Mr. Vasu came at eight fifteen in the morning to take us to the slum he spoke of the previous  day. It was a twenty minute drive in an automatic rickshaw from one of the most expensive areas to the most pathetic of slums. The slum was recognized by the government for the fact that it has been in the place for over a two decades. It is in the ununsed railway lands near the station. This area has a railway track on one side with abandoned quarters that belong to the Visakhapatnam Port Trust(VPT) on the other. As a part of the beautification of the city and forming a Greater Visakhapatnam, the government wants this slum to be emptied. So, it gave them pukka houses in an area quite far from the city. If the slum is moved to the outskirts, they lose their source of livelihood as they work in areas close to the slum. So, they want pukka houses to be built in the slum area. This cannot be done however, coz providing the railways an area at some other place does not make any sense.A sane solution would be to build the proposed houses in the Port Trust Area (as it is largely unused), emptying the slum beside and allotting the VPT another area, as for them location is no issue. The Vishakapatnam Port Trust on the other hand is not very responsive to the issue, despite being sensitized a couple of times.

We went to look into the status of the situation in the area and the locals were quite optimistic about the government’s inability to help them. We were particularly impressed by the people who were ready to accept their mistakes and also pointed that an absence of able leadership as one reason for the issue to remain unresolved. We left the place, for we had to meet Mr. Ravi back at the office. We bid Anna one final adieu, hoping to meet her sometime again in life. Though I got back to the office, my thoughts now revolved round the fact that our road trip ends that day. My mind was looking helplessly for anything that would make the day seem longer. I never had a feeling like that before. But I needed to accept then that all good things come to an end, just like the bad ones.

We met Mr. Ravi at about three in the afternoon and thanked him for the wonderful days we spent with Samata. We also met some teachers who worked with the Bala Mitra for the final time and also Ian Paul, another German who lived with Anna and worked at the school. Took some time to know each other and also appreciate one another’s endeavours. My team mates were enthusiastic about seeing home, but it held me no interest for I know, it will bring about nothing but more boring days where i will have not many to meet and nothing interesting to do(came to my old form of being a pessimist :P). I delayed the process of packing to five minutes before leaving and my team mates were waiting for their road trip bro who was almost emotional.