City Landmark – Phool Mandi, Daryaganj
Brassai’s stones. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Parisian Cobblestones, shot in 1931. It is one of the most iconic photographs by Brassai, the celebrated chronicler of nighttime Paris. Our Delhi is not Brassai’s Paris. But this place in…
City Landmark – New Bharat Hair Dresser, Khan Market
The market story. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Muse, let’s again sing of the tony Khan Market. The fashionable front lane has a foreign-origin confectionary; something like the Haldiram of Paris. It opened during the pandemic, and by…
City Landmark – Five Graves, Around Town
In the city of tomns. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Good puzzle would be to cross Delhi without passing a grave. Sometimes anonymous graves lie clustered in neighbourhood alleys (see photo). Here are the city’s five lesser known…
City Landmark – Railway Station, Gurgaon
A station, for memories. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Ting tong. Yatrigan kripya dhyan de. Passengers, may we have your attention please. Better later than never. That thing called change will soon be expressing into one of Delhi…
City Landmark – Agrawal Sari Emporium, Chirag Delhi Village
Personal history. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Delhi, a city of monuments. One gets tired of the adage. But its true. So many forts, so many tombs. More thrilling is when you land into a place that looks…
City Landmark – Water Fountain, Kasturba Gandhi Road
Time passing by a place. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] New in town. This water fountain. A couple clicks a selfie with it as their backdrop, and walk on contentedly. The fountain came up at one end of…
City Landmark – Mullaji Ice Merchant, Mohalla Qabristan Chowk
Of the ice age. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] It never snows in Delhi. But our eyes can always see the ice at Mullaji Baraf Wale. This tiny establishment in Mohalla Qabristan Chowk sells baraf all through the…
City Landmark – Gole Market, Central Delhi
Tomorrow’s museum. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] Gole Market is gole. Truly round. An octagonal building is the sun in its solar system. This central edifice has a grimy tin roof but is historic — it was a…
City Landmark – Poets’ Corner, Modern Tea House
Poetry with chai. [Text and photo by Mayank Austen Soofi] The white lighting at Modern Tea House would illuminate the darkened Walled City alley far beyond the midnight. Inside, the last table would be clouded in tobacco smoke, smelling of…
City Landmark – Charles Correa’s Tara Apartments, Kalkaji
Dream architecture. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Up, down. Right, left. Wherever you see. The place is swamped with staircases. Each stringed into zig saggy flights of steps. Some suspended in mid-air, almost. Tara Apartments is a fantasyland…
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