay. This time however, because we much wiser about where to go and what sort of prices to pay, we found a nice place, with a/c, that only cost us Rs. 600/- per night for both of us. Although it wasn’t the best kept hotel and the walls and floor were a bit mucky, the service was friendly and there was a good internet and tourism facility. After settling down and cleaning up, we decided to look around the immediate area and found that there were loads of hotels on the road we were staying on (there had to be well over a hundred) and there were also a lot of back street restaurants where we could eat cheap. The rest of this fourth day was spent relaxing and trying to book a tour of Delhi for the next day. We got a really good deal from the hotel we were in, providing us with a private driver for 8 hours who would take us anywhere we wanted to go for only Rs. 800/-. We also looked into whether the tickets home that Santosh had sent through courier had arrived, which they hadn’t and worried Nandu a lot. I must admit I was a little worried but not really too bothered. I had come to the conclusion that it was out of my hands and worrying about it would only spoil my trip. What does it say in the gospel of Matthew...?
‘Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?’ Matt 6:27

‘Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own’ Matt 6:34

To Nandu’s devastation India were knocked out of the 20/20 World Cup by none other than.......England! Hey!

Day 5
So today was our tour of Delhi and it began at 9am sharp, that is after our driver had smoked a cigarette and drank his tea. We ate breakfast in our room and headed downstairs ready to experience the sights that Delhi, India’s capital city, had to offer. We actually got to see loads on our tour and I was really pleased at the feeling of exhaustion at the end of our trip. If I hadn’t have been tired I would probably have thought that I didn’t get my money’s worth. So what did we see you may ask? Well I’ll tell you...

Birla Mandir
This was a really big Hindu temple with some, what would have been lovely gardens if the water fountains were turned on. Being the first thing we visiting a feeling of negativity came to mind. I thought, even though this temple was really very grand, I hoped that the rest of the tour wasn’t going to be just full of temples and statues. Even though being a Christian I didn’t believe in any of the Hindu ‘God’s’ I did enjoy reading about and seeing the artwork that depicted the Hindu’s histories and values. The artwork and sculptures were really well preserved and maintained and the whole place functioned as both a temple where Hindus could worship and a tourist attraction. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take any cameras inside so I only took pictures of the temple from the outside and of the gardens.

India Gate
This huge structure was India monument to all those who had fought and died in World War II. All of the names of those soldiers were inscribed into the stone and it was guarded heavily day and night, also having ceremonial attachments and objects to show the nations continuing gratitude and respect for their countrymen. Nandu says that there are roughly around 90000 names engraved on this massive monument and I couldn’t help thinking about how many soldiers Britain had lost in the wars (millions).

Parliament and Presidents House
After seeing India Gate, just up the main road in direct view was the houses of parliament and the president’s house. We briefly drove up the drive, jumped out of the car and took some quick snaps while the car kept moving because there was no stopping or parking allowed. It was like we were on a mission to collect intelligence about the layout of the president’s grounds for some top secret reason (not really). It was a pretty lush ground and was heavily guarded as well. We didn’t spend too much time there and moved onto the next ‘attraction’.

Indira Ghandi Museum
We visited the home of Indira Ghandi, the first women prime minister of India and Mahatma Ghandi’s granddaughter. Her home had been turned into a museum, displaying all of her personal belongings, including the garment she was assassinated in, and detailing her life’s works in the form of newspapers and photographs. I have to say I didn’t know who she was at all and wasn’t really that interested, but I thought, as I’m in India I should try and learn as much about the culture and its history as I could.

Mahatma Gandhi Museum
Next on our list was the Mahatma Ghandi Museum. Again, just like Indira Ghandi, his home that he used to live in and its grounds had been used to display everything about his life, his works and what he stood for. It was a pretty interesting place with a lot of information to take in. Upstairs was an modern electronic museum where, if you had the time, you could spend hours looking at all of the interesting gadgets and gizmos that were depicting Ghandi’s story. We didn’t have time however to look at and read everything, although we took our time, our driver was keen to get on. We visited the spot where he died after being shot and continued on our trip. I bought a small brochure that had a lot of information about Ghandi’s life in it, as a souvenir.

Local Factory Outlet
After lunch at Dominoes Pizza, our drivers took us to a big sort of mall where all the locally made handicrafts were sold. A lot of the items we saw were identical to what we had seen elsewhere but at the actual cost that it should have been. There was lots of nice things; wood carvings, marble sculptures, jewellery and lots of textiles shops. I really didn’t feel like a buying anything but Nandu bought a shawl for his Mother. Apparently it is a big tradition in India to buy a souvenir for your family from your holidays wherever you go, be it 100KM away or 6000KM away.

Lotus Temple
Unfortunately because it was a Sunday, The Lotus Temple was closed. It was used as another Hindu temple for which God, I forget. I did manage to get a couple of pictures of it as we drove past though.

Red Fort
The Red Fort in Delhi was apparently exactly the same as the one in Agra but not as grand. We opted not to go inside but instead just drove around it towards our next destination. As time was moving on Nandu and I both thought this was the best option.

Raj Ghat
This beautifully constructed and well kept park and gardens was the location of the final resting place for the ashes of Mahatma Ghandi. Walking around the gardens, the sun was beating down at its hottest and without a lot of shade and lack of water we were both struggling in the 46 degree heat. It would have been great to spend some time relaxing on the grass and take some time out and possibly have a picnic, but again because time was running our we didn’t have the opportunity. Coming into the actual place where Ghandi’s ashes were, we had to take our shoes off and be quiet in showing our respects whilst visiting the final resting place of the father of the nation. Nandu had mentioned that in Bangalore, space for burying the dead had run out and the government had to double stack the graves and he thought this massive use of ground was a waste of space.

Ghandi Memorial Museum
After Ghandi’s cemetery we visited another of his Museum which was smaller than the last but much the same. In this museum however they had preserved the robes that he had been killed in, covered in blood and bullet holes, poor guy.

Red Light District
The last place we visited before being returned to our hotel was described by our driver as ‘a big business centre’. I didn’t quite know what he meant until we got closer and he said, ‘ladies business centre’, in other words, Delhi’s Red Light District. Whilst driving up the road he was explaining that all of the houses’ first floors on the road were used for prostitution. We could see loads of women of different ages looking out of the windows and hanging around by the stair wells. Our driver said, ‘If you like, you can buy. If not then no problem, we’ll go back’. ‘Thanks’ I said, ‘I’ll keep that in mind’. I don’t think he had a clue that we were Christians and weren’t in the habit of visiting prostitutes. It did put in my mind however, ‘is what the people in Delhi think about westerners; that they all smoke hashish (having been approached a few times to smoke it) and are all heavily into prostitution?’

Our tour of Delhi had finally ended and we gave the driver 50 rupees as a tip, knowing that he probably didn’t see a great share of the 800 we gave the travel office. We retired to our hotel room for some time and after resting found a nice, but a bit expensive, restaurant to have dinner. Tonight we ate Indian food as Nandu was missing his staple diet of rice. I ate something called paneer masala, which is quite a spicy curry using tomatoes and cottage cheese as the main ingredients, and a few japatis. With the discussion being about the sights of the day and sharing our opinions about The Fisherman Trust, we spent quite a long time eating before going back to the hotel to watch the cricket and to sleep.

Day 6
This was to be our last day in Delhi and to be honest we were a bit lost as about what to do. We enjoyed a long time in bed taking up most of the morning, before checking if our tickets had arrived by courier. They had! All our worries had been wiped away and our prayers fulfilled, we would be returning to Bangalore the morning after and been arriving two days after that.
We spent our last day in Delhi looking around the main shopping area. This was called Connnaught Place and contained a plethora of different shops ranging from the highly priced ‘branded’ shops such as Adidas, to many street merchant selling their wears on the pavements. This was the equivalent on Bangalore’s MG Road and was extremely busy with all classes of people rushing about for their own reasons. The actual layout was a huge circle of buildings with roads in between and you could keep going round and round until you got tired or lost. The inner circle was where most of the branded shops were, and then there was a middle section in the circle where you would find all the independent merchants and then on the outer ring (where the main road was) was all of the restaurants and street vendors.

Everyone wanted to sell you something or get business out of you. On one occasion I was approached by I guy who wanted to clean my shoes because he said they were dirty. I said they were fine, but when looking down I found a massive pile of crap on my trainer. He then proceeded to clean it off and asked for Rs. 350/- which seemed extortionate for cleaning my shoe. I told Nandu and he said, ‘What? Kick him! Give him 10 bucks and tell him to get lost!’ A guy told me later that these guys would have actually put the crap there themselves so that they can clean it off and extort people. Why is everyone out to cheat me? This really frustrated me and I became extra cautious about everyone from then on. Actually after that point I began not to enjoy my experience of walking around the main shopping area of Delhi. Nandu managed to buy a book on photography and I bought some new sunglasses because my old ones had broken.
In the evening we ate dinner in the hotel room and retired early because our train left at 7am. The next morning we awoke early, paid our bill (minus the luxury tax) and left a tip for the lad who had attended our room for the last three nights.

My whole experience of Delhi and Agra as a whole leaves me with very mixed feelings. Nandu and I both agree that the places and the historical heritage that they contain are absolutely amazing and definitely something worth visiting. This does come with the cost of putting up with the attitude of the local people. Please don’t understand me, there are some people who are genuinely honest and want to help without any cost, but you have to be very careful who you trust even though they may seem like the most upright person in the world. A perfect example of this was KK, tour guide in Agra, who although had a lot of good reviews from others and seemed friendly and honest, what he didn’t tell us was about the commission he received from every place he took us.

There is the unfortunate truth that if you are a foreigner in these extreme tourist areas, you already have the image of having lots of money and therefore need to be taken advantage of. This is something that I struggled with and found that it spoilt my experience somewhat.

Journey Back

I was pleased to get on the train back to Bangalore and was actually looking forward to the journey back. This time round we got chatting to everyone in our section, played card games with them and other stupid games. We also got into some great debates about religion which I found challenging and much different from any conversations in the UK, these guys I was talking to were much more open to hearing about my faith in Christ. We talked about what sorts of work we were all into; Nandu shared about TFT, I shared about my youth work in the UK and the work I was doing in India, one guy had just set up his own I.T. business in Bangalore and another two guys were working for a school in Delhi that taught street kids a trade (they were actually street kids once as well and smoke lots of weed and drank lots of rum on the train). The journey went really fast and after two days and one night we were eventually back in Bangalore with a feeling as though we had never left and as though our adventures in Delhi and Agra were distant memories.