City Hangout – Blue Chai, Kale Tea Stall Food Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - November 2, 20230 The street of the tailor's needle. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Winter in, blue out. Neela aasman kho gaya—the blue sky is lost. Soon the air above Delhi will be all grey, dusty, smoggy, cold. Indeed, in our polluted city, every bit of blue colour can be experienced as a testament to what we do not have most of the year. Searching for distinguished shades of blue then becomes a homage to our expired blue sky. The color certainly isn’t elusive; the capital’s road signs share a dark blue background. But it is harder to find places where the blue gets to be the dominant character. No, it cannot be Humayun Tomb’s gracious Neela Gumbad monument, its neela is too
Mission Delhi – Monu, Somewhere in Delhi Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - November 2, 20230 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] This sight, so rare. A citizen not holding the customary mobile, but a book. Monu is reading, while awaiting his rickshaw’s next customer. So it had seemed a moment back. He is actually recovering from a knee fracture. This afternoon, he is perched on the rickshaw’s passenger seat. “I cannot ride my rickshaw for some days,” he says matter-of-factly, closing the paperback in hand, using his finger as a substitute bookmark. A time was when Monu, a compulsive reader, preferred fiction over non-fiction. “I would read lots of novels, especially of Premchand ji and Reema Bharti ji.” Each time he mentions a writer, he suffixes the name with the respectful