Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Shoe Repair


After touring Vishwanath Mandir in Kashi (the older name for Varanasi), I found that my sandal had broken. The strap around the back of the ankle had torn loose from where it joined the front of the sandal.

"I'll have to tie it together with string," I thought to myself. "I won't have time to find a shoe repair shop today."

But two minutes later my Nepali guide noticed that I was limping and my sandal was broken.

"Oh, you need to get that repaired," he said.

One minute later we stopped on the narrow street, wide enough for pedestrians only, in front of a man sitting on the pavement with tools spead in front of him.

I handed him my sandal and watched as he expertly repaired it. I paid twenty rupees and thanked him, but he didn't look up or smile.

And on we went.

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