January 22, 2001 - How To Select A Street Kid for A Guide
January 22, 2001 - How To Select A Street Kid for A Guide |
Prabhu, Mari, Vela, Mumtaz
Here are my guides to life in India. When you go to India, you can get to know them... or you can choose your own Street Kids to be your guides. |
Selecting A GuideFinding a street kid is not difficult. You have a wide selection to choose from so you need to find ways to narrow your choices. I think the best way is to take a group of kids swimming. Usually you can find a lot of kids who want to go, specially on Saturday or Sunday when there is no school. Then you can watch the kids and select the best. If you ask Vela, she will organize a trip to the beach for you. |
Who's In Charge? Everyone tries to organize things to impress you. They take you not just to the beach but eventually to the movies as well. By taking kids someplace, you quickly see what kind of personality they have. In most cases, boys are not recommended because they are taught to dominate others... including you. In the far picture, we take a short cut through the government offices to the beach. |
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Marina swimming pool costs 15 rupees for one and half hours swimming. This is more than the kids can afford so many kids have never been swimming. The pool usually has 100 kids in it. |
The Marina Swimming Pool & Beach The beach is not too far from Broadlands and Hotel Maharaja. You can go wading at the beach but the undertow is extremely dangerous for swimming. Eliot's beach is named for the English man who drowned there. (I think he was trying to save someone else at the time who also drowned.)
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Maria Beach Usually the kids go have fun while you watch their clothing. On a clear day, you can see the port of Madras. The boat at the bottom is a local fishing boat.
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Amusements There are a number of amusements at the beach including shooting balloons with a beebee gun. Most kids like to ride a horse for a few minutes. One of the stalls actually has good clean fish but that is very expensive. |
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Dining Out If you have too many kids in a group, it is better not to take them inside a restaurant (called Hotel). Some of the boys do crazy things in a restaurant such as chew their food and then spit it on the floor for the waiters to clean up. Instead, Vela will arrange for "parcels" which are food wrapped to go which the kids can eat on the sidewalk. Then it is off to a movie, in this case an Arnold Schwartznager movie in Tamil. On this day, they had just been celebrating a holiday much like Halloween so the kids looked scruffy and covered with dye. |
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Look at their smiling faces Look at the faces of all the kids. See which ones have interesting faces. This narrow down the selection process very quickly. This girl seemed nice but I never saw her after this trip. Normally her hair would be black but the dye used to celebrate the Holi Festival can be seen for a month afterward. |
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