From the Slums to the Mall

Surviving on 30 rupees (less than a dollar) for breakfast and lunch in Bangalore on Wednesday wasn’t too difficult for most of our group, with the help of Visthar staff. The experience, however, definitely opened our eyes to the reality of poverty in India. The reality is that 750 million Indians live on 20 or less rupees a day for not only food, but housing, transportation, and every other cost of living for their whole family. Our group only had to find two meals for ourselves and didn’t even have to pay for our bus with the allotted 30 rupees.

After our breakfast on the street, which cost between 7 rupees and 14 rupees for a meal, we split into two groups and walked through two areas of urban slums in Bangalore. My group followed David and Roshen eventually coming to a railroad station where we crossed the tracks, then down a little dirt path through rotting garbage. We were in the slum. The street was narrow and lined with garbage. Stray dogs barked as we walked. People were going about their daily lives, sweeping, doing laundry, and other chores. Children smiled and waved. Indian music could be heard periodically throughout our walk. Besides the scent of garbage, scents of food drifted past our noses. We even stopped to try an apple custard fruit being sold from a street cart owned by a family trying to make enough money to feed themselves for the day.

Eventually we came across a group of local boys playing cricket. Surprisingly, David led us out onto the field right in the middle of the game. None of the players seemed to mind, and David asked them if we could try playing. A few of our group gave it their best try and then we continued on to a public school in the neighborhood. The school was right next to the cricket field, with the classrooms open to the outside. The walls of the building were covered in multiplication tables, the alphabet, etc. Unable to afford books for everyone, using the wall seems to be most practical for them. Before we moved on, we were even able to briefly visit with the headmaster about the school and the teachers.

After walking through the urban slums of Bangalore, both groups reunited at Garuda Mall. Puma, Ben & Jerry’s, Subway, Tommy Hilfiger and other western stores were scattered between Indian clothing stores. With only about 20 rupees in our pockets, depending on what people had ordered for breakfast, almost everything at the mall was completely out of our price range. Without knowing that the group was planning to stop somewhere outside the mall for lunch, Megan, Jericho, and I pooled our money to have lunch in the food court at the mall. The most reasonable thing we found for our total 70 rupees was a single meal of North Indian food. All three of us shared the two pieces of naan, chickpea main dish, and raw onions on the side.

When we reflected on our experiences of going from the slums to the mall, many of us realized that the slums weren’t as shocking as the westernized mall. The slums ended up being what most of us expected and had visualized, but the mall wasn’t. Many of us were surprised to see how our western culture had significantly impacted and spread to other cultures in the world. Also, the fact that the mall was literally right next to the slums, where a 70 rupee meal was a short two-block walk from a more filling 12 rupee meal in the slums. This contrast of westernized upper-class Indians living right next to the poor lower-class Indians is something we continue to observe and consider while in India.