City Monument – Bloomsday 2024, Martello Tower General Monuments by The Delhi Walla - June 15, 20240 Bloomdsday Mubarak. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] One evening, two nattily suited men climb a steep cobbled slope to reach a lesser-known Delhi monument. Each of them has a copy of James Joyce’s 1922 novel Ulysses, a classic of modern literature. The duo is here to mark — in advance — the date celebrated worldwide as Bloomsday, named after Leopold Bloom, the novel’s protagonist. June 16, 2024, is the 120th anniversary of Bloomsday; this is the date on which the novel’s story, set in 1904, unfolds. Ambassador of Ireland Kevin Kelly and Deputy Ambassador Raymond Mullen have now climbed the Martello Tower at Old Delhi’s Ansari Road. This monument has a namesake cousin in Dublin, Ireland. That Martello Tower in the
City Street – Gali Surkh Poshan, Old Delhi Regions Walks by The Delhi Walla - June 15, 20240 Red lane. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The fakeer’s deep-throated singing voice is wafting probingly along the weathered walls of the narrow cul-de-sac. The other much younger fakeer is silent, holding a small polythene thaila filled with surkh-red tomatoes. Both men are attired in white. Gali Surkh Poshan must have its share of dwellers, but nobody else can be seen this afternoon. No matter, the fakeer continues to sing with feeling. Dur hoon Medine se, Aur isliye udasi hain. (Being far from Medina, Is the cause for sadness.) Meanwhile, it is unbearably hot, but it is so outside the lane, where the lane merges into the open expanse of Gali Choori Walan. Within the cramped Surkh Poshan, it is like being in cool
Mission Delhi – Mukul, Jumna Paar Mission Delhi by The Delhi Walla - June 13, 20240 One of the one percent in 13 million. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Can fiction save a life? It did for a young “jumna paar” poet and music student in east Delhi’s Mayur Vihar Phase 3. Mukul is one of those rare Delhiwale who have read “cover-to-cover” a book universally acknowledged to be among literature’s most difficult novels—James Joyce’s Ulysses. As the world prepares to celebrate the annual Bloomsday on 16th June, the date in which the great 1922 novel is set (Leopold Bloom of Dublin being the novel’s hero),this devoted Delhi Joycean gets frank on his relationship with Ulysses. How was your first encounter with the novel? It was post the monsoon of 2019. I had just quit my
City Monument – Christian Cemetery, Prithviraj Road Monuments by The Delhi Walla - June 11, 20240 For loved ones, from loved ones. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The gravestones are burning hot, this June afternoon. Strolling in a city graveyard and gazing at the inscriptions on graves is like browsing through a book of prose-poems. Each offering is brief but permeated with lasting sadness. Here is a sample of the very many engraved sentiments commemorating the Delhiwale who have become one with the earth at the Christian Cemetery in Prithviraj Road. Each body of inscribed lines is identified with the person it memorialises. I loved you more than everyone, let death not part us. —Aman Anthony Choudhary Dearest “Shona”, who left us suddenly under tragic circumstances on 30th April 1999 to give happiness and laughter in heaven as she
City Landmark – Hafizji ki Clock Shop, Gali Choori Wallan Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - June 10, 2024June 11, 20240 Funeral blues, and resurrections. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Stop all the clocks, silence the street sounds, and bring out the janaza, let the mourners come. We thought that it would last forever, we were wrong. For a long time, the beautiful clock repair shop stood at the mouth of Old Delhi’s Gali Choori Wallan. It has vanished, along with its massive collection of stately old wall clocks. The shop closed some weeks ago. The passing of the landmark has progressed into new beginnings. The three venerable brothers—who would be seen hard at work inside the shop, diligently concentrating on those precious heirlooms—have launched their own clock-and-watch repairing shops. Riyaz Khan, who specialises in hand-wound wrist watches, has his new establishment in
City Neighbourhood – Brijmohan Marg, Old Delhi Life Regions Walks by The Delhi Walla - June 9, 20240 A lane in the Walled City. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Buildings evoke eras. With its arched doorway and carved balcony, a mansion of lakhori bricks in Gali Chooriwallan instantly transports the gazer to the late Mughal times. Some streets away within the same historic quarter, in Ganj Meer Khan, a multi-storey apartment complex resembles the contemporary aesthetics of the distant suburbia. While towards the eastern walls of the Walled City, here at Brijmohan Marg, these contemplative houses are indicative of… just which era? These buildings are neither as ornamental as havelis, nor as toneless as flats. Take this mansion of modern-day bricks. It doesn’t look old, it also doesn’t look new. The hulky facade is partitioned into equal halves
City Hangout – Friendly Faces, New Friends Colony Hangouts Life by The Delhi Walla - June 8, 2024June 8, 20240 Different perspectives. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Are folks in New Friends Colony (NFC) friendlier? Seems so—at least in the market. The NFC Community Centre is an archipelago of interconnected plazas dense with mehendi stalls, cake shops, chai houses (shout out to Juhi’s Tea, the adda with 14 varieties of chai options!), eateries, groceries, stationeries, and denim outlets bearing grandiloquent names like Fashion Point-The Hub. Beyond these bazar businesses lie the bazar faces. Say salam-namaste to three friendly folks of New Friends. Their presence fortifies the Community Centre’s quirkiness, a trait borne out of the commingling of big city commerce with small town apnapan. The juice walla The friendly man’s modestly named Juice Corner is across the road from the Community
City Hangout – Khan Market Updates, Central Delhi Hangouts Life by The Delhi Walla - June 6, 2024June 6, 20240 Last houses. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The Khan Market sunset is seldom noticed. The sightings of the famous and the fashionable, strolling along the lanes, take away attention from the twilight sky. Then there is the market’s other sunset. It too is seldom noticed, though it has long been gathering about the market’s original character. Khan Market started with 154 shops and 75 flats. That was in 1951. The year 2024 began with only five of those flats, all the rest having slipped into history. One of the flats, a market tattletale informs, was vacated a few weeks ago. It too might be replaced by a cafe or a showroom. Named after the freedom fighter Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan’s elder
City Landmark – Neem Tree, Old Delhi Landmarks by The Delhi Walla - June 5, 20240 A Walled City sight. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The night air is growing less hot, almost spring-like pleasant. The sky is pitch black, not a single star to be seen. The dozens of street stalls are lying locked, sheeted and roped. The deserted lanes are littered with trashy remains of the day—upturned slippers, stained paper plates and squeaky clean chicken bones. Most lamps are out. Some homeless citizens are slumped across a flat landing, probably asleep. A barely perceptible sound is of the shiny green neem leaves that rustle in occasional gusts of warm breeze. This tree is among the most picturesque night-time sights in Old Delhi. Positioned directly opposite the eastern face of Jama Masjid, its nocturnal avatar
City Neighbourhood – Gali Andheri, Old Delhi Life Regions by The Delhi Walla - June 3, 20240 The darkened street. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] No darkness tonight in Gali Andheri, not even a spot of it—though the name translates to ‘darkened street.’ The twisty long-winded Old Delhi lane is momentarily landscaped with unwieldily patches of white and orange luminosities. These lights are emanating out of scores of street lamps and house windows. Young Moosa, a Gali Andheri dweller, is standing at the street’s colourfully painted gateway, where it meets Pahari Bhojla’s crowded bazar. He informs that his street had no wayside lamps until about the turn of the century, and that it would return to total darkness each day after sundown. An eighth grade student, the boy naturally doesn’t have a lived experience of