THINGS
India: Things Picture Description
Energy / Firewood + Dung
Location : Agra

This lady is carrying firewood and shaped, dried cow dung on her head for use in cooking.

Agriculture: Markets
Location : Agra

This fruit vendor sells a variety of produce. This would be the equivalent of your produce section in a grocery store.

Garbage Disposal / Recycling
Location : Agra

One of the earth's most efficient recycling machines at work. Everywhere I went in India there were pigs running around on the streets.

Water
Location : Agra

A local water well provides water. This man must pump the water then carry it back to his house for cooking, drinking and bathing.

Transportation : Water
Location : Agra

Boats are frequently used for transportation. This boat is used to ferry people from Taj Granj to the other side of the river.

Labor Markets: Shipping
Location : Agra

Moving goods around via shipping is very much a done by hand. All the trappings of a large modern society are present, but often on a smaller scale. Where America might use an 18 wheeled semi-truck and forklifts; Indians use a bicycle and human forklift.

Food
Location : Agra

The food was spicy, hot and delicious! The smaller the restaurant the spicier the food. AFter 2 weeks I hit my spicy limit and couldn't eat any more hot spicy food. I'm not sure I had any working taste buds left after that.

Smells
Location : Agra

The smells of India / Perfumes.

Markets
Location : Agra

A vendor selling spices and other drystock. His store was on a raised platform.

Labor Markets: Shipping
Location : Agra

Many goods are transported via bicycle. Amazing loads are placed on all vehicles in India. Find out what the limit of the vehicle is, and use it until it breaks.

Labor Markets: Shipping
Location : Agra

Animals are used directly for transporting goods.

Labor Markets: Shipping
Location : Agra

A shipping bicycle loaded to the brim.

Monkey
Location : Agra

Monkeys roam freely in India.

Water
Location : Agra

A public "water fountain". (No I didn't drink this water - just posing for my shot).

Transportation: Taxi
Location : Agra

These small scooter taxis (known as Tuk-Tuks in Thailand) are called Auto-rickshaws in India. Super stinky, with no catalytic converter they were by far the most polluting thing in India. They covered the smell of the dung and garbage on the roads.

Clothing: Laundramat
Location : Agra

This is a Laundry center. Three things clean clothes (1) chemicals (2) agitation (3) temperature - heat. The Laundry center would take your clothes and pound them clean. Labor is inexpensive in India.

Paperwork
Location : Delhi

Ah. Paperwork, the most dastardly nuisances of modern life. India's bureaucracy is perhaps unparalleled. I spent 3.5 hours trying to cash a traveller's check in Kanpur. Kanpur is is a city of 2 million (about the size of Chicago). We went to 5 banks trying to cash this cheque. Then we gave up. Mountainous paperwork sat next to many bank tellers. On the floor. In the open.

Transportation: Trains
Location : Delhi

Trains are the primary city to city transportation in India. Usually not on time, crowded beyond belief. In the car I was in they packed 22 people where only 8 should sit. I had an elbow in my face for 3 hours.

Transportation: Trains
Location : Delhi

Train Station

Transportation: Trains
Location : Delhi

Train Station

Transportation: Cargo
Location : Delhi

Bicycles used as Cargo truck.

Transportation: Traffic
Location : Delhi

A typical traffic scene. Roads are good, but traffic is so congested that driving at 3 miles per hour is considered making good progress. Looks like a traffic jam? It is, but this is typical, normal.

Recycling
Location : Delhi

More Recycling creatures.

The State Bank of India
Location : Kanpur

Ah, The State Bank of India. In Kanpur I tried for 3 and a half hours to cash a travelers cheque. This is a relatively semi-modern city of 2 million mind you. After 3.5 hours I gave up. But pictured here is the plaque in the lobby of the State bank of India.

The State Bank of India
Location : Kanpur

India freezes things. Cultures, music, anything that arrives in India freezes the way it looks, feels and works. The inside of the state bank of india appears out of a world war II movie. Modern cars appear like they are from the 1920s. Movies are shown as in the 1920s speakeasies.

Rickshaw
Location : Kanpur

This is a typical Taxi of Kanpur

Minibus
Location : Kanpur

A typical Minibus of India. Built on a three wheeled scooter frame. With no catalytic converter, these loud public buses raise quite a stench.

Chicken Coup
Location : Kanpur

This is the western equivalent of the meat section of a supermarket.

Telecommunications
Location : Kanpur

This is a typical telecommunications telephone pole.

Water
Location : Kanpur

A local water well provides water. These ladies must pump the water then carry it back to his house for cooking, drinking and bathing.

Court
Location : Kanpur

The outdoor argument took place as we passed on a bicycle rickshaw. We weren't sure what was being said, but it was clear that people were trying to unsucessfully work out their differences.

Laundry Machine
Location : Kanpur

This is a Lady doing Laundry. The equivalent of a Laundry machine in the modern western world.

Electricity
Location : Kanpur

This electrical generator provided power during blackouts. Blackouts occur everyday. The question isn't whether there will be a backout, the questio is how long. Everywhere , everyday there is a blackout. In some places it only lasts a short time, in Bihar it may last up to 20 hours.

Bicycle Parking lot
Location : Kanpur

This is a typical parking lot , as many people use bicycles and walking to get around.

Restaurant Menu
Location : Kanpur

A typical Restaurant Menu. 45 Rupis is $1.0 USD.

Crafts
Location : Kanpur

A store the makes tables

Cargo
Location : Kanpur

Ox Carts are a standard way of moving goods and people.

Sanitation / Sewer system
Location : Kanpur

A typical toilet (in our hotel)

Hospital
Location : Kanpur

This is a little hospital in Kanpur

Hotel Classic
Location : Kanpur

This is the Hotel Classic. For $30.0 per person a night we got a "executive" room. 58.6 feet long, 9 beds, 2 A/C systems, personal servant. Of course, we didn't have much of a choice, when we arrived late a night, they said this was the only room available.

Butcher
Location : Kanpur

A handler of meat/ chickens.

Traffic Light
Location : Varanasi

A non-functioning traffic light in downtown Varanasi. This is the middle of the day , bustling traffic, non working traffic light.

Human Stoplight
Location : Kanpur

If electrical power is unreliable, traffic lights are unreliable, traffic accidents happen, people die. Solution? A human traffic light. This officer directs traffic with Green and Red flags.

School Bus
Location : Kanpur

A school bus in Kanpur

Recycling
Location : Kanpur

A recycling unit in Kanpur

Bookseller
Location : Kanpur

A "bookstore" on the streets of Kanpur

Onboard a Bus
Location : Kanpur

A picture onboard a typical public bus.

Sanitation Engineer
Location : Kanpur

A sanitation workman

18 Wheeler
Location : Kanpur

The equivalent of an 18 wheeler

Right of Way
Location : Kanpur

Cows have a right of way.

Shipping containers
Location : Kanpur

These international shipping containers are the cell boundary membrane of India. They represent the outside universe.

Gas Tanker
Location : Kanpur

This is a Petrol Fuel Truck

Cargo Truck
Location : Kanpur

Cargo Truck

Exhaust from Vehicles
Location : Kanpur

Transportation systems produce waste. Horses, and Oxes, transport goods, people and things, but also produce waste.

Observatory
Location : Varanasi

This ancient observatory sits on an equally old building. It rests along the Ganges in Varanasi. There is some light pullution here, but nothing compared to the US.

Store
Location : Varanasi

A typical small Shop in Varanasi

Burning Ghats
Location : Varanasi

People also come to Varanasi to die. They believe that this will help them along in the afterlife.

Dead Body
Location : Varanasi

So many people come here to die that bodies are creamated (burned). But there isn't enough wood to cremate the bodies fully. They are tossed in the Holy Ganges River. So many bodies have been throw in the Ganges that over time, a certain species of Frog has evolved to eat human flesh. Pictured here is a dead body floating in the Ganges River.

Bathing Ghat
Location : Varanasi

All Along the ganges River in Varanasi are the Bathing Ghats. People make a long pilgrimage to come here to bath in the Holy Ganges river, most will fill up a water bottle full of the brown water.

Electric Incinerators
Location : Varanasi

Because of the number of people who come here to die, the Burning Ghats can't keep up pace. So the government installed Electrical Incinerators. Apparently this has reduced the number of dead humans being tossed into the Ganges.

Automobile
Location : Varanasi

Here is another good example of India freezing something in place. This car was produced not that long ago, yet it looks like something out of a world war II movie. Their music videos look remarkably like Michael Jackson's "Beat-it". In other words, they froze a snapshot of what music videos were like when they first arrived in India. And to this day 20 years later, they are performed as they were when they first arrived. Automobile production is like that too.

Alarm Clock
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

These destardly little alarm clocks may serve as protein for dinner, but they are a relentless alarm clock with no snooze button. I don't mind getting up at 6AM, but these rooster-alarm clocks are set for 4:22AM and once they start they don't stop.

School Bus
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

A School Bus ferrying children home from school.

Water Well
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

A private water well serves this residence, you have come out to pumps water for drinking, washing, bathing etc.

Laundramat
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

This is a lady tending to laundry.

Police Car
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

Here is a discretely taken picture of a Police Car. A little fuzzy because I digitally zoomed in on it with Adobe photoshop. But all the police cars looks like this. Straight out of a world war II movie.

Classroom
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

The inside of a classroom. Single room school. Single chalkboard. I am taking a picture down the length of the entire school here.

Sewage
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

Everywhere you go in India there are open sewer ditches with standing , black, muck water.

Pole-Pole restaurant.
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

Here is where I had most of my meals in Bodh-Gaya. I had numerous intellectual discussions with a man named Thorsten from Europe. I met a Japanese fellow that had lost everything. Stolen. His camera, film, most of his clothes.

Thai Wat (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

Bodh-Gaya is a living Buddhist city. Spotlessly clean compared to the surrounding state of Bihar where it resides. This Temple is fashioned after a temple from Thailand which is over 90% buddhist. This temple was indeed put up by the Thai government. click here to see my photots from Thailand

Tractor (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

This tractor is doubling as a taxi at the moment

Tractor (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

This tractor is towing firewood.

Chicken Coup (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

A chicken market.

Social Cage (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Bodh Gaya, Bihar

The people I have met in third world countries know that they are in a social cage. But in India it is much worse, as many people still follow a rigorous caste system. Not only can they not climb out of the country's social cage, but they can't escape their caste's straightjacket. Having talking to many people in third world countries nearly all would like to leave their present circumstances. People would kill to just live in America. The poor people of America have access to public bathrooms with toilet paper, drink clean water, and live ten times better than many people in India. 25% of India is malnourished. That's 250 million people. That's equivalent to the entire population of America.

Siding (Buddhist Temple)
Location : Jagdispur Village, Bihar

This home is constructed of a clay substance. And this pile of mud looking substance is "patch" for the home.

Village Well
Location : Jagdispur Village, Bihar

The village well. Some children are playing on it. This will serves as the water source for the village. of about 20 village-homes.