Agra...our return to the city

After easily finding our train and seat in Jaipur, we settled in for our 7 hour stop start journey to Agra. We enjoyed being in a slightly lower class, with openable windows, and a chance to see the countryside. We discovered the travelling economy that is the Indian Railway, with many hawkers selling chai, peanuts, meals, lollies, chips, pani(water) the entire journey, as well as the odd beggar and busker. The chai here is fantastic, and we don't usually need to be asked twice(although we were a bit disillusioned to see it being made with a tea bag on the train!). It's been warming as the nights have been cold. Despite the chilly nights, the days have been clear and sunny, and quite warm in the sun...(even a tad of sunburn). We've adjusted pretty well to the food, and eating with our hands, although the spice is still a little fiery sometimes!

We arrived in Agra Fort a hour or so late, and amazingly found an autorickshaw driver who again took us straight to our hotel. The nice hotel in the middle of the tourist city was a bit of a culture shock after saharia... but it was great to have a warm shower!

Today we've spent some mandatory time at the Taj Mahal, which is pretty impressive in reality, and we're glad we made the effort to get out here. We're ready to leave the tourists though! We're learning that Internet Cafes are a lovely refuge from the busy streets.
We'll pass some time in Agra this afternoon, and then find our train station, which is about 35km away. Our train to Varanasi doesnt depart until 11.20pm tonight, so we're in for an interesting evening.

The sensational Saharia Organic Farm

So...New Years Eve. Our normal experiences are parties with friends, lots of food, lots of noise, and perhaps a drink or two. Picture if you can a mud brick shack with thatched roof sitting amongst fields of wheat and mustard, with the resident camel keeping an eye on things from out the back. This was where we found ourselves on Sunday night after taking a bit of a risk in Melbourne and booking a few days at a farm 28kms from Jaipur.
We passed the new year, strangely enough, sitting in a thatched room, watching Narnia in Hindi on a laptop, through the smoke of a fire set at our feet. Similar to last year but different!! (We watched Narnia in Canberra with Paul and Amber just on a year ago when it came out). We were joined with some of the local families, and Bill, a volunteer from England who's Woofiing his way through India. (http://www.wwoof.com.au/)

Saharia turned out to be an amazing experience of connecting with some local organic farming families, and being let into their simple yet amazing lives. Saharia allowed us to relax after some pretty intense days in the city and on trains, as well as giving us the opportunity to share a chai squatting in an outdoor kitchen with local families, taste the most amazing chapatti straight of the fire(drizzled with gee...hmmm), and walk through the fields and learn about their organic techniques. Did you know Cow's urine is great for polishing wood?? Harley...you'll have to give that a try on your next project!! We were thrown in the deep end at a village school nearby, where we were expected to teach 4 rowdy classes English in 20 minutes. Needless to say, we wont be giving up our day jobs in a hurry. It definitely gave us a good taste in preperation for Kolkata. We're stuffed!

We were blessed to spend some time with amazing people at Saharia who shared their lives and their wisdom with us, with inspiring integrity. It was a really grassroots example of community and communal living in action. The families all lived completely self sufficiently from the farm, and the happy contentedness that emerged from this simple living was contagious.

We were sad to leave this amazing place after only a few days. It encouraged us to give Wwoofing a try sometime, and challenged us about living more simply in Melbourne.
We left Saharia on the Camel Cart, a sensationally slow way to tear ourselves away from the place. We caught a local bus to Jaipur, took a wander, and prepared for our train trip to Agra.