Home Sweet Home – Michael David’s House, Rue de la Cité Delhi Homes by The Delhi Walla - March 10, 2016March 10, 20160 A piece of the pavement. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] A paperback is lying open beside him. It means that this pavement must be his study. Next to the book is a folded blue sweater. Now, the pavement suddenly looks like his wardrobe. One evening The Delhi Walla meets Michael David at his home on Rue de la Cité in Central Paris. He is without a house but it seems his home is where he is at any given time. At the moment he is seated on a gutter, close to a tree. His possessions are arranged around him. His cap is turned upside down beside him. There are a few coins in the cap. The pedestrians are walking past
Our Self-Written Obituaries – The Little Mynah birdie, Ambience Mall Farewell Notice by The Delhi Walla - March 10, 2016March 10, 20160 The 114th death. [By the Mynah Birdie] The little Mynah birdie, an aviator and a soloist who often sang self-composed impromptu compositions to varied people of Delhi, died on March 8 on the concrete floor at Gurgaon's Ambience mall. The cause was a physical phenomenon called "short circuit", which is the flow of current on the path of least resistance. Apart from singing for the common masses, the birdie liked to display his big ruffled breast feathers to strangers tottering in the mall. Last time it even pecked at a pair of shiny brown patent leather shoes of a Proust-carrying gentleman. According to Pawan Kumar, the bhelpoori vendor near the mall’s gate, the birdie came between two current carrying wires high above
City Landmark – Berkeley Books of Paris, Near San Francisco Book Company Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - March 9, 2016March 9, 20163 The real Berkeley. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The silence is so intense that one’s own thoughts feel like noise. The Delhi Walla is at the Berkeley Books of Paris, one of the best secondhand English language bookstores in the French capital. Berkeley is a minute-long walk away from San Francisco, another absorbing English-language secondhand bookstore. The two landmarks are near the historic Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe in the heart of Paris. Both shops are dangerous—you could spend an entire day in either of them buying scores of books you never thought existed but on spotting them you realized you have been looking for them all your life. But it’s Berkeley with its cool balmy lights, old typewriters and a great reading
City Moment – Evening Bird Over The Barbed Wire, Venice Ghetto Moments by The Delhi Walla - March 8, 2016March 8, 20162 The memorable instant. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The wind is cool. It had rained earlier in the day. Now, some parts of the sky are completely covered with waves of clouds, and other parts are clear. The sun is beginning to leave and the air is drenched in a soft shade of bluish-red, or is it bluish-orange? The symbolic barbed wire installed to commemorate the holocaust seems mournful, as always. It is evening and The Delhi Walla is at Campo del Ghetto Novo, the bigger of the two squares of the ancient Jewish district in Venice. The two tall trees are looking watchful and the centuries-old buildings are looking tired. The world’s first ghetto is observing its 500th anniversary
City Food – Youssef Safwat’s Pizzeria, Venice Ghetto Food by The Delhi Walla - March 7, 2016March 7, 20160 Pizza from Cairo. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Places are as shifty as time. The ancient Jewish district of Venice is no longer a ghetto. It still has its old synagogues but today it is home only to a few Venetian Jews, who are now dispersed across this fish-shaped city. On its 500th year, the world's first ghetto has expanded to absorb a diverse diaspora of a different kind. One such face of the ghetto is Youssef Safwat, the Cairo-born owner of the enormously popular restaurant-pizzeria Al Faro. Its name means 'light house' in Italian, and it faces the office of the Jewish Community of Venice Tourist Information. The pizzeria staff includes Muslim Bangladeshis and Christian Moldovians. Mr Safwat is so
City Landmark – Libreria Alef, Bookshop, Venice Ghetto Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - March 6, 2016March 6, 20161 Italy's unique bookshop. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It was very curious. The other day the Italian Jewish newspaper Pagine Ebraiche ran a special issue on the 500th anniversary of Venice's ancient Jewish district, the world's first ghetto. The 12-page supplement had no mention of Libreria Alef. The bookshop's staffers were disappointed yet again. Opened in 2006, the important landmark is almost never mentioned in any newspaper feature on the ghetto. This is puzzling because Libreria Alef is the only bookstore in Italy devoted exclusively to Judaism, which means that it stocks books written for or by the Jews--this explains the high visibility of Woody Allen in the shelves. According to bookstore’s manager, Ugo Casarin, Rome used to have a Jewish bookshop,
City Faith – Angelo Grossi’s Churches, Venice Faith by The Delhi Walla - March 5, 2016March 5, 20162 Looking for the cross. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He always walks with his hand on his heart. Angelo Grossi believes in what he calls Proustianity, but still, he attends the evening mass every Sunday at San Giacomo dall'Orio, which--to him--is the most Proustian church in Venice (see photo no. 12). He feels its outer wall has the colour of sunset. The Delhi Walla meets this PhD student of American literature one morning at an appointed spot in this watery city. In his 20s, this Marcel Proust devotee is from the Southern Italian town of Putignano but has been living in Venice since 2007. Mr Grossi spent the entire day showing me his most beloved churches in this city of churches. He
City Secret – The Hero Around The Corner, Venice Ghetto General by The Delhi Walla - March 4, 2016March 4, 20160 The closet Arlecchino. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Its small size does not match its great historical importance, as is the case with the city in which it is situated. The ancient Jewish district of Venice consists of a few narrow streets, not more than half a dozen bridges and just two squares. But that’s of no concern. The world’s first ghetto gave the world the word ‘ghetto’. And this year it is observing its 500th anniversary. Today, the Venice Ghetto is no longer a ghetto. Most residents are Catholics--including the guides to the area’s five synagogues--while the Venetian Jews are scattered across the city; no longer they have to live within confined quarters. This makes the ghetto just another
City Library – Renato Maestro’s Books, Venice Ghetto Library by The Delhi Walla - March 3, 2016March 4, 20161 A vanishing world. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Thick yellowing pages sewed within leather-bound volumes. Ancient threads escaping out of cracked spines. Centuries-old letters tucked inside spotlessly white envelopes. Bundles of very old newspapers. And boxes after boxes marked 'Fragile'. This is a world of Judaism that lies safe behind the bullet-proof windows of Renato Maestro Library and Archive--the building lies almost unseen in one corner of the Jewish district of Venice. The world's first ghetto is observing its 500th anniversary this year. The Delhi Walla recently spent a long afternoon in the library, randomly taking out these old books from their metal shelves, feeling their heavy weight, turning over their antique pages and moving the eager fingers over Hebrew characters that
City Notice – ‘Somewhere in Delhi’ Exhibition, Second Show in Venice General by The Delhi Walla - March 2, 2016March 2, 20162 Facebook on khadi. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It was a curious show. Instead of being decked up on walls, the art works were laid down on the floor. The Delhi Walla attended the second viewing of Somewhere in Delhi: 17 Printings on Hand-Woven Khadi Muslin in Venice. The venue, M9, is an ambitious work-in-progress space that is being billed as the ‘Museum of the 20th Century Venice’. (The first viewing of the art works was held in an outlying island of this watery city. I wrote about it here.) Somewhere in Delhi is a collaboration between Venetian designer Anna Gerotto and Delhi blogger Mayank Austen Soofi. Since 2009, the aforementioned blogger has been telling the story of a complicated city of