"Red Fort is made of the red sandstone,"

"you know, is local to this part of India. Was start building in 1526 and complete in 1720. 40 million rupees were completed in this time." -Delhi tour guide

This was our guide's refrain. When we first saw him I thought he was a used car salesman. He wore a blue blazer with dark pants and some kind of leather shoes shaped like alligator snouts. Their slight upward curve reminded me of mojdi- except sleazier. His ensemble was incomplete without his stylish sunglasses, which kept his eyes hidden the entire time we were with him. I feel a bit uneasy when I can't look a stranger in the eyes. But he was very humorous.

We had to pass from New Delhi to old Delhi (about 15 km) and along the way he would stop at nothing to provide us with valuable information/guidance/history relating to the sights of India's capital. As we drove along the main highway he pointed left from his post at shotgun, and would say things like "Right is Red Fort," or "This round building on right is Parliament building," or "That building is where our Supreme Court of India meet." He was a stickler for detail.

When we finally got out of the car, we were outside of Rashtrapati Bhavan, the former palace of the Mughal Emperors that now houses India's president. The palace sits at one end of the capital complex and is flanked on both sides by beautiful buildings in mixed Mughal and colonial British style. A wide promenade stretches west to India Gate, a large structure that commemorates the Indians who died in the World Wars and the Afghan Wars. I was reminded of the capitol mall in D.C. Both areas are meticulously planned and set aside from the metropolitan areas they neighbor. Whereas in London, Parliament looks as if it were dropped from the sky onto a fully developed city block. And 10 Downing St. is right next to...well, 8 Downing St. probably.

The entire area is breathtaking, partly because it is so large, open and well maintained. It is a far cry from anything in Bombay. We later found out that the Gateway of India area of Bombay was supposed to be a sprawling area in the same style as the capital but the city government didn't want to promise so much land to the architect, in case his gate turned out an eyesore. By the time he finished the gate, the surrounding area had been sold to developers. So now his gate sits skewed from the rest of the area's grid, pointing to where its sister buildings were supposed to stand.

Our next destination was one of the most wonderful spots in Delhi. It is the oldest shopping and 'downtown' area in the old city and it's called Chandni Chowk. Chandni is star and Chowk means square. There are chowks everywhere but this one is unique. We hopped on a bicycle rickshaw and entered the smallest lanes I've ever seen. Inside the chowk the streets are wide enough for 2 bicycle rickshaws at most and with two-wheelers and foot traffic, they are some of the busiest streets anywhere . The most fun is when you are on a bike rick and you encounter another one coming in the opposite direction. First there is a gridlock and everyone gets annoyed. Then with some effort all the pedestrians duck into a shop front to make room as you slip past each other. You don't fear accidents here because traffic is one big accident. But everybody travels so slowly that most people don't get hurt. A westerner once famously said that if you don't believe in God you should see traffic in India and you'll be assured of His existence.

We passed whole blocks of sari shops with their brightest pinks, reds and saffrons hanging out front. Other blocks were occupied completely by silver merchants or gold merchants or puppet makers or sweetmeat shops. The neighborhood is magnificently old. Space is so precious in Chandni Chowk that all the wires required by our advanced age are suspended twenty feet above street level along each lane. With the ancient buildings sagging over the lanes, you feel confined to a system of tunnels where the outside world ceases to exist. It is said that if you can't find something for sale in Chandni Chowk it is probably not worth having. (There is generally at least one area of every ancient Indian city about which this same thing is said.)

On the southeast corner of Chandni Chowk sits Jama Masjid, the third largest mosque in the world and one of the oldest in India. "The Jama Masjid was built by first Mughal Emperor, Babar, was start in ... 20 million rupees were completed in that time," said Rakesh. We would soon figure out that short of the Taj Mahal, everything in Delhi and Agra was built out of "the red sandstone, you know, is local to this part of India," and a lot of rupees were completed in those times. We had to wait a bit to enter because afternoon prayers were about to begin. From the outside you wouldn't believe that it had a capacity of 20,000 but once you pass under the large Mughal arches, you enter a vast courtyard. At this point I had yet to develop an appreciation for the influence of Islam and also Middle Eastern culture on India. I still thought of them as unique phenomena that had a long history of contact. But as the trip continued I began to understand the adaptive and creative powers that have long been the law of this land.

See some pictures for this entry at my Flickr page.

Haiku Travel Journal :: India 2006

Warm and temperate,
like normal, the question is,
why were sweaters packed?

Rajasthan, year round,
is ‘sss’ ‘hhh’ and even sigh,
but rarely drip drop.

Orion pulls taut
his grand celestial bow.
The hunt is short lived.

Sticky thigh on couch
waits in anticipation
of late June relief.

Eastward Deccan breeze
lifts spirits in Talegaon.
Bus travel is slow.

Unnatural cold,
greets the homebound traveler.
Would be grass is snow.

"Bombay really only has two seasons..."

"monsoon and summer. It's hot and humid during both."
- Anna

I'm sitting in my Grandpa's living room, under the ceiling fan listening to the sounds of my family talking and the traffic outside. Some call this season winter, from December to February, but now we know better.

At 8 o'clock my brother is falling asleep against his will. He tempted fate by not taking a nap in the afternoon. As we adjust to the climate, the heat and humidity tire us out quickly. It makes sense to me now that our family plans everything around meals. You can only go so long here without a boost.

Being a connoisseur of sound I am amazed by the ever present din in this residential neighborhood of Chembur. We are right next to the highway, just like in Sunnyvale, but the other sounds are more interesting to me. My favorite sounds have always been the calls of the bhajiwalas that come in the morning. I never knew what they were saying but I listened intently. They have such wonderful intonation.


From sunrise to sunset the tree outside our window hosts several species of tropical bird. They hold loud meetings all morning, break for lunch and resume in the evening. After school the children of the neighboring housing compound play gulli cricket, carefully avoiding parked cars and two-wheelers. They shriek with joy and yell appeals to their umpires. The neighborhood beyond the park that I see from the window must be populated entirely by marching bands, masjids and home theater systems. Five times a day the namaz comes over the loud speakers, filtered through the trees of the park that separates us from that mysterious place.

Mysterious because it has always been just beyond the park, yet I've never been there. I've watched the neighborhood grow for twenty years over successive visits. Corrugated iron turned to brick turned to steel girded cement. At some point, the marching bands moved in along with the home theater systems. I've always wondered what it was like over there, but not enough to walk through the park and find out. In fact I don't know if I've ever been inside the park. My personal Mumbai starts from this window and extends in the opposite direction. I watch this window like a TV and in a way it has taught me a lot about Mumbai.

When I was a kid the park was a swamp. Reeds and grasses grew out of the stagnant water that filled the space. I associated with it mosquitoes and threfore discomfort. But slowly the swamp was reclaimed with dirt and trees until it became a park with a thin path winding around its edge. Now those trees are home to hundreds of birds that chatter all day.

Back in the day the housing compound next door seemed dusty and dirty, ill-lit at night. And the fence separating the compound from the swamp was topped with exposed shards of glass. Eventually they finished the carpark with cobbled stones and its walls got a fresh coat of beige all-weather paint, dur be gone. They replaced the crude shards of glass with barbed wire hidden by a row of tropical trees.

The neighborhood beyond the swamp used to seem ever so far away. All I could see were corrugated iron roofs that reminded me of the squalor outside Chembur station. But those made way for brick walls and eventually cement and plaster. The skeleton of a new office building now sits unfinished, its steel rods reaching up to the sky like the tall reeds they replaced. Though the mosque was always there I realized it only recently. Unconsciously I heard so many prayers, but now I listen to them. They seem almost impossible to ignore.

Over there feels like it has come over here. I have never seen it but I know it well.