City Walk – Babar Road, Central Delhi Walks by The Delhi Walla - January 15, 2022January 16, 20220 Into a bubble. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The tree is tall, wide and choked with green leaves. You can spend a long time surveying its immense proportions consisting of dozens of branches. The tree gets even more elaborate because it is casting a shadow equally huge on a building’s long wall that runs along a path. Some leaves tremble with a sudden breeze. So do the shadows of those leaves. But this is just one tree. Babar Road has a multitude of trees with similarly magnificent canopies. The avenue is in Delhi’s heart, but feels far from the metropolis, as if it were the suburb of a suburb. So detached. Full of birds twittering. The muffled roar of passing autos
City Hangout – Tintin in Delhi, Around Town Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - January 14, 20220 Travails in India. [By Mayank Austen Soofi; the above photo was taken in Calcutta] Delhi has been visited by many world famous celebs. The Beatles bought a sitar in Connaught Place. Gabriel García Márquez browsed for books in Khan Market. Queen Elizabeth II spoke from Ramlila Maidan. Che Guevara stayed at the Ashoka. Ricky Martin performed in Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. Margaret Atwood met fans at the Stein Auditorium in India Habitat Centre. And Tintin… yes, he too hung out in our city — and his presence lingers across NCR. There’s a Tintin cake shop in Gurgaon’s Sector 23 A, a Tintin crockery store in Faridabad’s Jawahar Colony, a Tintin cosmetic shop in Ghaziabad’s Indirapuram, and a Tintin food delivery service in Delhi’s
City Hangout – Sunday Book Bazar, Mahila Haat Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - January 12, 20220 Good old wine in new bottle. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The Sunday Book Bazar was closed — no thanks, Omicron! Whenever the pandemic situation eases, you have to visit the book bazar. For decades the weekly market for used books unfolded along the pavement of Daryaganj. Its long run abruptly ended in 2019 after the Delhi high court declared the area a no-hawking zone. Much chest beating followed. The bazar was relocated weeks later to nearby Mahila Haat exhibition ground. The new location intensified the feeling of loss. In the old bazar, you covered a mile by walking from one stall to another, with books laid out on the pavement. In Mahila Haat, you have to move in circles in
City Landmark – Peepal Tree, Hazrat Nizamuddin Railway Station Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - January 10, 20220 Beyond train watching. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is an old city with many katras and kuchas. Each kucha has many gallis. Each galli has many havelis and homes. And each home is as intricate as any old city with its own domestic katras and kuchas. Such is the comprehensiveness of this peepal tree. A giant landmark standing on platform No. 1 of central Delhi’s Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station, the peepal is without doubt the grandest sight at the rail terminus. It is taller than Route Relay Cabin, the three-storey concrete edifice that soars just behind it. In fact, the building’s staircase runs perpendicular to the tree, as if it were expressly built to mount the tall leafy giant. The tree
City Landmark – Old Building, Sadar Bazar, Gurgaon Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - January 8, 20220 The lost world. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The street is teeming with market people. The street-side is taken over by two tailors. They are mending torn suitcases. More of such damaged suitcases are piled up behind them. But who will mend the damaged building (see photo) further behind? On a closer survey, the building turns out to be as haunting as a lost world. Staircases are going up to rooms that no longer exist. The cobwebbed niches on the walls joyfully stare into the air, like an eternal grin of skulls. Some parts of the house appear to be made of lakhori bricks, the building material of yesteryear. This ruin is in Gurgaon in the Greater Delhi Region, considered to be
City Hangout – Bird Watching, Connaught Place Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - January 8, 2022January 8, 20221 The N Block flights. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is late morning. The N Block sky over Connaught Place is blue and sunny. The icy air is echoing with the peep-peep of traffic horns. Most of the pedestrians are walking down CP’s tunnel-like corridors with eyes firmly fixed on their mobile phones. Suddenly, a different kind of sound makes it to this placid world. As if it were a great fluttering of many feathers. Indeed, up in the sky, a huge dark cloud has surfaced — of pigeons flying along an imaginary arch. The birds soar above the busy road. After some moments, they retrace that arch, as if somebody abruptly ordered them to return along the same track. The
City Food – Butter Chhole Kulche, Outside Humayun’s Tomb Food by The Delhi Walla - January 6, 2022January 6, 20220 Delhi's best chhole kulche. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The whole world comes to see Humayun’s Tomb. The monument must be beautiful. You ought to head to Humayun’s Tomb for another beautiful reason, too. Just outside the gate is an eight-year-old snack stall that sells one of Delhi’s best chhole kulche (with butter). The crowd around Mr Jasbeer’s modest establishment this afternoon attests to the deliciousness of his signature delicacy. A family of sightseers who just emerged out of the monument are eagerly standing around the stall. The entire enterprise is mounted on a bicycle. The stove to heat the kulchas, as well as the giant brass cauldron filled with the pre-cooked chhole, are placed on a wooden case that is
City Life – Theatre Stage, Mandi House Roundabout Life by The Delhi Walla - January 6, 20220 A play ground. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] They all are speaking at the same time, speaking over each other, and so uninhibitedly and loudly that you will fear their lungs might explode any moment. Actually, these six young men are reading. They are reading aloud, randomly, from whatever they happen to be holding in their hands — which is either a newspaper or a book. Four of these men are sitting in a circle on the trimmed grass, here in this landscaped roundabout in central Delhi’s Mandi House. Another man is perched some steps away, as if diligently following the pandemic-era dictum of physical distancing. And the last man in the group is standing close to the busy road -
Mission Delhi – Sikander Nath, New Railway Road Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - January 3, 2022January 3, 20220 One of the one percent in 13 million. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] The man in the black hat is walking silently along the roadside, and yet he is attracting a great amount of notice. Heads are turning towards him almost instinctively. May be it is the peculiarity of his walking style. His arms, legs, and neck are moving jerkily in short mechanical movements. While the cane in his hand appears to have a life of its own—at one moment whirring into a blur, then slowing down, and picking up velocity yet again. The man’s painted face is frozen into a wide smile. Sikander Nath is a joker—that is the word he uses to describe himself. “My business is to make public laugh…