'The Internet Cafe' At Agra

It all started because I needed to use the Internet to email for work - it was a working holiday :) .

I had planned to use the internet facilities at our homestay location, a requirement I knew they offered. The owner, probably thinking I would tie up his computer all day and told me the connection was down. And he had arranged for me to use a ‘friend’s shop’ – another of those amazing networks. I thought, wrongly, that it was an Internet Café.

Never in my life did I expect to be doing work for my client sitting in a carpet / Indian fabric shop with 4 men staring at me. It was early morning and business was eh, not happening. So they chatted and well, they had someone else to look at. So here I was, sitting on a sofa, with my laptop on my lap. I kept my eyes fervently on the work, feeling quite unnerved, stepping up occasionally to send the email to client.

That went from 9.30 am till 1.30 pm. I was a little worried about Charlotte. The driver whom we chartered for 2 days, had taken her to Sikandars - a suburb of Agra - while I worked. Meanwhile, Charlotte did have a little adventure in Sikandars. She was taken to the tomb of Akbar Sikandars - one of the greatest Mughal emperors in India. She was unaccompanied because the driver stayed with the car. While walking into the tomb, a man approached and followed Charlotte. She confronted the man,” Why are you following me?”. The man replied that he was the official gate keeper and his job was to explain the art and history of the tomb to visitors. Hmmmm...

 

While Charlotte was appreciating the beauty of the artefacts, some other men began to crowd around her asking for money. Bewildered by the sudden rush of people surrounding her, she fled away. Later she learnt from a group of Indian tourist from another province that tourists are not supposed to give money to these so called “official gate keeper” as it would encourage them to harass tourist. A lady from this group invited Charlotte to join them. Charlotte was very touched to find safety and friendship with this group and even took pictures with them.

Charlotte also got lots of pix of animals free roaming during her adventurous trip.

 

 

I must have watched too much CSI !!I My imagination started to run wild. Like the cup of black coffee I asked for when offered. I was worried if I might be drugged. When Charlotte did not come back at the agreed time [actually I mis-calculated the time] my mind started playing tricks on me. All kinds of conspiracy theories popped into my mind – like both of us being abducted and our kidneys sold…

 

Charlotte arrived safely. God must be amused with the way my mind runs out of control.

After spending so much time there in the shop, I got to know Mevarif Khan. He is in his mid twenties and interestingly he met his wife at the Taj Mahal when he was only 16. He said that he proposed to her right there at their first meeting – talk about love at first sight! He said there were not too many young ladies these days who would conform to the Muslim attire so he was smitten when his eyes saw a young and beautiful girl in conservative attire.

I ended up spending money for a customised salwar suit and so did Charlotte. Well, ‘Arif’ is a passionate up-and-coming designer, so I thought perhaps someday when he gets famous, we could claim allegiance. Hehehe…. He is honest and hard working. A great learner too - that was probably why I enjoyed chatting with him. Between the 2 of us fussy ladies, he had spent at least 4 hours meeting our needs though the actual tailoring took only a couple of hours. Instead of complaining, or giving us a hard time, he took the opportunity to hear our requests and turned them into new designs for the boss to put on the shelf – the true spirit of innovation! The new design has some Chinese / Vietnamese elements and it would be called Charlotte [kidding]. The changing room, hahaha, was the shop itself… they all had to vacate the room when we ladies tried out the suits!

On thinking back, it was not just a business transaction. We built a relationship with ‘Arif’ and promised to stay in touch with him via email. I had given him a written blessing in Hindi and he loved it. He was quite surprised and touched by it. We got our goods, we haggled like all good shoppers, and we found a new friendship. What can beat that!