One more day in Delhi, Lodhi Gardens

A Muslim refugee camp in Old Delhi, during the Partition era.

The Partition. I mentioned it before. The Partition, the seismic moment in Indian history. I talked to Leon about it, and I wanted to ask Sheila too, but somehow in a subtle way, like I couldn't just grab her by the shoulders. Shout, HOW ABOUT THAT PARTITION. I hope you know what I'm talking about. The nation arbitrarily torn into two parts. The mass exodus of Hindus from what was now called Pakistan, and Muslims from India. It is hard to imagine now but Pakistan used to be as Indian as India itself. Even today (like so many world conflicts) the differences between the two nations people are insignificant, the similarities enormous. As a a friend of mine said to me: "Whenever I went and lived overseas, most of my friends were Pakistani. Once you're overseas, you realize pretty fast fast that Pakistanis and Indians are the same people, there's no point in denying it, you have so much in common..."

Do you know that I don't know a single Pakistani? They are, so I hear, very common in the UK. And pretty much non-existent in the US.

And the Partition was a tragedy, a tragedy of epic proportions. Around 12.5 million people displaced and on the move. No one is quite sure how many people died in the inevitable fighting, but estimates range from a 100,000 to a million. The division of land between the two states was often arbitrary or poorly thought out: Partition is one of the reasons why Kashmir is such a mess today - combine a majority Hindu population in the Jammu region and a majority Muslim one in the Kashmir valley? You're going to have problems. Anyhow. Fighting on the streets, friends lost forever. Even the language got messed about. (Leon, remembering the day when he learned to speak Hindustani up in Mussorie, instead of Hindi). Another irony: some of the oldest archaeological sites in India are in Pakistan, in the Punjab. Gandhi was against the Partition. No one seemed to listen to him.



That evening, Sheila and I set off for one last walk around Lodhi Gardens. My favorite place in India.

(When I first came here: I went to one of the more secluded tombs, and was all alone (so rare) in India. It was my last few hours in India, I was headed to the airport right after. And I watched the green parrots and thought to myself, "When will I see this again, when?"
And reassured myself, "It will be soon, must be soon. Within two years, which is all I have left of school."
And do you know - I did it).

I asked her about the Partition.

"Ah, I remember," she said, as we begin our loop around Lodhi Garden. The sky is pink and birds coming down, the sun so distinctly Indian, a sun that can be found nowhere else. "My sister and I went to the Woodstock School every day, you know - we lived in Landour. There was a sweet old man who used to sell lovely bangles and jewelry, on the way to school. We loved to buy those beautiful things, and sometimes our mother would get them for us. He was a Muslim man - I guess we knew that. It wasn't anything important, then. He was very kind, a lovely person.



Partition happened, and the fighting happened, you know all that. My mother, terrified. She tried to shield us from the worst of it, and she mostly managed. But - we went to school one day, I suppose, and the little man wasn't there. And my mother - she told my sister that he had moved, had gone away.

Of course, he had been killed, murdered by the Hindus. We found out about it all at school. It hit my sister the hardest. She cried for days and days, couldn't understand at all."

Like anyone could.

"I remember the violence, too, in the eighties, with Indira Ghandi and all. Your grandfather, too. Living in Berlin, right after the war. And the Great Depression. He saw things, too

Baldev, too. He's from Peshewar. His father, my father in law - he was a popular dentist there. So they didn't let him leave after Partition. They wanted him around. That kept them relatively safe, even not being religious. He never spoke Hindi, as a child. Just learned Urdu."

She though for a moment. Green parrots in the trees, and an ex-pat couple jogging bouncily around the trails perimeter, and the air going pinker and more divine by the moment. The tombs glow this time of night, as if backlit, and the remnant of blue tile on their fronts become intensely colored.

"Have you ever seen violence? Real violence?"

No, I said, no, not at all, not like you and my grandparents, not the world you four occupied.


"Well, that's good. It's the real world, maybe. But you don't have to experience so much, not just yet. Maybe Cambodia will be like that. "

She ran into a friend of hers, a very old looking Indian woman with the particular carriage of one who has led a life of stone cold bad-assery. We exchanged greetings, and continued our stroll. I love it when this happens because then Sheila always tells me all about the person we just met. She didn't fail me.

"That woman - her husband was diplomat to the pope. She had me over for lunch one day, and told me a story, a wonderful story. She had an audience with the Pope, and the Vatican naturally requested she wear a hat, and gloves, and stockings, something like that. Of course, she wondered. How would she do that with a sari? It would look absolutely strange. She was no push-over. She covered her head with her dupatta, and put her hands in her dress instead of wearing gloves. "This is appropriate for Indian dress," she explained to the Pope, when she appeared.

Well, he certainly wasn't going to argue with her.

Her family - her one son - he shaved his head in college. Some philosophical thing. And her husband, his father. Well, he refused to talk to him for 8 years, because of this silly thing. She finally broke down the wall, she did it. "This is stupid," she said, to both of them. And it did work. She's like that. The husband is dead now, I think.

The son - he was a lawyer, or something - he loved Mussorie, he wanted to retire there like everyone does. He made a lot of money, so he bought a nice place there, when he was middle-aged. And what do you know. Maybe his second night there, he died. All alone, his family all back in Delhi. He just had a heart attack, unexpected and sudden. He was quite young.

I guess the moral is, you might as well live as you please, now. There's no use in waiting."

(How many times have I heard that from family and older mentors, that particular advice. My grandfather, regarding his bourbon at 6:00 PM, sitting in the leather chair I know so well. "You might as well. You could get hit by the beer truck tomorrow. You might as well." )



We went back to the house for dinner. Baldev had finally come down - I suspect a big grudgingly - from Mussorie, and it was good to see him again, him and his curious electric-blue eyes. Like my grandparents and like Sheila, he carries the same aura of sheer gravitas about him.

"I know I'm not a Hindu," Sheila said, "not really. But, there was this one time." (Pouring me yet another drink).

I said I'd go to this temple, if Rajeev got well. And he did, so I went with my friend. I was dutiful about it. We got to the airport - they assigned us this nice young soldier, to accompany us. We couldn't get a jeep up there, the roads were out, so we needed to walk. He looked at me in my salwar and said, "Mrs. Lal, can you make it?" And I said, "Well, I'm from Mussorie. I guess I can try."

I got up there, and the shrine is in this cave, it's quite popular. It's like re-entering the womb, it's really slippery. That's the idea. You crawl through corriders, and caves. You can't go out the same way you came in. In the central area - it costs a lot of money to do puja there, or stay there a while. I ran into this group of people, Gujaratis I think, and they had paid a lot of money to do this puja. So they let me into their group: "Ah, you're my sister, you're like my sister." And I go, "Uh, okay, I' m your sister." So I get to see this - very expensive puja, i get to stay in there for a while.

I was going out, and I passed by this very tall woman, over six feet tall, and dressed all in white. I remember her sari was very long, and I couldn't see her feet. She looked almost lost - she was going the wrong way, and you shouldn't do that. But you're not supposed to correct others in temples. They're places of worship, in the end, you do do what you want to do. She had the most beautiful face, as I recall. I thought it was strange - you don't see lots of over six foot tall women in India. I told my mother about it - she was a hardcore Hindu - and she laughed at me. "Oh, Sheilie - that was obviously the Dara. You saw her, it was her. "

"Well, the Dara is very beautiful, then," I said. Another friend of mine - they say it was a hallucination, that I wanted to see her. So I willed myself into "seeing" something. They're probably right. But it makes a good story, doesn't it?"



I took some photographs of them for my grandparents. I got the two of them connected on Skype. (They are both remarkably technologically savvy). That's the power of technology: get two couples who have known each other forever and live on opposite sides of the world, talking on video phone for the first time in years. Cynics about technology and its supposed evils might want to stop and consider that.

I was headed to the airport early that morning: off to Bagdogra. We all said goodbye in the rather manful fashion of our respective families. I reassured them I'd be back (I would). They assented (they would). I said goodbye to the dog, and was sent off with a Ferro Rocher chocolate, and then went to bed early.

The Red Fort And Other Historical Learnings

The Red Fort is Delhi's most distnctive immensity. In that it is, indeed, goddamn enormous. The gigantic red sandstone strecture completely dominates Old Delhi, set as it is conveniently across the street from the Jama Masjid. The Red Fort and the Jama Masjid were both commisioned and erected by Shah Jahan - the man otherwise known as The Guy Who Built the Taj Mahal - and the face of Northern India today is defined by his remarkable good taste.

I somehow managed not to actually go inside the Red Fort on my last trip. And it looked like the same was going to happen this time, too. It's a classic scenario: a massive, beloved tourist attraction that you never quite find the time to go to. And you use a wide variety of excuses to justify it. It'll take a long time. It's hot in there. The admission is expensive.

Then, I cleverly left my debit card in a restaurant. I'd been meeting with a charming old friend from Bangalore, we'd had a couple of drinks, we'd had a lovely time, I had (characteristically) got distracted by some amusing twist in the conversation when the check came - bam. The night before I left on an early train to Amritsar.

I discovered this at 5:30 in the morning, when I woke up to go to the train station. Whoops. Needless to say, I wasn't getting on that train until I found my damn card. Thankfully, Providence (or something) came through for me. The properitor of Defense Colony's Angels in the Kitchen had, upon finding the card, immediately put it in a lock box and had been waiting for me to call. What a mensch. His restaurant has excellent fusion cuisine, a lovely ambience, and an alluring spread of desserts. You should eat there post-haste when you are in Delhi.

So, I got my card at noon, I missed my train, I was stuck in Delhi for one more day with no idea what to do. I got online post-haste and booked a train ticket up to Dehradun, with the intent of returning to the charming Raj-era hill station of Mussorie as a stop-gap measure. There were actually seats available on the train. So far, so good. My blood pressure had spent the entire evening at a level usually experienced immediately prior to a fatal cardiac event. I had to go do something with my day. So: Time to See the Damn Red Fort.

I hailed a taxi and we dutifully made the rather long drive down to Old Delhi and the Fort Area. Halfway there, the formally blue and reasonably welcoming skies entirely erupted. It was apocalyptic rain, the kind only India can really dish out - it felt like that shit would hammer through the car walls and drown us all. Everyone on the street was running crazily for shelter. "Well, uh, we're here," the driver said. I had, of course, not thought to bring an umbrella. I had a brief internal debate: Do I go back to the hotel and not see the Red Fort once again, rendering myself a member of the Crappiest Tourists in Human History society? Or do I man up, square my shoulders, and completely and utterly soak myself in the interest of culture?

I got out of the taxi. Was soaked to the bone in roughly 2.5 seconds, maybe less. I marched over to the ticket counter anyway, where about 60 tourists were huddled under a leaky awning, standing in ankle-deep water. (Delhi and drainage? Hah, don't make me laugh). I sloshed on through and bought my ticket. I was going to see the damn Red Fort if it killed me. I walked through the gates.


A lovely pavilion in the inner compound.

It's hard to express how shockingly huge the Red Fort is. And this becomes an incredibly good thing. If you pay the price of admission to the Fort, you see, you've got an immense, controlled, and quite clean green space pretty much to yourself (in the off season), a place of remarkable serenity and relaxation in the middle of Delhi, one of the planet's bigger clusterfuck metropolises. The rain finally slackened off, to a refreshing drizzle, and I strolled down the path through the former British army barracks inside, headed to the Indian Independence museum within to wait out the last gasp of the rain. It was really quite lovely.



The Independence Museum does do a reasonably through job of explaining the long march of India's freedom from its colonial captors. Indians are very fond of demonstrative dioramas in their museums, which always amuse the snot out of me. Not that the subject matter is amusing at all. This depicts the brutal Jalianwalla Bagh Massacre in the 1919 Punjab. Punjabis, spurred to protest by Ghandi, began to demonstrate throughout the region - especially active in Amritsar. British official General Brigadier Dyer was put in control of the city, and he quickly began to use harsh methods to bring the demonstrators to heel, including random arrests and a total ban on all gatherings. On that fateful April day, a large number of Punjabis gathered at a protest meeting- unaware of the anti-meeting law - and were suddenly confronted by Dyer and his men. The British troops without warning began to indiscriminately fire into the peaceful - and shocked - crowd. Almost a thousand people died. An excellent article on the massacre is here.

Dyer, for his part, wasn't exactly repentant. In his own words:

"I fired and continued to fire till the crowd dispersed, and I considered that this is the least amount of firing which would produce the necessary moral and widespread effect, it was my duty to produce if I was to justify my action. If more troops had been at hand the casualties would have been greater in proportion. It was no longer a question of merely dispersing the crowd, but one of producing a sufficient moral effect from a military point of view, not only on those who were present, but more specifically throughout the Punjab. There could be no question of undue severity...(report to the General Staff Division on 25 August 1919)"

Interestingly enough, Micheal O Dwyer, the official who approved the action, was assassinated by a Sikh -one Udham Singh - in 1940 (Dyer having already kicked off).

I had not been aware that a significant Indian independence movement existed among Indian Americans (mostly Punjabis) in the early 1900s. Pretty cool story, that. Check out the Ghadar Movement here. The Ghadarites published journals and newsletters extolling Indian independence, but were tragically (and often fatally) repressed by the British.


The Mughals were very keen on water features. You would be too if you lived in the hell that is April in Delhi.

On to the main attraction, the Red For itself. Well, if I could find it. it's really easy to get lost in the countless paths of the Red Fort. There's usually helpful soldiers carrying fearsome looking weaponry to give you directions, but these directions (as it turns out) are usually wrong. I ended up walking over a small green bridge that connected two parts of the fort to one another - now divided by a highway.



A train was going by under me, a coal train. For a moment, I had ab brief and utterly surreal feeling that I was standing on a railway bridge somewhere in North Carolina and that a hobo carrying a ruck-sack and a banjo might manifest magically out of the bushes. Thankfully, the feeling passed.



I turned myself around and finally found myself in the main fort complex - in other words, the old stomping grounds of the Great Mughals themselves. It's an incredibly beautiful place, full of graceful Mughal architecture - and what architecture style really tops it? - and old British buildings, water-features and garden areas. Sadly, the Fort is poorly maintained, and little to no restoration or reconstruction work has been done. This place could be reasonably easily restored to its former majesty...but I suppose the 15 USD or so entry fee isn't going into the upkeep of this superb piece of human history. Can't say I'm shocked. The actual living quarters of the



This is the Moti Masjid or the Pearl Mosque, erected by the hyperactively religious Emperor Aurangzeb. Aurangzeb did not share the rather relaxed and hippie-ish religious notions of his forefathers, and imposed a new era of strict Muslim rule on India. To his detriment: his disinterest in tolerating minor Indian cultural elements like, I don't know, Hinduism, ended up diminishing the influence and popular support that the Mughal Empire had previously enjoyed.



At least the rather dreary and startlingly uncharismatic Aurangzeb could appreciate a decent building, as evidenced by the graceful Masjid. (Aurangzeb is also the guy who deposed and locked up his father - Shah Jahan - in the Agra Red Fort, allowing him the smallish dignity of being able to view his Taj Mahal from across the river. Whatta mensch).



The Hamman, or Royal Baths, are definitely the crown jewel of the Red Fort Complex. This incredibly ornate and lovely white marble structures are where the Mughals abluted, shot the shit, and consorted with their armada of concubines in their off time (and being a Mughal emperor, hey, it was off time whenever the hell they felt like it!). Official business was supposedly conducted here on a regular basis.


Like every tourist attraction in India, the Fort is perennially full of roving packs of bored teenage boys. I find myself wanting to yell GO AWAY AND GET A JOB whenever they hit on me, though doubt this would really achieve much.

This strikes me as a bit awkward - being naked in a royal bath with your boss and a couple of concubines - but I guess cultural norms change. Fast. The complex and highly advanced water system sprayed both hot and cold water, and basins of rose-scented liquid were thoughtfully set out for the sweaty. It is nice to know that the Mughals probably smelled pretty good.



Built in a similar style, the Diwan-i-Khas was the Emperor's personal quarters and also served as an official receiving room (presumably for folks who didn't warrant a full rub-down and a toe tickle by some Kashmiri babe). This is the place where the iconic Peacock Throne of the Mughals sat- and is the place where the great Persian warrior Nadir Shah took it in 1739. There really was an artificial river that ran through the holy baths and this area, nicknamed (somewhat grandly) the Nahar-i-Bihisht or the River of Heavenly Peace.



These rooms were used and abused by the British after the exile of the Last Mughal, Bahadur Shah II after the Delhi Mutiny - soliders were quartered here and doubtless had boozy drinking parties and other carryings-on in what were formerly sacred and incredibly closeted environs. As is the case with all successful invading parties, isn't it?




There's a small museum kept up in the sadly shabbily-maintained Mumtaz Mahal, the old residence of Shah Jahan's beloved wife.



Mughal armor.


The Diwan-I-Am was the spot where the Emperor engaged in public activities of state. Inaugurations and other show piece events happened here - as evidenced by the epic and imposing scale of the building. It's hard to imagine, but the building was originally coated in burnished white plaster, and was trimmed with real gold. If you were inordinately lucky, you might get invited here for a state event, doubtless involving elephants and other awesome things.



I ambled back outside the Fort now. What a pleasant respite from the constant sensory fist-to-your-face assault that is day to day Delhi. A tourist outside the gates was being shaken down for money after foolishly photographing some charming local boys. Rickshaw drivers were calling at me from behind the metal security-gates, as soon as I emerged. The sky was electric blue and the weather almost cool, post-rain, and the Fort was redder then I'd ever seen it before. Such is life, such is life. If there be a paradise on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this....

Delhi: The Ridge, The Golf Club, The Mutiny

Raan al Sikander. It's a beautiful thing. Named after Alexander the Great of course. (Sikander himself!)

One afternoon in Delhi, Sheila had a friend over for lunch. He's a history professor at St. Stephen's College in Delhi, one of the city's predominant educational institutions, and taught Rajeev when he was a student there. He was from Australia at one point, (Fremantle, to be exact) but he's been in India for more then 50 years and has taken up Indian citizenship, has almost entirely repatriated himself. Most importantly: when Rajeev fell ill, he was there. Even when he had his schizophrenic breaks, he came to the house and talked to him, kept him company. Although he's pushing 86, he still works as a residence advisor at the university. And he still comes to see Rajeev and Sheila, once or twice a month.She vacillated some on inviting me. "He's terribly old, you see," she said. "He's very old and he might bore you."

(The probable worry: that I might bore him).

"But I have specially ordered raan al sikander, of course, and I know you do like that." She thought. "So perhaps you could put yourself out. Come over for lunch."

And I did. Raan al sikander is, of course, Indian style leg of lamb. Absolutely divine, and Sheila's Guwhati cook does a bang-up job of it. Tender and delicately spiced meat. Served with bhindi masala, just the way I like it.

"Well, I've got something to show you two, and Rajeev," he said, as we sat back in our chairs, in a state of post-feast recuperation. One of his students had prepared a video on the Ridge.

The Delhi Mutiny was India's first great surge against British rule, an immense outpouring of popular anger and outrage. It all started in 1857, when the sepoys - Indian soldiers in the pay of the British - exploded into action against their employers, who had been under the cheery impression that the Indians were perfectly happy with the invasion of their country. The reason cited for the explosion of violence was a religious one; a rumor spread that the bullet cartridges the army was issued - the wrappings of which had to be bitten off to be used - were greased with cow and pig fat. As this was abhorrent to both Hindus and Muslims, the Sepoys revolted in various areas across British India, with action occurring from Meerut to Peshawar. It was a close fight for a while there, and the Indian rebels were only decisively put down with the fall of Gwailor in late 1858. It was the first indication to the previously blissfully ignorant British that India was not willing to humbly submit to the Crown forever - a conflict that would, a few generations later, come to a head under the leadership of Gandhi.

Delhi was the scene of one of the most savage and protracted battles of the Mutiny, and it was the Ridge that served as the East India Company's base during the infamous 1857 siege. The sepoys had, as a nationalist play, decided to attempt to restore the Mughal Empire to its pre-British eminence: they flocked to Delhi to attend the aged (and deeply unenthusiastic) Emperor Bahadur Shah. The rebel forces managed to violently push the British forces and their families out of the city, with a copious amount of bloodshed - much of it civilian - on both sides. British troops were either scattered or unavailable. The future of Britain's ascendency over India lay very much in doubt. As may perhaps be obvious, the British did defeat the Indian rebels. The Last Mughal, Bahadurr Shah - forced to be an unwilling nationalist symbol for the mutineer forces - was captured and taken into British custody. His three sons were captured the next day at Humayun's tomb by East India Company official William Hodson, whose clemency only extended to their father. He stripped them naked, forced them to kneel and shot all three of them dead at the Khooni Darwaza (Bloody Gate). Their heads were, thoughtfully, presented to their father after the fact. The unfortunate Bahadur II died in exile in Burma.

Today, Delhi University and St. Stephen's both abut it the Ridge. The former battleground has become an enormous green space in the center of the city,much of it a biodiversity park that has been allowed to exist in a fairly untouched state. Hordes of large and deeply terrifying monkeys roam the area, as well as Delhi University students looking for a good place to canoodle (as occurs everywhere). The professor's student decided to focus on the Flagstaff Tower in her video, a small building of British origin that served as a refuge for the scattered and mostly civilian British survivors of the May fighting. It's on the Ridge, and very near to the University. But it hasn't been kept up, and almost no one knows what the Flagstaff Tower is, or why it was (at one point) important as a place of a refuge and an important icon of the Delhi Mutiny.

"You have to conclude," the Professor says in the video, sitting in front of the Tower on a hot day. "You have to conclude that Delhites don't care about their history. Even though they've got so much of it around them.

The video couldn't quite play all the way. Even I, the 21st century representative, couldn't repair it. "Ah, well, then," the professor said. "That's that."

"Well, I think I'll have to go to the Ridge, then," I said. "The video makes it look quite interesting."

The professor either could not pick up about 98% of what I said at any given time (which wasn't much - I knew my place) or simply found it irrelevant. "I guess you can, if you'd like," he shrugged. "Why not."

Sheila gently but firmly forced him to take a nap, in the way she forced everyone to bend to her will. I headed back to the International Center by way of Lodhi Gardens, thinking of the past. The professor was not in any way shape or form of this era, had committed himself to history, to drawing rooms in Delhi. I'd asked him about Australia. He'd shuddered. "Ugh. That horrible place. It's so awfully new. No respect for history. No history at all, and no culture either."

"I thought it was all right," I said, a bit chastened.

"You did," he said. A subtle judgement on my character.

I dutifully set off for the Ridge the next day. I corralled an exceedingly proud Sikh driver outside Khan market (but all Sikhs are, aren't they?). I looked at the map he had in the backseat as we drove off. "You have no need for any other cab driver in Delhi, madame," he said.
"Oh?" I said, looking out the window at the Gandhi monument. I keep on not visiting it.
"For I am Mister Delhi," he said.


Here's a photo of a goddamn monkey. I hate monkeys.

"Oh," I said. Forty minutes later, we were at the Ridge. I began walking up the hill. It's a beautiful place, totally unexpected in the middle of the occasionally horrific urban jumble that is Delhi. It feels like a real jungle, full of monkeys and mysterious bird calls.



Populated by a healthy number of my beloved giant mutant snails, as evidenced here.



As expected, the building is not spectacular. St. Stephen's uses it as a storehouse for athletic equipment. There isn't any signage - you have to know what it is you're looking at. Still, you can imagine what did happen here, if you squint a little.



Here's how the Flagstaff Tower looked right after the Mutiny. I suppose the Ridge was massively defoliated by the conflict, but I'm not really sure. The photo was taken by the enigmatic and fascinating photographer Felice Beato, one of history's first war photographers. His eery and stark photos of the Indian Mutiny are incredible and well worth a look if you've any interest at all in the history of the era.


Sheila, Rajeev, and I went off to have dinner at the Delhi Golf Club. This entailed getting dressed up. The Golf Club is society.

One has to wonder what the enraged sepoys of the Mutiny would have made of the Club. There is no sport, no pursuit, more British then golf after all, no recreational activity so obtusely luxurious. A golf course requires an incredible amount of space to build, after all, and then it also requires an incredible amount of effort to maintain.

But then, look at the clientele. All Indian. They've entirely inhabited the Golf Club, and so the club is an entirely Indian institution. It's not like India hasn't put up some of the world's very finest golfers. This is perhaps the end-game of the British colonization. The British left an inordinate amount of things behind, but Indians took them up, tweaked them a bit, and made them entirely their own. (The English language is perhaps the paramount example of this - Indian English having become a very separate but entirely relevant offshoot of the King's own tongue).

The food at the golf club is quite good. A step up over limp burgers, fries, and beer at most American golf clubs. The bar upstairs is convivial in that British Indian way, and you can sit at little glass tables and watch the football (soccer) game and argue over things, over tandoor items and whatever else pleases you. So we did.



They have a servicable fish tikka...



And very nice roomali roti...



And a damn good bhindi masala. God, I love bhindi masala. Why can't anyone make it right outside India? (Well. Other then me).



Like we did two years ago, Sheila and I took out our drinks, our glasses of whiskey, and looked out over the golf course in the night time. An abandoned and lovely red Lodhi tomb sits on the first hole, and spotlights bathe the greens in a rather ethereal, moonlit light. I remember what she told me last time we were here. "There's cobras on the golf course," she said. "It's a bit of an obstacle."

"What's the rules say about cobras?"

"If your ball comes to rest on one - don't ever pick it up."

Duly noted.

Old Delhi: The Bazaar, Moti Mahal, Lots of Photos

Somewhere in the old delhi bazaar.

Old Delhi is the only place I've been in Asia that really and truly scared me. Old Delhi is the nucleus of Northern India, maybe one of the concentric centers of the earth itself. There's nowhere I've been that comes anywhere near it in terms of the throbbing vitality of it, the terrifying largeness of the people, the activity, the chaos that surrounds it. It's a gross immensity, sort of a vortex - you have to go through it you go to Delhi. It's where the main train station is. It's where Delhi began, and where Delhi was sacked (many times over the years), the seat of Mughal power, the seat of British power, a spiritual touch-point for many people and many generations. But, geography. Old Delhi is generally considered to be defined by the Chandni Chowk, the long street that runs through it, and is made famous by the dual Mughal immensities of the Red Fort and the Jama Masjid.

I remember this very clearly. I'm 19, on my first visit to Delhi. Auntie Sheila has let me use her car and driver for the morning. "You have to see Old Delhi, of course," she tells me, as she packs me into the car that morning. "You have to go walk around the Chandi Chowk." Well, okay, I think, I'll walk around the Chandi Chowk. Having no idea what that entailed.

She set me up. I'm certain of that now. Sheila did it on purpose.


Cushions for sale amid a churning sea of umbrellas. India makes you realize the shocking number of umbrellas our planet harbors. As I have lost upwards of ten umbrellas in three months, I know that of which I speak.

The little Grey ford came out of the green and luxurious embassy district that Sheila lived in, and we turned onto the highway, and we kept going and going. Delhi turned more and more like the India I was most familar with the, chaotic but mostly-conceivable mess of Bangalore. Something I could handle, parse out. Then we got into the Chandi Chowk district, the outskirts of the Center, then we drove down the Chandi Chowk. There were more people there then I could concieve of in the universe, riding bicycles and autorickshaws and horses (yes), all of them wearing differently colored clothes, all of them leaning on their horns at approximately the same time. On either side of me were Delhi's two defining monuments, of course - the shockingly huge red swell of Shah Jahan's Red Fort, and next door, the big mosque, the mosque, the Jama Masjid. People were funneling into the bazaar to the left of the mosque, shoulder-to-shoulder, carrying sacks of things on their shoulders and leading little kids in school uniforms by the hands - every other man or woman seemed to be wearing the requisite garb of the Ramadan season. "I drop you at the clothes market, okay?" the driver said, and I agreed since I didn't know any better. He impossibly threaded the car through stall after stall of men selling fabrics and knock-off North Face jackets.

He ejected me.


The bazaar (a mere iota of it) as seen from the steps.

I was wearing a sundress. I got out, and walked to the steps of the Jama Masjid (about five or six paces). I stood on the steps and looked down them, down to the bazaar and down to the Jama Masjid. Beggars and street kids were already starting to advance on me. Large and odiferous looking vultures picked at the rubbish pile to my right. There were three or four lepers in mats on the sidewalk nearby, and one of them had a little ribbon of white spittle coming out of his mouth, and someone was playing the American Top 40 hits in my ear from a pirated CD stall. I have never felt so astoundingly out of place. Like I had been emitted from an alien spacecraft or something, halting - like my first steps on a new world, testing the ozone for breathability. Finding it somewhat wanting. "You give me change, madame!" a grubby street urchin at my knee said. So it began.


Your friendly neighborhood goat head store.

I survived of course. And wanted to go back soon as I left. Old Delhi does that to you. It scares the shit out of you then makes you want to come back over and over again. There are few places in the world with such an incredible buildup of history, history overlaid upon history, a bazaar and a neighborhood with more stories and more happenings behind it then just about anywhere else on the planet. Ruskin Bond, in one of his books, tells of a mysterious Black Well lurking in one of the closed old haveli houses of Delhi. There are rumors of antiques stores selling things you couldn't obtain for love or money anywhere else. Things people lost all over the place re-apparating in Old Delhi. Probably people, too. I've met a few people on the road who lost a year or two of their lives in this neighborhood. One guy who spent his early twenties playing the black market round about the Delhi of the late 60's. One woman who spends her life as a photojournalist in conflict areas and, insofar as I could determine, comes to Old Delhi for R&R. Tougher then me.

"How'd you like it?" Sheila asked me when I got back. A little smile on her lips. How did I like it? Any response would involve about ten pages and footnotes.

"It was interesting," I said. "Real interesting."

"Uh huh," Sheila said.


The clothes market.

I got out of the taxi this time, and I walked five paces. And then I saw the stick. A bamboo stick, about the length of my forearm I'd guess. Probably some sort of construction site leaving. I picked it up - it was sturdy and strong. Perhaps it is time for a social experiment, I thought. I picked up the stick.

Northern India is tainted by sexual harassment. It's not an easy place to be as a woman - of any nationality - and it's especially hard if you're by yourself. Single women are fair game in Delhi. Single women are probably slatternly and easy, and you should try your luck, because why the hell not? Walking down the street in non-gentrified Delhi usually involves lewd commentary, being followed, and (if you're really lucky) one or two lightening-fast attempts at groping. Far as I can determine, it doesn't really matter what you wear, especially if you're a foreigner. This is the big stain on Delhi, a national shame. Fact is: women can't move about freely here. You are conspicuous, noticed, and to some extent hunted wherever you go. And it pisses you off more and more and more as every day goes by.

And so, the stick. Maybe it was paranoia. Maybe I just wanted some agency. If someone grabbed me or got in my space, I could whomp them on the head in retaliation. Perhaps teach them an important lesson, or something. At least there was the visual deterrent factor. Right? Right.

I don't know if I should be proud or not about the stick. It's a bit of a moral quandary. Especially if you're into non-violence. (I'm not. At all. Just so you know).

The fact is? It worked. The stick absolutely, 100% worked. My usual North India experience as a blonde foreigner was turned on its head, entirely neutralized. A few men came at me with hands outstretched or tongues out and flapping around, shouting "HALLO YOU VERY SEXY YOU WANT FUCK," usual routine - and immediately stepped back in shock when they saw The Stick. "

"Whoa, whoa! Okay!" they'd say, giving me a very respectable amount of space. They'd go off giggling nervously to their buddies, hahah, look at that. Damn, that felt good.

What makes me feel better about The Stick? The fact that just about every woman I met on the street - and there weren't many, this is Delhi - smiled at me. A solidarity thing. "That's right!" one large Sikh woman said, as we passed each other. "That's right," she said. The schoolgirls giggled and offered me sly thumbs-up signs.

A later post here should be devoted to what Indian women go through on a daily basis when it comes to sexual harassment in India, and especially North India. Horror stories. "I know women who move to Delhi from South India," a friend of mine told me. "They get a good job, and they relocate. And you know what? They all come back. Because they can't go anywhere without getting grabbed, or followed. Something. They can't live free lives."

But about the Bazaar. Here, have some photos.



Much of the bazaars commerce centers around meat, and most of that meat is mutton. Butchers are rife here. I like seeing them. I'm a proud carnivore, but I'm also a realist. This is where supper comes from. Bouncing, adorable, delicious sheep and goats.



Getting nailed by a motorbike is a very very real possibility here. Keep your eyes open. There's really nothing you can do about the ground. I suggest not looking down ever.



Piles of aromatic something-or-another on the street. LIke most of India, Old Delhi is as much an olfactory experience as a visual one.



I don't think the legal department got consulted on this one.



These are piles of vermicelli noodles, commonly used in dessert dishes. Sevian is particularly popular. It's made with condensed milk, dried fruits and nuts, and cardamom, and it is delicious.



Yeah, there's something I like about butchers. Butchers have been considered the lowest of the low in most cultures in human history. India's no exception. More so, considering its deep vegetarian tradition and antique caste system. But the meat loving millions would be in dire straits without them. And I find a certain visual poetry in the whole affair. Maybe I'm blood thirsty. Those are, in case you were unsure, goat heads.



A man selling biryani on the street. There's some kind of conversation going on here. What do you think?



Hanging out by the red sandstone walls of the Jama Masjid. I've never been in . There's always something vaguely wrong about my dress. And it seems wrong somehow. A week after I left, five Taiwanese tourists were shot (non-fatally) by a supposed terrorist group at the Jama Masjid's gates. Whatcha gonna do?



More red sandstone. It's a damn hot day, but the walls are coolish.

I had lunch at Moti Mahal. The Moti Mahal. It's an absolutely iconic restaurant, considered to be one of the pioneers of the tandoori cuisine that has so efficiently and quickly swept the entire planet. It's said that the restaurant's founder, a Peshawari by the name of Kundan Lal Gujral, actually invented both tandoori and butter chicken. (Apparently, the tandoor oven was previously reserved only for bread, instead of meats). The restaurant began in Peshawar and was moved to its current Delhi location in 1947, after the Partition - and has been plugging on with shocking success ever since, drawing the affection of Indira Gandhi, Nehru, John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon - in other words, everyone vaguely important who was sent to India on official business has eaten here.

There was no one there, which was somewhat curious. The interior of the restaurant is a bit 1960's mental hospital. But at least they have lots of fans operating on high-speed. I ordered my usual - tandoori chicken, tandoori gobi (cauliflower) and sat back. The owner of the place came over to chat, in lieu of anything better to do. "Did you know that Gordan Ramsey came and cooked here?" he asked me. No, I did not. But so The Ramsey did come to Moti Mahal. Engaged in one of those celebrity cookoff things that are so popular on food networks. Naturally, the Moti Mahal boys won hands down. The owner came over with a few photographs after I expressed interest. "That's us. When we won," he said, pointing to an image of both himself and Ramsey looking pleased with the universe.

The food was, as expected, excellent. Moti is also known for its Mughali style curries. Delhi is particularly known for curries made from mutton "variety" meats - you can order up goat brain curry here if so inclined. There are Moti Mahal outlets all over India now, although a family argument means that this Chandi Chowk branch bills itself as the One and Original Moti Mahal, Hands Down. I'm not prepared to argue.



The tandoori gobi had the interesting addition of sesame seeds up top. I think it does add a certain nutty depth to its flavor. A delicate yogurt marinade and a lot of spices, heavy on the aromatics. Really addictive stuff - and a lot of it. I couldn't finish it all.



And excellent chicken. Not too heavy on the yogurt - actually, I kinda like that. But juicy, excellent meat with a lot of complexity of flavor.



They talked me into ordering roti. However, missi roti are superb. It's a thin crunchy roti prepared with besam or gram flour, seasoned with fenugreek, ginger, nigella, chili powder, ajwain, and sesame. And brushed with an inordinate amount of butter. They are very savory, and incredibly delicious.

After lunch, I was going to go to the Red Fort. Which turned out to be closed.

So I didn't. But I did the next day.

Eating Stuff in the Car in Delhi: Kakori Kebab, Bhel Puri

Delhi, like the rest of India, is a bastion of street food. And the number one Delhi street food is, of course, the almighty kebab. Kebab functions as a catch-all word for a dizzying array of meat products on a stick here in India, but rest assured: whatever it is, it will be incredibly tasty. India being primarily Hindu and Muslim, kebabs are almost always made with mutton or chicken - vegetarian variants with paneer (cheese), potato, and mashed vegetables do exist.

Al Kauser
Off Sarder Patel Marg, near the Assam Bhavan. (Look for the stall with smoke coming off it, and lots of hungry people sitting on their cars. You can't miss it).




Sheila insisted that we try the kakori kebab at Al Kauser one night, and I was of no inclination to defy her. (I am rarely of such an inclination). Sheila, Rajeev, and myself accordingly jumped into the car, wherein Sheila grandly asked the driver to take us to the Kebab Place, and be quick about it. "It's just a stall, of course, but they are simply the most divine kakori kebabs in town. But it's just a stall, really."

(She was looking for an accomplice, in the dark art of Eating In the Car. We both knew it. And I was happy to oblige).

Al Kauser is a bit of a kebab stall institution, beloved by an entire generation of Delhi-ites for its kakori rolls. The kakori kebab roll, for the uninitiated, is made of ultra-finely cut ground lamb, ground to a fine paste and seasoned with garlic, cinnamon, cayenne, cardamon, cumin, and some other tasty aromatics. The result is an incredibly tender kebab that quite literally melts in your mouth, creating a decadently fatty explosion of flavor in one's mouth. As kakori kebabs are delicate things, they are usually served with ultra thin and buttery roomali roti. Traditional condiments are hyperactively spicy cilantro chutney with green chili, and pickled onions. Mix these elements up together and you've got a work of art. Kakori kebab is a foodstuff entirely suited for eating in your car or while standing up - that's the other beauty of them. And did I mention that kakori kebab is cheap?



Al Kauser is best known for its kakori kebab, but they also turn out a popular mutton burra kebab (mutton on the bone with a coating of yogurt and spices). Chicken tikka is on offer for wusses who can't handle mutton, but there's no real reason to bother. (I don't know why people bother with chicken tikka in general). Watching the cooks slap the kakori paste on the table and form it into kebabs at super-human speeds is half the fun. Must not be comfortable to spend all night working in a flaming inferno of a grill stall, but I'm glad they do it. As are a lot of people.

There is something delightful about devouring kakori kebab in the back of a car with a grand dame, dripping cilantro sauce and bits of roomali roti all over the upholstery. Since that is part of the sacred ritual of eating kakori kebab. It must not be abrogated. "God, I do love these!" Sheila commented after we polished off the last batch. She handed me a paper napkin. We both delicately and in a highly lady-like fashion wiped the mutton grease off our mouths. "You have to eat them in the car, darling," she said, as we pulled away. "It can't be done any other way."

Well, I'd concur.



We ended our casual-style dinner at a nearby shopping center, for bhel puri. Sheila has a bhel puri guy there she likes, and the three of us ordered up plates of the good stuff.



A lovely rendition. Plenty of fresh mango and onion, plenty of chutneys. A pleasant overdose of sev and seasonings. Not too dry, not too moist. Crunchier then most. Christ, I love bhel puri.



We adjourned to Haldiram's - one representative of India's ginormous Bengali fast-food chain - to sip on Diet Cokes and watch the locals sink their faces into thalis, samosas, and chaats. Sheila vacillated with the idea of getting some kulfi or some barfi, something like that, but talked herself out of it. "Too fatty," she sighed. "You know that Delhi is in the throes of an obesity epidemic."

Which it is. And we know why.