Seelampur

Today we were driven to Seelampur, one of the most distant slums from the Asha office. It has its own lab facility.  It is rather an impressive building as Asha's Community buildings go - very spacious with a lovely central courtyard:

I understand the women employ a gardener to look after the plants!  The community of 30,000 is mainly muslim.  I saw the computer room where some lads were surfing as I arrived.

These are the friendly Asha staff who helped me with the clinic:

The month of Ramadan has just started so I saw a lot of people complaining of feeling faint - including one pregnant lady.  They have no food or drink from sunrise to sunset - in this heat!  It's not easy!  I also had a number of patients with respiratory illnesses.  I was able to spend time with patients explaining their treatments, something that they don't get from Government hospitals which are swamped with patients.

After the clinic we had to make our own way back by metro - but it was quite a walk to the station.  Hence my first ever ride in a cycle rickshaw. 

It was on a quiet road with mainly cycle and autorickshaws being the other traffic so I felt reasonably safe.  I never fancied trying one on roads with lorries and buses buzzing past.  Mind you we did meet an ox cart!

We arrived at the station and Ayesha showed me Delhi Metro cards and how to use one.  May be worth investing in one for 50 rupees and using it when we come.  It would certainly save the long queues for tickets.

I then took an autorickshaw to the office, keeping the price down to what the Asha staff told me it should be!  Ignore the meter...everyone else does.  It wasn't on zero to start anyway!

Later I took another autorickshaw back to the flat as all the drivers had disappeared by the time I finished.  Bianca was brave and took the bus that I discovered yesterday!