City Walk – A Lane in Jacoobpura, Gurgaon Walks by The Delhi Walla - August 31, 20190 Another country. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] This is a sudden dive into peacefulness. As if you have not entered into a mere lane but a region of light and void and silence. The very air feels on snooze mode making you wonder if the clock too has slowed. The main road slicing through the Furniture Market in Gurgaon’s Jacobpura is blessed with a harmonious flow of pedestrians, scooters and rickshaws. This afternoon it is marooned in a padding of cosy clatter. The unnamed lane lies on this road so discreetly that its opening is barely noticeable to a passerby. This afternoon the lane is lying resignedly like a meditative prisoner in solitary confinement. It terminates into a cul-de-sac after a distance
City Moment – The Henna Couple, Central Delhi Moments by The Delhi Walla - August 31, 20190 The memorable instant. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Oblivious to the evening rush hour, Rekha is applying henna on Bhagwan Das’ hand on a central Delhi pavement, her eyes barely blinking. Mr Das is lying slumped across the ground, as if it were his bed, fanning himself and his wife with a hand-held punkah (fan). Rekha’s hands are already decked up with the dye in a roughly drawn floral design, though she still has to wash off the paste. “The longer you keep the paste, the stronger the colours will be” she says. Although Rekha is in her late 40s and Mr Das in his mid 50s, they have been living together as a married couple for eight years only. “My first wife
Atget’s Corner – 1126-1130, Delhi Photos Delhi Pics by The Delhi Walla - August 31, 20190 The visible city. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] Delhi is a voyeur’s paradise and The Delhi Walla also makes pictures. I take photos of people, streets, flowers, eateries, drawing rooms, tombs, landscapes, buses, colleges, Sufi shrines, trees, animals, autos, libraries, birds, courtyards, kitchens and old buildings. My archive of more than 1,00,000 photos showcases Delhi’s ongoing evolution. Five randomly picked pictures from this collection are regularly put up on the pages of this website. The series is named in the memory of French artist Eugène Atget (1857-1927), who, in the words of a biographer, was an “obsessed photographer determined to document every corner of Paris before it disappeared under the assault of modern improvements.” Here are Delhi photos numbered 1126 to 1130. 1126. When Life’s a Lemon 1127.
City Moment – A Letter Writer’s World, Somewhere in Delhi Moments by The Delhi Walla - August 29, 2019August 29, 20190 The memorable instant. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The setting is too picturesque. Here’s a centuries-old monument, an unknown grave in a shabby lawn, a cluster of pink bougainvillaeas, a couple of stray cats, and a man writing on a sheet of paper. It’s not extraordinary to see people writing in a public place. Just step inside any Khan Market cafe and you would inevitably spot a few consumers immersed in their MacBooks. But somebody writing with hand is a rare sighting indeed. And Abdul, as the gentleman introduces himself, is penning a letter to a friend. “I have filled three pages but I might use up some more.” Not willing to share the letter’s content, Abdul reveals that “I live alone but have
Mission Delhi – Ram Krishen Das, Central Delhi Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - August 28, 20190 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] His is the simple life. This sage survives on fruit and rotis—and has been living in a bamboo scaffolding within a temple for more than 40 years. Known as Machan Wale Baba or “the machan’s sage”, devotees regularly turn up at the central Delhi temple, sitting on the floor in contemplation or awe. His 65-year-old kind face glows with so much wisdom attained over the years that some would think he was born that way. But of course, the Machan Wale Baba had a childhood and a real name—Ram Krishen Das. Very polite and soft-spoken, Mr Das declines to talk about his parents. “That part of my life is
City Hangout – Secondhand Bookshelf, Quill And Canvas, South Point Mall Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - August 28, 20190 Books with a background. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is true. The neighbour’s drawing room shelves do reveal a glimpse of their private life. That’s why it’s so tantalising to browse about the secondhand books stacked at Quill And Canvas. The shop in Gurgaon’s South Point mall in the Greater Delhi Region blends an art gallery with a bookstore. The solo shelf containing secondhand books stands at the back of the showroom whose bookstore portion primarily consists of firsthand books. This afternoon the sunshine is falling on the used books rack through a glass window, lighting it up into a kind of halo. Shop owner Shobha Sengupta is a polite woman, but extremely guarded about her secondhand section and is reluctant
City Food – Chankaya’s Momos, Central Delhi Food by The Delhi Walla - August 27, 2019August 27, 20191 Proustian experience. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Generations of Delhi people grew up with the magic experience of the old Chanakya movie theatre. If you were very lucky you just could even manage to obtain a front-stall ticket for 10 rupees. Those halcyon single-screen days of subsidised tickets are long gone, while the beloved theatre in central Delhi that came up in 1970 was demolished in 2007. Ten years later, a sleek multiplex was built where an earlier tradition still survives: You can still eat those delicious momos at one of the adjacent eateries. These stalls look shabby but their momos are marvellous. Try the steamed dumplings at China Town, one of the oldest shacks, founded in 1986. The vegetable momos are
Home Sweet Home – House of Shadows, Lodhi Road Delhi Homes by The Delhi Walla - August 27, 20190 Monsoon dwelling. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It’s hardly more than a lean-to. But the recent addition of an awning means the world for the little family. “We recently got that awning from a tea stall owner,” explains Irfan. He’s a ragpicker who lives under the new roof with his wife and little son, here on Lodhi Road. One disadvantage: the shadows of tree leaves thrown on the yellow plastic cover at night by the nearby streetlight frighten their child. “He thinks they are animals, and starts to cry,” says Irfan. “We have to then distract him with toffee or cheeni-chawal.” Indeed, at this late hour, the plastic surface looks strangely magical as the slight breeze causes the leaves, and hence their shadows,
City Faith – Sufi’s Tree, Old Delhi Faith by The Delhi Walla - August 26, 2019August 26, 20191 Sacred greens. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] In the beginning there was the tree. It must be so. The neem is the first thing you see while walking to the twin Sufi shrines of Hazrat Sarmad Shahid and Hazrat Hare Bhare Shah in Old Delhi, situated on the footsteps of the Mughal-era Jama Masjid. The area was a wilderness before the Walled City was built as his new capital by emperor Shah Jahan. Jama Masjid was raised on a hillock. Many trees must have been uprooted to create the new city from scratch. Somehow this one, and a handful of others in the vicinity, have survived—or so says the shrine’s rose seller, Shamsuddin, who claims that the tree at the dargah is more
Mission Delhi – Geeta Rani, Sadar Bazaar, Gurgaon Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - August 26, 2019August 26, 20190 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It is so simple to sell household appliances in the bazaar. But it hasn’t been all that easy for Geeta Rani. The 50-year-old stall owner in Gurgaon’s Sadar Bazaar in the Greater Delhi Region has sloughed through her share of trials and challenges. “In the beginning, I would feel very odd sitting here,” says Ms Rani on a cloudy afternoon, perched on a wooden chair, her arms resting on her cash box. The lady’s cart is filled up with door locks, vegetable graters, kitchen knives, shoulder bags and many other everyday objects that make up one’s homely possessions. Ms Rani’s shop was founded 50 years ago earlier by