Spending a day in New Delhi's oldest marketplace feels more like a lifetime. Worn, weathered, and enriched with hundreds of years of active trade and commerce, it's like stepping onto a movie set, where everything seems almost too fantastical to be real. Need a goat? About time for that haircut and shave? Fresh new whites for the colorful madness of Holi? How about "new" tires for your rickshaw? You'll find it here.
Glancing up, I saw a thousand serpent-like cables and wires dangling from every edifice, like empty clotheslines connecting itself to a thousand others like it. It's a "sharing society" when your neighbor merely "borrows" it from you by rigging his to yours.
Passing innumerable options of street food carts and side walk eateries, I couldn't resist the urge to stop in for a quick taste of what the locals were cooking up. Now, a note to the reader: I had lived an intensely squeamish month while backpacking the jungles of Thailand a few years back, and it took me a while to recover. So picking up a chapati off the food carts of India, took a lot of, well, guts. And I am SO glad I did.
Out of all the wonderfully orchestrated chaos that is Chandni Chowk, my favorite souvenir was intangible: it was to lose myself in its ancient and intricate alleyways, my senses tantalized by a million and one exotic spices and aromas, as clouds of people and incense breezed by me. It was Life. Unfolding daily. Welcome to Chandni Chowk.
- Andre Bolourchi
Related articles:
Inside India: Celebrating Holi & Avoiding Delhi Belly
A Taste of India - Southern Indian Specialties
On Thin Ice: How I Saved My Sherpa
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