City Life – Peacock Sighting, Mausam Bhawan & Elsewhere
In search of beauty.
[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi]
Wow, this one’s costume more dazzling than even Rihanna’s oversized hooded camellia covered Valentino cape at the Met Galla red carpet. Conservation architect Ratish Nanda just spotted the super-stylish stunner trespassing outside his office window in Delhi’s picturesque Sunder Nursery. Strutting in such an exquisite golden-blue cape, each strand of the long train sparkling into a separate strand of light.
The trespasser is a peacock, the cape is its long feathery tail shimmering under the noonday sun.
Sunder Nursery is Jamna-paar from Mayur Vihar, which they say is in east Delhi. Mayur Vihar is actually the whole of Delhi, plus Noida, Ghaziabad, and Gurugram. Because mayur, the peacock, is sighted in all these places.
About a month back in Gurgaon, a corporate executive ran into a peacock in DLF Magnolias. The mayur was joyfully showing off its ornate plume on a brick-paved walking track, before dramatically collapsing the plume into a straight narrow tail. A 13-second video was duly tweeted.
Some seasons ago, a similar showstopper sneaked inside the highly secured Mausam Bhawan, the Lodhi Road headquarters of the India Meteorological Department. The intruder walked past the gateway guard with the cockiness of a TV weather forecaster. The next hurdle was a board asking to “Please display your identity card.” See last photo!
Sadly, the best peacock-spotting destination in Delhi region is not accessible to all citizens. New Moti Bagh is a gated enclave for hi-fi government officers. One evening, a mayur naughtily darted along an empty road there, hopped towards a bungalow, and flew up to the roof, landing beside another mayur already there. A third mayur was perched close-by on the roof of a judge sahib’s white bangla, its feathers spread out like a Japani folding fan.
Back in Gurgaon, the lucky muggles living in high-altitude apartments of Golf Course Road often spot peacocks (along with neel gai) in the surrounding wilds. Some of these posh people might also be familiar with the Peacock Bar at ITC Grand Bharat, the Café Peacock in Sector 63, the Peacock Art Gallery in… wait, it shut down some time ago!
Meanwhile, in your next outing to Sunder Nursery gardens, stroll towards the so-called peacock reserve. There you’ll hear very many mayurs crying out in almost human voices “Main hoon! Main hoon! (I am! I am!)”. That’ll be your cue to cry back with “Main bhi hoon! (I am too!)”
Here, there, everywhere Mayur Vihar
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