And All the Rest

This is probably the closest I got to a wedding.

In India anyway.

Anyone I'd spoken to about India who'd been there had said "You've got to go to a wedding". And several people in India said the exact same thing. Well, I met several people who were going to weddings during the time I was there, but for whatever reason no on wanted to make me their +1. Too bad, as I would have loved an excuse to get a nice pair of pajamas with a nehru jacket.

Yes, that's what they're called. Blame the Brits for stealing the word and making it all about bedtime.

That's just a guy who saw me taking a picture of tbe Blue Man Group up top and wanted me to take a picture of him too.

There you go buddy.

And that's later that night.

All of those by the way are taken from my balcony. January is wedding season, and between those and various other unidentified celebrations, our little street was pretty busy at night, either with drums, or more often than not, the next door neighbours setting off firecrackers. Big, booming, oh my god is there a war going on out there, firecrackers.

See, unidentified celebration of some sort or another. This one though was in Hauz Khas Village, a place I know I've mentioned before, as I've already been here a few times. Well, I was back again, this time with the Delhi Photo Group for a Sunday afternoon photo walk in the old complex and adjoining park.

At the beginning of the meet up the organizer gave us an idea of what he had in mind as an itinerary, and also suggested that, given the conditions, shooting in black and white might be fun.

I haven't shot in B&W. What fun! I couldn't find a B&W setting on my camera, though what I did find is, I think anyway, pretty much the same, but with a much cooler name - Dynamic Monochrome.

Excuse me while I get all arty and pretentious.

That's Aman. He and I hung out during the first photo walk a few weeks prior, and then again at this one. He also got myself and two others together during my last weekend in Delhi for some time in Old Delhi and the Garden of the Five Senses. But more on that later.

Oh, and when I say "more on that later" I mean "later in this entry". It's gonna be the last one, and it's gonna be a long one. Even by my standards. I'll try my best to keep on track. Promise.

And honestly so far I'm doing pretty good, I've skipped the thing I was going to say about dogs and how they're senses work, I've...

Right.

That's Radhika. She was not on the first walk that I attended, but she was on this one, and we had a fun time chatting. Lots of knowledge, and a strong desire to share it, so yeah, someone to definitely hang out with. Which we did. Some of the shots you will see later are a direct result of Radhika saying "Oh, you should go here."

And that's Minati. Totally different day, but for whatever reason I was still in artsy pretentious mode (there really should be a factory setting for that) when we went to Lodi Gardens to play the ukulele.

The cup is chai. How cool is it that you can sit around in a park and wish for chai and a few minutes later have a guy magically appear and sell you some? I'm telling you, we need this in Canada.

I'm not sure we need the guys in parks wandering around with q-tips offering to clean your ears, as happened to me repeatedly one afternoon when Maya and I met up in the park in the centre of Connaught Place. Okay, yes, my ears are kinda large, and I'm fairly tall, so maybe they're a bit of a beacon. But showing me pictures and testimonials of happy customers, or asking if you can "just take a look" as you attempt to grab my head, still doesn't make me want to have you put a stick in my ear and swirl it around.

Unless you're also carrying a pensieve. Then we could do some business.

These next few are of Chhatarpur Mandir, a large temple complex dedicated to the goddess Katyayani, which is properly named Shri Adhya Katyani Shakti Peeth Mandir. So why Chhatarpur? Well, that's where it is. So that's where I went.

Katyayani is one of the nine forms of Parvati, and is associated with Durga, the warrior goddess. Her favourite colour is red. And that's as far as I'm gonna go.

Just look at the pictures.

Oh, this seems like a good time to correct something I said in a previous blog that Radhika kindly pointed out to me. At one point I referred to Hanuman as a monkey. The very important word missing from this description is god. Monkey God. My apologies for the unintentional disrespect, and my gratitude for being gently corrected.

You're not allowed to take pictures inside this or other Hindu temples. Something I learned shortly after taking the above picture. Again, sorry about that.

In a way though it's too bad, as I would love to have shown you all these elephant faces that adorned the walls, that look down on you when you enter. For whatever reason I truly felt a sense of peace in this place. Nothing seems as wise, gentle, or happy as how these elephants are portrayed.

So you get to see these ones instead.

Above is another 100 ft. + statue of Hanuman. Apparently there are a few of these about town.

And those are puppies.  We came across them in the Garden of the Five Senses, which is what these next few pictures are of.

And when I say "we" I don't mean Aman, Rajeev, Shikha, and myself. I mean me, Ian, and Stiena, those two below.

Ian and Stiena are a German couple who I met at the temple, and ended up spending a good portion of the day with. Their next destination was the Garden of the Five Senses, and while I was originally going to be going there with the other three people I just mentioned, the last email I'd gotten from Aman suggested that that was no longer the case, which isn't how it turned out at all, but whatever, it's a park and you can visit those plenty of times and there's always something new to look at if only because the young couples making out the in the bushes the day before eventually had to go home and its a whole different flock the next time.

Ian and Stiena and two other friends of their's are driving from Germany to Australia. And yes, this can be done. Travel east through Europe into Turkey, then pop down through Iran (which by the way wins top marks for nicest people in their book), then through Pakistan and across northern India with a stop in Delhi to meet me. Doubt that last part was planned. Out of India and into Myanmar (assuming you've got all the necessary paperwork in order as travel is kinda restricted, though it is possible if you hook up with the right groups) and then through Thailand, Malaysia, and down that lovely geometry I love so much that is the curve of Indonesia that ends at East Timor. At that point it's a boat across to Australia, which is lookin' pretty close at that point, and voila.

Cool.

That woman is carrying alot of wood on her head. Which reminds me, I need to go get a massage, I can barely turn my head. Think I've been sleeping like an ostrich again.

This is Riitam, the band that the guys James and I jammed with, or rather James jammed with and I took pictures of, are in. And this is them performing for a Rise Against Cancer benefit outside of JLN Stadium. One letter short of getting to see Superman. Dang.

They did good. Real good.

And this is one of those notes to myself, one of my mental snapshots about a photo I didn't get to take. Google now has this amazing app that can take memories from your head and store them as images on Drive. This guy with a q-tip in Connaught Place showed me how it worked.

Actually, it turns out that finding a dog curled up and dozing in a warm bed of ashes is not overly unique in Delhi. So I got it the second time I saw it when I was with Aman on the Sunday morning outside the metro waiting for the others to show up to begin our photo walk around Old Delhi.

And that's what this next set of shots is of.

By way of further introduction to them I will add that some days are good days for taking pics, other days are not. For me it's got to do with that thing I talked about a long time ago, creativity vs. craft. To briefly sum it up, I see creativity as those inspired moments, whereas I see craft as the set of tools and skills you've learned that you use either when you're not feeling inspired but need to work anyway, or use to refine and shape whatever neat stuff came out of a creative spurt.

Well, let's just say my craft is very poor when it comes to photography. And I will not comment on my creativity other than to say this particular day was not one in which I was feeling overly inspired. Ah well. Still an amazing day with my friends Aman, Rajeev, and Shikha, and that after all, is what it's all about.

Ken, I think you should bring your family to this Sunday book market in Delhi. It stretches on for blocks, and with costs ranging from 10-30 rupee per book, I'm thinking you'd still be saving a bundle even after factoring in flights, accomodations, and food.

For those of you who dont know, Ken's family reads alot.

That below is Delhi Gate.

There are over 1,000 historical cites in Delhi. And people wonder why I'd spend all of my time here?

Don't worry. He's just sleeping.

Another autorickshaw selfie. Shikha, Aman, me, and Rajeev. In that order even, assuming you started on the left. Your left. My left is busy holding the camera.

I've come to the conclusion that autorickshaw drivers are practicing a new form of three-wheeled parkour. They don't stop, they only move forward, and if given enough runway and a speedbump they get air.

Back in the Garden of the Five Senses, none of which are common by the way. This particular installation is titled Prayer for Peace, and you can see another shot of it above from when I was here the day before. When I'd seen it the first time I'd figured it would be a great subject for my photo friends to have fun with. Turns out I was correct.

There's this massive cactus thingy in the garden where people have carved Joni Loves Chachi type messages into it.  I looked around trying to find names of couples I knew that I could send a pic too. No such luck. So instead I'm attempting to suck up.

And no, seriously, they were happy. They were even making fun of me for being grumpy, which by the way, I got over five shots ago, which is like 30 or something in real-time, but for now you only have to suffer through the abridged works.

I really get the feeling that flower is giggling.

This, as you may have guessed, is no longer The Garden of the Five Senses.

This is Gurgoan Cyber City, and is near where Radhika works, and where I went to meet her for lunch one day. My visit here was part of my required education. Radhika, being a reader and critic of the blog, felt that I was kinda skewing the view of Delhi by showing just really ancient stuff, or the worn down parts of places. Well, rest assured, there are shiny new buildings and sprawling parking lots in Delhi too. Truth is, they just don't interest me as much. We've got lots of those back home. I'd try and argue that I'm drawn towards taking photos of things that we don't have at home, but that would leave me open to some smart a** asking "What, you don't have doors in Toronto?"

And no, we don't. We just all start moving really fast and jiggle our atoms through the walls.

I'm really hoping that this guy was taking a picture of himself in front of all of these rose hearts because he thought it'd be nice to send it to a loved one, cuz if it's just for him to keep on his phone, then, well... I just don't know how to complete that kindly.

Mind you, they are pretty.

That's my barber. I went and got a shave from him once a week the entire time I was there and got my haircut twice, and he did an awesome job every time, and apparently would rather look in the mirror then at the camera.

And that's the mirror he was looking in, along with the rest of the shop.

And that's the little pocket of the Malviya Nagar market less than five minutes from the apartment where the shop with the mirror and the barber are. Just not on Tuesdays. Well, I'm sure the shop is there, its just got a steel garage door closing it all up, and I'm really hoping he wasn't trapped inside.

But it's like the veg guy I had in Marrakech. These routines, this continuity, it all gets you starting to almost kinda belong to a place. And it's a good feeling.

James, you were absolutely correct. If you take those steps up into the field near the metro, instead of walking along the main road, it is in fact a shorter, and less hectic route back to the apartment. Here's a bit of what it looks like on the way to the metro.

This is back at Connaught Place one sunny afternoon when Maya, instead of being wise and resting for one more day because she was sick, decided to come out and play instead. Yay me!

This play time consisted primarily of sitting in the park, avoiding guys with q-tips, looking for chai, being accosted by every autorickshaw driver who wanted to take us to a place with better shopping, and who would often get surprised when, after hearing me say "no" in English four times, heard Maya say no and a string of other fine words I am sure, in Hindi. One driver actually apologized and said she looked to pale to be Indian.

More words followed that I did not understand.

The best confusion like that though happened at a music store we came across and wandered in to. It goes something like this...

Maya and I went into this music store because I saw this shiny white baby grand piano, and I just can't help myself. So, after playing another piano for a few minutes and getting some light applause from one of the two gentlemen working in the shop we also checked out the tablas, sitars, tanpuras, and other fun instruments they had adorning the walls. There was one that was really neat called a gopichand. It hails from Bengal, and is a single stringed instrument that you pluck and then adjust the pitch by pinching the sides of it's neck together. Kinda like what you'd do with a chicken if trying to turn one of those into a musical instrument only better sounding.

Anyway, Maya asked how much one of the little ones was. I know this because she was speaking English. Some Hindi chat was exchanged between the two gentlemen and a price was given. We discussed that for a bit and left without purchasing.

Turns out autorickshaw drivers are not the only people in Delhi who do not realize Maya is Indian when she's hangin' out with the likes of me. I'm believing this to be the case as Maya filled me in on the shop guys conversation in Hindi between her asking the price and them responding. It went something like this:

"She wants to know the price. What should I tell her?"

"Be sure to jack it up alot."

"Okay, I was thinking 2,000."

"Yeah, that should be good."

Yep. It doesn't just happen in sitcoms.

This is Gurudwara Bangla Sahib, a large Sikh place of worship in Delhi, and one of the top two temples Radhika thought I should visit.

Good call.

And this is the street leading up to the Gurudwara that somehow got put in the wrong spot and interupted the flow but I'm not going to fix it, so just deal.

Meanwhile back at Bangla Sahib.

These fine fellows are supporters of one of the three parties running in the election that was held on Saturday. Which reminds me, I should check to see who won. This picture is also out of sequence, but I'm sure you'll be able to handle the bounce around.

It's not too far out of sequence though. After leaving Bangla Sahib I walked over to the next of the two temples Radhika had suggested, Birla Mandir.

This is not Birla Mandir. This in fact is Sacred Heart Cathedral, which, as I walked by, was busy hosting a big rally protesting the recent vandalism of Christian churches in Delhi, something that apparently sparks up every so often, usually around election time. Nice eh?

So you've got protesters on the inside of the gate, you've got police and media and people like me who were just passing by but decided to stop and take a gander on the outside of the gate. And then you've got the scooter brigade supporting another of the political candidates whipping by.

Delhi is this place where you don't know where to point your camera most of the time as there are way too many options.

Man I screwed the order of these up. He's with that other party that I started this out of sequence bit with.

Meanwhile back at Sacred Heart...

It makes for an interesting triptych if you focus on the text in each shot.

And this is Birla Mandir, also known as Laxminarayan Temple, and is devoted to Vishnu.

It also has elephants.

And a garden. A really big, lovely garden, perfect for walking around and taking pictures...

... and more importantly meeting people. People in this case being Mr. Sakslena.

Mr. Sakslena is not the kindly gentleman who I chatted with a couple of times in Deer Park, he is however the kindly gentleman who asked where I was from and invited me to join him on the bench.

Two hours and an amazing conversation about India, what's wrong with Delhi, how the education system could be improved, why it's important to experience adversity, and why religions are all saying pretty much the same thing so can we please all realize that and just get along, I found myself at Moti Mahal, apparent creators of butter chicken eating, well, eating what you should eat when you go to a place that invented one of your favourite foods. Butter Chicken.

Yummy yum yum yum. And sure, not a temple, but still another awesome suggestion from Radhika.

This is Sarvsukh Singh. He's my tabla teacher.

Oh, and that's me on the right.

And that's Neha.

She's the wonderful lady who rented me a room in her apartment that I've been telling you about along the way. Neha is very cool. She's the kind of cool that wakes up one day and decides for the first time ever that she wants to paint. So what does she do? Does she say, ya, I'll find some time some day to give that a go? Nope, she heads out, gets herself the paints and canvasses, and spends the entire weekend painting.

That kinda cool.

We could all do with a little more of that kind of cool.

Which reminds me, I need to go say something nice on airbnb.

That's me on the right again.

Just to switch it up I'm on the left and two feet taller in this one.

That's Malti. She's the last pic I'll be showing of my time in India, and above everyone else in India, I have her to thank the most.

She's the cook.

She is the wonderful lady who came in everyday, or nearly everyday, and made food for all of us. Breakfast and dinner for sure, and lunch if, when asked, we said we'd be around. Home cooking for six weeks. I ate at home more in Delhi than I do in Toronto. Seriously.

So that's Delhi, or at least my Delhi and many of the people who made my time there so incredible.

Let's wrap it up wth some mental snapshots...

• Guys in a scooter repair shop in Old Delhi adjusting a pile of horns so that they'll be louder
• Sitting in the park around the Qutb Minar with James and watching the security guy as he blows his whistle and shoos away the young couples from one of the more secluded areas
• Standing in line at the post office with Kieran when a gentleman butts in ahead of us. I call him on it and he informs me that he is a senior and that gives him priority in India. I apologize, explain I'm Canadian and that we're not as nice to our elderly back home. We talk about WWII.
• Walking through the Malviya Nagar market on a Sunday morning and there is music blasting out over the neighbourhood PA system
• Being told by the gentleman in Deer Park:
• There are two religions  - man and woman
• There are two politics - man and woman
• I had no response. I still don't
• Seeing a family of five on a scooter
• In Jaipur the lady at the Temple of the Sun raising her arms above her head and howling at the monkeys as she chases them away
• A cow yelling at a guy on a scooter to stop
• A visit from the police one evening as Obama was coming to Delhi for Republic Day and apparently there were unregistered guests living in the apartment. Oops, that'd be all of us. We got registered. I'm guessing the lady from downstairs squealed because she didn't like having to look at the dustbin for a week instead of the potted plants.
• Approaching the Laxminarayan Temple and being approached by a guy who first tries to sell me postcards, then coins, then stamps, and finally The Kama Sutra, or Good Indian Sex Book, as he explained it.

I'm coming back for more.