Indian Subcontinent 2008 - 2009

Dear friends and family,

We are now at the end of a wonderful 5 day stay in Udaipur Rajasthan, and will be heading to Jodhpur, Rajasthan tomorrow by local bus (6 hours). Cisco says the buses here are just like the local buses in Zimbabwe. We love them because it gives us a chance to mix with locals (no tourists are mad enough to take local buses).

Udaipur town is set around a beautiful lake with a palace in the middle and more ancient palaces on its shores. Check the gallery for photos. Cisco took on board the advice from Johnny and we decided to take the first part of our trip easy so we don't get sick or burnt out. Most of our time in Udaipur has been spent walking through the old part of town and the back streets where we have met some lovely people and been invited for yet more chai and local dishes.
We spent yesterday afternoon at the home of a local lawyer after meeting his two lovely girls in a side street and they excitedly invited us to inspect all rooms of their home, their school books, their photo albums and to watch them sing and dance in both Hindi and english.

What we have both found is that children here are how we remember children to be when we were growing up. They still play outside and find all sorts of simple things to make games from. Yet again we have found a great respect that children have for their elders.

While most children remind us of our own childhoods - there is the heartbreaking reality of child labour on every street we find.
An example is in the chai shop across the bridge from the ghat (jetty) where we are staying. In this chai shop two little brothers work night and day - washing cups, serving customers, sweeping and cleaning tables. Sunil is only 6 years old and his brother Prakash is 9. Sunil has been working at the chai shop since he was only 5 years old. We felt so sad for these two little boys who wouldn't know the things children their age should be enjoying. But the harsh reality is that these two are comparatively lucky - some of India's other children live alone in rubbish dumps and eat scraps from the road, like the cows and dogs. We have seen some of these children on the streets of Mumbai & Amdavad, and are trying to figure out what we can do to help...
We gave the boys some biscuits and water and their eyes lit up like it was Christmas time. Since then everytime we walk past the chai shop they have big smiles and waves for us. It's awful that something so small, which we take for granted at home, is such an amazing thing for children like Sunil and Prakash.

On Tuesday we took a very long walk far off the beaten track to a local market. It was very rustic and full of buzz and yet people were still so welcoming to us. We quenched our thirst with a much-needed Kingfisher beer in the store room out the back of a beer shop (along with 6 local fellow-boozers)

Tomorrow we say goodbye to Udaipur and will be spending the next 5 days in Jodhpur. Chloe will get to meet the two little kids she sponsors to go to school (we will be staying at the school itself).
We also hope to gather a lot of information about how we can help here. We have already started some brainstorming...
The sad reality of the corruption here means that cash given to beggars or homeless will usually end up in the pocket of a beggar-wallah - literally someone who trades in beggars. So we are looking for other options...

We are safe and happy in India

Sending much love to everyone,

Chloe & Fra xxxx