City Food – Raj Kumar’s Jal Jeera Drink, Sadar Bazar Food by The Delhi Walla - February 13, 20210 Season's flavour. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Everything changes. Winter too is changing to summer. But “the dukh (grief) inside you doesn’t dim, even though you start smiling again,” observes aloo tikki vendor Raj Kumar. His eldest son, Bobby, died early last year, and today “I’m growing old living with the loss of our eldest child... my wife cries on hearing his name, and then my sadness returns, as if Bobby left us just yesterday.” His wife, Mithilesh, is at their home in Gurgaon’s “Gully No. 7, Rajiv Nagar” in the Greater Delhi Region. Now, one correction. Raj Kumar is no longer selling aloo tikki. His long-time stall in the town’s Sadar Bazaar shifted to jal jeera drink yesterday. It’s an
City Landmark – Rachna Book House, SDA Market Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - February 12, 20210 Mom-and-pop. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The small stationery shop is noticeable because it also sells magazines, an increasingly endangered sight in these days of online reading. Then, you notice shelves decked with greeting cards, an increasingly endangered sight in these days of social media greetings. Then, you notice a row of DVDs... what’s that?! And then all these sights are trumped by the sight of the owners, sitting by the counter. The elderly couple running the Rachna Book House look totally devoted to each other. Clad in a grey cardigan, with a bindi on her forehead as tiny as a dot, Kanta Oberoi turns towards her husband, Tilak Raj, declaring that the long-time establishment is a consequence of his earnestness
City Hangout – Hyperlocal Notepads, Daryaganj Hangouts by The Delhi Walla - February 9, 20210 Being elegantly pretentious. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Spending the afternoon in a cool cafe and being seen with a sleek laptop, or better still, with one of those elegant writing pads, is certainly the most sophisticated kind of show-off. Indeed, all hipsters (and aspiring writers) are occasionally spotted jotting on imported notebooks that cost a bomb. But a truly hip human is one who believes in sourcing hyperlocally. That’s why you have to try out these writing pads sold in a handful of used bookstores of central Delhi’s Daryaganj. The shopkeepers say that the notebooks are made in tiny printing workshops, buried deep within the Walled City’s neighbourhoods, especially in the cramped lanes around the Turkman Gate. Irrespective of their origins,
City Walk – Taak Sightings, Roshanpura, Gurgaon Walks by The Delhi Walla - February 8, 20210 Finding old souvenirs. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] If you look closely, you can find taaks in at least some houses of New Delhi villages—these disappearing arch-shaped niches built into walls. Traditionally meant as alcoves to keep sacred objects, they can also be sighted in some Old Delhi residences. And yes, while Gurgaon in the Greater Delhi Region is referred to as the Millennium City, it has its share of taaks. Some can be seen in the pre-millennial neighbourhoods tucked around the town’s bus stand. There was a time when taaks were as integral to a household as a fridge or a toaster to a modern-day one. Prayer beads or perhaps a holy book would be kept in these niches,
City Landmark – Ordinary Village Well, Chirag Dehli Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - February 8, 20210 An ordinary wonder. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The city has a village. The village has a square. The square has a well. Delhi is well-known for its centuries old step-wells, or baolis. But in the Capital it is a rare thing to chance upon an average well, without picturesque stone steps—a well that resembles those thousands of other wells spread all over the country, in as many villages. The Capital itself has hundreds of villages within its limits, but who amid us ever bumped into a well in, say, fashionable Hauz Khas Village? But here in south Delhi’s historic Chirag Dehli village, an entire square is devoted to a well. Alas, nobody uses it any more in our era of running
City Monument – General Shah Nawaz Khan’s Grave, Old Delhi Monuments by The Delhi Walla - February 6, 20210 Hero resting here. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Among those who care for graves of historical people, it is common knowledge that the shrine of Sufi saint Hazrat Sarmad Shahid lies between the Jama Masjid and the Red Fort in Old Delhi. Some might even know that the grave of freedom fighter Maulana Abul Kalam Azad lies between these two monuments as well. But very few will be aware that the area is also home to the grave of General Shah Nawaz Khan. Born in 1914 in Rawalpindi, he served in the Indian National Army (INA) under the leadership of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose during WW2, and was famously convicted for treason in 1945 by the British in the Red
Julia Child in Delhi – Susanna Di Cosimo’s Sarson da Pizza, Gurgaon Julia Child's Delhi by The Delhi Walla - February 3, 20210 The great chef’s life in Delhi. [Text and pictures by Mayank Austen Soofi] She has married thrice—to the same man. Susanna Di Cosimo, 42, came to visit our motherland from her Italy in 2011, and two years later settled in Lajpat Nagar. In 2016 she got hitched to her Indian sweetheart (at a court, Hindu, and Christian wedding), and now enjoys a happy existence in a 13th floor apartment in Gurugram’s Sector 49, with husband, Gaurav, mother-in-law, Indira, daughter, Anaaya, and housekeeper, Masudha. With a cheeriness that’s infectious over this Whatsapp video chat, Ms Di Cosimo says she started baking Italian breads during the coronavirus-triggered lockdown last year when she found herself idle as a tour operator. “I would exchange my breads for
Home Sweet Home – A Mansion for Labourers, Mohalla Qabristan Delhi Homes by The Delhi Walla - February 3, 20210 Old house, new home. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It looks like a museum. Nothing like this old-fashioned balcony exists anywhere else in the immediate vicinity. What is it like to actually live in this building? It turns out that this elegant Walled City mansion is a rent-free home to a dozen labourers. They work for a construction material supplier who sits in the shop below, here in Mohalla Qabristan neighbourhood. The building belongs to him. “It’s at least a hundred year old, but our family moved to a bigger house, nearby, a long time ago,” he says. The entry is dramatic. The steep unlit staircase abruptly opens into a tiny, cluttered courtyard. It doesn’t feel like the same building — that from the
Mission Delhi – Monty, Roshan Pura Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - February 2, 20210 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] His face is invisible. Even his black mask cannot be seen because of the tall tower of pink cotton candies—each wrapped in a separate plastic—that he is holding in his left arm. Monty must be a teenager, though it is difficult to guess his age — the mask prevents it, and he won’t tell. He initially laughs to all the queries put to him, while hawking his candies here in Gurgaon’s Roshan Pura in the Greater Delhi Region. It’s only after moving a few meters away, into a quiet and almost uninhabited side-lane where he plans to sneak a quick break, that he starts to talk. “Once
City Monument – Ruined Graves, Lodhi Garden Monuments by The Delhi Walla - February 1, 20210 Links to past. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Squirrels, a great many of them, are prancing about the dusty stone slabs. Water pitchers—probably kept for birds—are reflecting the cold cloudy sky. Dry leaves litter the ground. And there’s some stirring within the thick bush. Maybe some more squirrels, one thinks, and hopefully not snakes. This is a little graveyard in Lodhi Garden, so secretively situated, so invisible amid this screen of trees, that it is barely noticed. Actually, there is a chance that it has never been clicked, in this otherwise extensively photographed public park of central Delhi. It has three graves; the third one is so disintegrated that it is but a pile of stone chunks. This afternoon, the tiny plot