City Moment – Portrait of a Marriage, Mandir Marg Moments by The Delhi Walla - January 30, 2012January 30, 20125 The beautiful Delhi instant. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] One sunny noon The Delhi Walla saw a bride and a groom at a temple in Mandir Marg, Central Delhi. The couple was in the temple's lawn, along with a few relatives and a priest. They were sitting under a canopy made of pink and yellow silk. It was decorated with flowers. The priest was reciting Vedic verses. A large fruit basket was placed beside a platter of uncooked rice. After offering an apple to the gods, the couple got up and exchanged rose-and-chameli garlands. The relatives clapped. The couple posed for photos. It was a beautiful moment. Do as the priest says The venue view Adam, eve and the apple The garland scene Remember this
City Reading – The Delhi Proustians – VI, Indian Coffee House Delhi Proustians by The Delhi Walla - January 29, 2012April 17, 20136 A la recherche du temps perdu. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Today is the sixth meeting of The Delhi Proustians, a club for Delhiwallas that discusses French novelist Marcel Proust. Every Sunday noon for an hour we read his masterpiece, In Search of Lost Time. Now, an announcement: the reading will take place in the coffee house every Monday - and not Sunday. Time: 7 pm. Why? Because Marcel should not affect our shopping excursion each week at the Sunday book bazaar in Daryaganj, the best place in Delhi to get second-hand books. Meanwhile it is 12.18 pm and The Delhi Walla is alone with Marcel, re-reading a passage that makes Proust one of the most evocative food writers of all times.
The Delhi Walla Books – Now in Japan The Delhi Walla books by The Delhi Walla - January 27, 2012January 27, 20129 Delhi to Tokyo [By Mayank Austen Soofi] The four-volume The Delhi Walla series have become a constant fixture in Delhi’s bookstores. Being its author and photographer, I like to believe that they are considered as a serious attempt to interpret the city. So, it’s very hurtful when some people I know dismiss the volumes by casually referring to them as ‘booklets’. Once, a friend of a friend called them ‘pamphlets’. Therefore I was pleasantly surprised when one The Delhi Walla reader pointed out that a Tokyo-based style magazine called Pen has mentioned my booklets on its pages. It’s just a few lines, but look at my smile(!) However, I cannot determine if Pen has written good things or bad things about The Delhi Walla
City Food – Gular Leaves, Around Town Food by The Delhi Walla - January 25, 2012January 25, 20123 The secret of the mutton. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] If you love mutton curry, you cannot ignore gular. The leaves of this tree are the food of goats. Gular, the common fig (Ficus carica) native to West Asia, is cultivated in North India. Delhi gets its supply from the farmlands of western Uttar Pradesh. The truck carrying gular leaves from Bulandshahar arrives in Delhi shortly after midnight. It stops at the traffic light outside Turkman Gate, one of the four surviving Mughal-era gateways leading to the walled city of Shahjahanabad. The waiting traders crowd around the truck; the leaves are priced at 700 Rs for a quintal and sold on for 10 Rs per keg. Most gular leaf stalls
Mission Delhi – Savitha Sastry, Greater Kailash I Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - January 23, 2012January 23, 20124 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Wearing a flamenco skirt, she enters the practice room at her apartment in south Delhi’s Greater Kailash I, and breaks into the classical movements of Bharatanatyam. Like most artistes, dancer Savitha Sastry believes she is different. Preparing for her new production, Soul Cages, Ms Sastry, 42, tells The Delhi Walla, “Unlike most Bharatanatyam performances, mine will have no romance and no yearning for Krishna or any other god, and trust me, you won’t miss anything.” The classical dance of Tamil Nadu, Bharatanatyam used to be presented by devdasis, the temple courtesans, who seamlessly entwined spirituality with the erotic. In the 19th century, when morality acquired new meanings, the fall
City Reading – The Delhi Proustians – V, Indian Coffee House General by The Delhi Walla - January 21, 2012January 21, 20129 A la recherche du temps perdu. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Today is the fifth meeting of The Delhi Proustians, a club for Delhiwallas that discusses French novelist Marcel Proust. Every Sunday noon for an hour we read his masterpiece, In Search of Lost Time. Since it was Chehlum on Sunday, the club’s fifth meeting was moved to Monday evening. It is 7.08 pm and The Delhi Walla is with Jonas Moses, a French man living in the city. The crowded coffee house is stinking of piss. A man at the door is hesitantly looking towards me. Is he a fellow Proustian? He is entering the men's loo. “The club hasn’t expanded yet,” says Mr Moses, who has become a regular. Pointing
City Special – Arundhati Roy in Bombay General by The Delhi Walla - January 20, 20124 The Delhi-based author on India's richest house. [Photo by Uttam Ghosh] Is it a house or a home? A temple to the new India, or a warehouse for its ghosts? Ever since Antilla arrived on Altamount Road in Mumbai, exuding mystery and quiet menace, things have not been the same. “Here we are,” the friend who took me there said, “pay your respects to our new ruler.” Antilla belongs to India’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani. I’d read about this, the most expensive dwelling ever built, the 27 floors, three helipads, nine lifts, hanging gardens, ballrooms, weather rooms, gymnasiums, six floors of parking, and the 600 servants. Nothing had prepared me for the vertical lawn – a soaring wall of grass attached to a
City Life – Home Sweet Home, Mathura Road Delhi Homes by The Delhi Walla - January 18, 2012September 29, 20153 Inside the walls. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] One cold evening The Delhi Walla met the 80-year-old Manikchand, a retired rag-picker. He stays alone. The entrance of his one-room shelter faces the busy Mathura Road. In a pinkish-red dressing-gown, Mr Manikchand was lying on the floor. His bed was made up of three layers of sheets: plastic, jute and cotton. A part of the floor was covered with urine stains. A mustard-green pillow was placed near a pile of bricks. The walls had broken in places. The rays of the evening sun fell on Mr Manikchand’s face lighting up his eyes. “I can’t see,” he said. “Do you have anything to eat?” I went to a neighboring bazaar and got kebabs and parathas. “I’ll
City Faith – Chehlum Procession, Matia Mahal Faith by The Delhi Walla - January 16, 2012January 16, 20121 End of a mourning. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Today is chehlum, the ceremony commemorating the 40th day after the death anniversary of the Prophet Muhammed’s grandson Imam Husain Ibn Ali. Centuries ago, he and his 72 followers sacrificed their lives for truth and honor in a battle at Karbala, in modern-day Iraq. Dressed in black, the Shiite Muslims, the followers of Imam Husain, have gathered in Matia Mahal Bazaar, Shahjahanabad, to mark a closure to the traditional 40-day maatam (mourning). The Shiite and Sunnis are two major sects of Islam. The Sunnis form the majority. Walking towards the Mughal-era Jama Masjid, the Shiite men are thumping their seenas (chests) and reciting marsiya, the poetic lamentations. The Shiite women are
The Biographical Dictionary of Delhi – Homai Vyarawalla, b. Navsari, Gujarat, 1913-2012 Biographical Dictionary by The Delhi Walla - January 15, 2012January 16, 20120 The definitive directory of famous Delhiites. [Text by Mayank Austen Soofi; pictures shared by Alkazi Collection of Photography] Like most of today’s generation, you must have been introduced to her photographs in history textbooks. Homai Vyarawalla, 97, originally a Bombay photographer, captured some of Delhi’s greatest 20th century moments. She worked for journals, such as Current, Onlooker, Bombay Chronicle, The Illustrated Weekly of India and Time Life. The Parsi photographer produced her most memoreable work when she was living in Connaught Place (CP), Delhi’s central business district, during the 1940s and the later decades. The residences used to be on the first floors of the Inner Circle corridors. She called the circular colonnade a “pearl necklace”. In a photograph of the Inner