12 amazing photos of people on the streets of India

These children live with their parents almost on the street, under a canopy near the road. They still have a very annoying brother, he always climbed into the frame with a bat for cricket. Maybe someday he will become a sports star and leave the slums. All boys dream of becoming cricketers or Bollywood actors.

In their free time from the dispossession of white tourists, the boys frantically chopped into cricket or fly kites. Jaipur, climb to the Tiger Fort. A huge number of children start kites, all of them are in heaven. Strong smog over the Indian cities, air polluted.

Cricket is a national sport. It is played on any patch that is more or less suitable for this. The rules are about the same as in baseball, only the ball is beaten with a bat, similar to an old-school washboard. Cricket is very popular throughout the region - India constantly competes with Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. In the evenings everyone watches cricket on TV. In newspapers, cricket is given a lot of space, there is a separate TV channel dedicated to this useful and exciting sport.

Children are often invited to play with them, once I left them with a ball, they were very pleased. It is necessary to throw with a run and with all the dope, if you throw them under the left hand, they do not expect such a trick.

Grandfather on the bus Jaipur-Pushkar. After long observations, I came to the conclusion that the number of skeins in a turban depends on age. Sikh boys have very small turbaned jackets, a couple of turns and a small bump at the top. In middle-aged men, the average number of layers. They say the color of the fabric also matters.

How already got these bombs!

Girls sell beads in Varanasi. In India, they start working at an early age. Most people involved in the tourism industry know English well, even children. They have a good incentive to learn the language.

Party enlightened on one of the ghats in Varanasi. They made themselves such a small temple on the street, in order to approach them, they need to take off their shoes. A man with discreet white paint on his body is a teacher-guru. To his left, an adherent in an orange bandage selflessly smokes hash through a pipe. On the left, two Frenchmen came up to talk about the high.

In Varanasi there are characters who specially dress as colorful as possible, so that tourists photograph them and pay 10 rupees per frame. If successful, you can get on the cover of the guide. They really take everything off, so when preparing for the trip, it seems that India is a country of freaks and such grandfathers are there on every corner. In fact, most people wear ordinary clothes: Indian jeans and jackets with dubious inscriptions, and the most colorful characters from Varanasi are export images.

The world does not look like on postcards! He is better.

Jaipur Kai misses his Gerda. He has pieces of ice in a jug. What for? I have no rational explanation.

The next reincarnation of Sergei Zverev.

Jaisalmer. The buyer is reluctant to part with cash to buy beans. There are no grocery stores and supermarkets; everything is sold on the street and usually separately. Someone sells cigarettes, some bananas, some sweets.

On the Jaisalmer-Jodhpur train, on the third shelf in sleeper (local reserved seat, only 3 rows of shelves, not 2). I wake up, and I have such neighbors.

This photo is about love. If I traveled to India with my beloved girl and broke up with her after returning, I would now look at this card and write such piercing lines:

“Until recently, you and I were together, and even our bicycles loved each other. The road, the hot wind, Indian dust - we all shared in half. Now I am sitting in the cold kitchen, listening to depressive hip-hop, remember other cities and your eyes "the colors of July sky. Where are you now, on whose pillow did your golden hair spread out?"

But in fact, there was no girl, I went with an imaginary friend, and we rented bicycles in Khajuraho. In the evening we stopped near a dried-up lake, Roma smokes hashish behind the scenes, I take photographs and think about postmodernism.

A boy is on duty near one of the temples in Khajuraho. When tourists arrive, he calls them to his father’s shop, located opposite. Also in Kajuraho, most young children greet you with the words "school pen". What exactly they want, none of them could explain.

In India, 100-200 people attack you every day. Half make commercial offers or try to somehow breed, half simply asks for money. It is sometimes annoying, but as long as you are in a good mood, it is only amusing. If the mood is bad, I want to break my head with a sledgehammer. Don’t get annoyed, molesters are an integral part of the trip, and you have already paid for it.

The Golden Temple in Amritsar is a super cool place. The Sikhs for the pilgrims of the Golden Temple did everything for free. You only need to get to Amritsar, and then you can not worry about anything. Free buses pick up from the airport and train station. The temple provides free lodging and meals. The number of beds is limited, the amount of food is not. We lived in a hotel, and once had dinner with pilgrims in the temple. Everything is put on the conveyor there, a large number of volunteers work, any person can become one. One Sikh told me that their free dining room can feed up to one hundred thousand people a day.

We went into the dining room, got a large plate with sections, a bowl of water and a spoon. In the large hall, people sit in rows in rows on the floor, on mats. Distributors run down the aisle, each with their own pot, and on the run throw food on plates. Rice, several types of vegetables with spices, bread, everything is quite tasty. If you don’t have enough, they will give it until you say that it’s enough. As soon as they ate, everyone gets up and the next shift enters the hall. You hand over the dishes to the sink. I believe that in Amritsar you should definitely go to this dining room, this is a real penetration into the real life of people, and not a commercial tourist luster.

While some talked for a long time about the construction of communism, others simply took and implemented this project in a single city. Who pays for all this? Believers in the Golden Temple donate a huge amount of money, I saw how the guards took out 7 large metal boxes with cash from the temple, I think they often carry them. I will talk more about Amritsar in a separate post.

In Amritsar.

Fashion Grandfather at Golden Temple, Amritsar. He has a Sikh logo on his turban and a dagger on his belt. A turban and a dagger are indispensable components for equipping a proper Sikh.

Jaisalmer. Located under a canopy, a huge kitchen. They are preparing something on an industrial scale.

In Jaipur. There are few men with glasses, because reading is not held in high esteem, and there are no computers. True, when we traveled several times in expensive train classes, the audience was completely different: they read the press in English, many had Blackberry, Nokia smartphones, laptops and they paid no attention to us, just like in Europe. But there are few such people.

Making reed fresh in Pushkar. We approached, watching the process. Indian family buys fresh juice for daughter.

- How much is? - I ask the seller.

- 20 rupees.

I look, the local smiles slyly. I feel the catch, India teaches to be always on the alert. An honest girl drinks fresh and says:

- One glass costs 10 rupees.

The girl’s dad shows her with a gesture to be silent, and happily winks with the seller.

The boy in Delhi. I do not know how to describe what was happening around. I will later make a selection with the darkest photos from India - no Taj Mahal, just the truth. You’ll see everything there, only photos will not be able to fully convey all this.