Greetings from: Delhi Train Station

I consider myself to be relatively adaptable; given a situation, I can generally figure out how things work and adjust accordingly. When given over to the Delhi Train Station by my auto-rickshaw driver, however, for the first time, I felt completely out of my element. I’ve read that deadly stampedes occur with some regularity at Indian train stations, and now I see why. First, the crush of vehicles is almost incomprehensible; the auto-rickshaws and cars and cycle rickshaws compete for every inch of available road space, and pedestrians pick between them, deaf to horns, exhaust blowing at their ankles. Second, at the ticket counter itself, a huge mass of people, organized only roughly by lines. Women with their luggage lean against columns, unmovable. People don’t cut in line as much as they simply jut in before you, right at the ticket counter. Whoever gets his money into the ticket slot first wins. When I finally made my move, I kept my elbow firmly against the ribs of the man formerly behind me, now adjacent to me. Tickets to my destination -- Shimla -- were sold out, however. But I think that’s probably for the best, as I wasn’t able to communicate that I wanted an advance ticket for Monday. Somewhat defeated, I made my way back to the hotel. On my way, I passed a car polka-dotted with flattened cow patties, drying to be used as fuel later.

Lonely Planet says that there’s an International Tourist Bureau at the train station, but I was unable to locate it. It said that main building, but I didn’t see anything that looked anything resembling main, and I was too flustered to ask. Therein lies my traveling weakness: I believe that I can figure it out, when I probably can’t. I’ll try again later.

Round 2: I discovered the problem: there are two entrances to the train station, the east and the west. I approached from the east, which means that I was on the other side. The travel guides warn about ticket touts who’ll sidetrack you and send you to your doom, but I was surprised that I hadn’t been accosted by any earlier. Now I know why: they’re also on the west side.

As soon as I came upon the right area, helpful faces came up to me: You looking for tourist bureau? I was handed papers and pens, told to get into an auto-rickshaw and pay no more than 10 Rs. for the ride, go now or office will close! Being Asian gave me a buffer, since I could pretend that I didn’t understand English. After being diverted the first time, I re-entered the building, whereupon a man grabbed my arm and insisted that I couldn’t enter without a ticket. He instructed me to go to Connaught Place, since the tourist office had shut down because of the Metro construction. Pay no more than 10 Rs. for the rickshaw, he told me. It’s because I’m not Indian that people will try to rip me off. You don’t say.

I found the International Tourist Bureau. I can see how people get sidetracked -- the staircase to the 2nd floor is difficult to see, especially with entire families spread across the floor. The bright saris and their colorful, playful stitching are a diversion, an opening to get swindled. As it turns out, although regular seats for Shimla are likely sold out, for monied tourists, there is always availability.

Greetings from: Red Fort, Chowri Bazaar… almost

If Le Meridien and New Delhi were a bubble, then Hotel Broadway and Old Delhi is the pinprick. The streets are narrow and packed. My window looks upon an alley where children are playing cricket with a plastic bat and a tennis ball (gully cricket, they call it). They use a paving stone as a wicket. A sheep wanders in and out of view. I decided to plunge solo into the madness headfirst; madness indeed, since I chose to walk to the Red Fort from my hotel, a 1.5 km trek. Monstrously overpopulated city versus guileless young Asian boy: let’s go! As soon as I stepped out, a rickshaw wallah approached me, but after a few quick shakes of the head and a few strides forward, I continued on. Indeed, I found that if I walked on the shaded side of Netaji Subhash Marg., I traveled against the flow of traffic, further discouraging potential rides.

Before you enter the Fort complex itself, you must pass through a shopping arcade. It’s like having the gift shop as a prerequisite to the museum.

At the Red Fort, I was surprised to see not just security guards, but soldiers with guns. One manned a checkpoint just outside the entrance, his machine gun propped up, he looking ready to fall asleep. But it makes some sense: this is a militaristic monument; the Indian War Museum on the grounds showcases weaponry from the ancient to the current (including a bewildering display of “Fuzes”). Soldiers also sat in the shade of the monuments, far behind the plastic ropes meant to keep out the public.

A man asked if I needed a guide. Since I was flying solo, I said no. Thus my knowledge of the Red Fort: red sandstone. Inlaid marble. Columns, Persian arches, minarets. I got the sense that this was a place for picnics; Indian families sat in the lawn on blankets. Some slept. Couples canoodled, reclining into one another in a rare public display of affection, while small chipmunk-like rodents boldly snuck up to their opened potato chip bags to see if they could grab anything.

At one end of the complex, an archeological museum, filled mostly with Mughal manuscripts and some Persian calligraphy. At the other end, a teahouse restaurant with low seats. I asked for the saffron kheer. They were out. I asked for the tomato and mint soup. They were out. I asked for the cucumber raita. That, they had. But it was salty and lacked any cucumber. My new motto: India: Live with it.

Having successfully navigated my way to the Red Fort, I figured I could do the same for Chowri Bazaar, which specializes in paper goods. I had a vague map in my head, and some even more vague directions written down. Walk right out of the hotel down Asif Ali Road, turn right into the Sitaram Bazaar (near the Turkman Gate), then right again at Chowri Bazaar. Even though I have a poor sense of spatial positioning, I had an idea of the general direction I should walk.

So of course, I got lost. Along Asif Ali Road, you can smell dark, dried rivulets of urine, hot oil and fried dough, mysterious streams of colored chemicals in the gutter, freshly squeezed limes and sugar cane, grease from a motorcycle shop, and then—sudden, unexpected—incense. I must have turned too early (too late?) because I found myself wandering the Jama Masjid Bazaar, named after the nearby mosque, obviously. I tried not to make too much of a spectacle of myself, but it’s unavoidable. I did feel more like a local however, as cycle rickshaws from behind me yelled at me to get out of the way. At least, that’s the gist of their commands. I realized that spitting in the street is a necessity, rather than simply a disgusting habit, as most Westerners would consider it. Primarily, dust accumulates in your mouth at an alarming rate, and spitting clears out the grit quite effectively. (I suppose you could lug around a bottle of water for a quick rinse, but I have a poor sense of fore planning as well.) More interesting, I kept seeing big globs of bright red sputum. I didn’t stop to examine them closely, but I figured they were betel nuts. An old man, pulling a cart laden down with bags of rice until the stack was twice his size, opened his mouth for a second, and I caught a glimpse of a bright red tongue. I was grateful to be able to spit, the same sort of relief you feel when you blow your nose and find the tissue filled with black snot, an uneasy relief: that stuff is in my mucus and not my lungs. Bicyclists, auto-rickshaw drivers and motorcyclists often tie a bandanna around their mouths.

Certain areas of the bazaar have a specialty: I passed through the car parts bazaar, the dark, oil-stained machine parts, all laid out on blankets. (As I discovered later, I was close, oh-so-close to Chowri Bazaar there.) If I break my glasses, I can go to Katra Baryan, Fateh Puri, where opticians jostle for favor. For jewelry, I can hit Dariba Kalan. If I want a kite, Lal Kuan. I picked my way up to Chandni Chowk, the massive retail artery of Old Delhi, via a network of tiny, dark alleys filled with flies. On either side, tiny stalls—rooms—lit blue from fluorescent lights. In some, large magnifying glasses mounted on lamp arms: jewelers, I assumed. In others: someone sleeping under a laminated poster of their swami of choice. Shops and vendors of all imaginable types filled Chandni Chowk, wares displayed haphazardly; a moment of carelessness, and I’d bump my head against an item hanging above me. I passed a Muslim temple, laid out horizontally. At one section, a man continually poured water out of plastic cups lined up on a marble railing for afternoon ablutions.

I eventually found Chowri Bazaar. But, sadly, only the Metro stop named Chowri Bazaar. By India standards, I count that as a win.

Greetings from: Noida

Suburbia has become mythologized in American culture, so much though that it’s become metaphor: isolation, stifling uniformity, repression. Manicured lawns and white picket fences, 2.5 children, 2.5 cars sitting in the driveway. Such is the image of American suburbia, and that was firmly fixed in my mind as I traveled towards Noida, a suburb of Delhi, with its own sleek, 70s-lettering style logo. Rishi had invited me back to meet his sometimes boyfriend, Sunit, and to watch movies. It could have been any of the Bollywood in his collection, but we ended up with House of Wax, Paris Hilton’s pole-in-the-head death scene abruptly trimmed away by the Indian censors. Rishi’s neighborhood is a block of concrete flats, the buildings shaped like half-played towers of Jenga. At my most gracious, I could call it a planned community; at my most ungracious, I could call it the projects. The entrance to Rishi’s complex was guarded by a small security force which opened the gate as necessary. The first channel on the cable TV system was a live feed on the single security camera pointed at the gate.

Across the (very busy) street was a small strip of stores, including a supermarket. People lived above these stores, and from Rishi’s balcony, I saw their laundry hanging on lines strung in every direction. Inside the supermarket, I was enthralled by brands familiar and unfamiliar. Since when did ordinary life take on the trappings of the exotic?

“Help me find some Tiffins,” Rishi asked me. We stood in the candy aisle, and I scanned the shelves, not knowing anything beyond the fact that Tiffins came in a tin. Moments before, I had stared at a milk-based boxed drink, kesar-flavored (saffron, I found out later). In American stores, the stock is carefully displayed, canisters and boxes in straight, orderly rows. In this store, boxed stock was kept behind the open stock on the shelf, a storage issue, I suspect. “Here it is,” Rishi said, pleased. The tin was neon colored, the cover image of a rollerblading Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. Tiffins are like malted milk balls, puffed rice covered in chocolate.

The three of us sat on a futon, eating a pizza from Domino’s. I was disappointed in the toppings; instead of tandoori chicken, mango and curry, we had instead a “Mexican Green Wave,” which had jalapenos, green peppers, onions and tomatoes. Even Indians get tired of Indian food. Or America cultural imperialism has become so pervasive that it now imports its own bastardizations of other cultures -- Italy and Mexico in this case.

Periodically, the power would go off; the whole block went dark. I could still see outside -- the full moon -- and on the side of the streets, fires flared up: pavement dwellers. Then the power came back on, the A/C kicked back up, and life continued as normal.

Greetings from: South Delhi

Can I call it? A different Mr. Singh. Today, at least, I’ve learned (by learned, I mean “finally read through my Lonely Planet”) to speak confidently and to pretend that I’ve been here before.

The designated day of shopping with Rishi and Robert. Robert wanted “authentic Indian” gifts to bring back home. Do Indians import their cultural souvenirs from China? In any case, our first stop: Dilli Haat, in South Delhi. From my new digs in Old Delhi, an auto-rickshaw ride to Dilli Haat cost 80 Rs., which stings because you can mentally deny you’ve been ripped-off until faced with the real cost of things. Alas. The auto-rickshaw does leave you exposed to the heat, but the moving air kept oppressiveness. Without humidity, the heat is simply… hot. Small constellations of sweat formed and faded on the driver’s gray shirt. As well, the rickshaw also leaves you more open to being approached by beggars. At times the road swarmed full of these green-and-yellow auto-rickshaws -- the world as ruled bye 7Up.

Dilli Haat is an outdoor bazaar featuring handicrafts -- think a flea market where each stall tries to lure you in with the promise of pashmina. Robert had some difficulty making up his mind; he wanted saris for his friends, yet didn’t know what color, what material, what cost. “As cheap as you can get it,” he said, which meant that Rishi assumed on the role of official tourist bargainer. One dealer explained the difference between needlework and hookwork in decorating the saris, and Rishi, a fashion stylist, pointed out flaws (uneven edges) and steered Robert away from dreadful color choices. Rishi demanded that a vendor bring out the Indian color combinations, rather than the European palette. So away went the grays and metallic edges; in came the saffrons, the turmerics -- piles and piles of them as the dealers unloaded the saris out of plastic bags, unfurled them, and showed us the careful stitching that Indian children’s hands can do. An emaciated British gent sat haggling for a sari, a skill that I leave -- for better or worse -- to my mother.

Rishi then took us to Greater Kailesh (commonly referred to as GK), home of the Fabindia store. Robert decided that he wanted some Indian clothes for himself, so Rishi and I watched as he tried on shirts of different sizes and clothes, pajama bottoms with extra cloth meant to gather at your ankles like bangles, regular straight leg pajama bottoms. The small, slim fits -- even in India -- are too big on me. Upstairs from a trendy clothing store was Le Café, where, Rishi informed us, the socialites and Page Sixers of Delhi liked to congregate. Indeed, at one table, a large group of Indian women (of a certain age) had gathered, as if they were the steering committee for a charity event. We met two of Rishi’s friends at the café (a young woman in a bright yellow dress that showed off her décolletage and a young man who could only be described as a prototypical stoner), and I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the young, upscale professionals of Delhi are no different from those in the United States. They’re always looking for diversions. And they find them: drinking, marijuana (which I understand is illegal to sell but not to smoke or possess in small quantities), art, drugs, sex. The favored catchphrase: “What’s our POA (plan of action)?” Urban malaise: the new global phenomenon.

Finally, with Robert shuffled off to the airport to catch his plane to Dubai, Rishi had business of his own to conduct. He took his hired car (cost $100 a month, including driver) to Lajpat Nagar, a street in which I was the only Westerner. Both sides were lined with clothing stores, women in bright saris walking in and out of them. Rishi and I walked into one, and the variations of colors were overwhelming. You know how, as a child, you’d buy the biggest box of Crayolas, then tilt back the cardboard top simply to take in the chromatic assortment before you? You’d pull out certain colors just to learn the names: periwinkle, cornflower, terra cotta. Imagine that, but with silk, the colors so varied that they no longer have names, but rather numbers on a swath card. As we walked back to his car, my first adventure with street food: a green coconut, its top hacked off to expose the sweet water within.