[jyotirmoy]

Early morning we park the car near Jama Masjid and take a rickshaw to Red Fort. The mists are rising and the fort is slowly emerging. Yashodhara buys the entry tickets and we approach the entry. The splintered sunlight has entered the corridor of Meena Bazar. Very soon we have the bright sunlight as we walk through the fort. This is Yash’s first encounter with Shajahanabad.

After the fort we take a rickshaw to Karim’s. We decide to feast like a badsha so we order seek kababas and roomali roti for starter and a whole leg of mutton roasted in burra style. For dessert we buy some Raabri and walk to Jama Masjid. Its noon time, the great open space in the mosque is bathed in heavenly sunlight. We walk past the red Mazzar of the Martyr and then thru the lanes of the market and then drive to Firoze Shah Kotla. Yash’s Lonely Planet has no mention of it but it is Thursday and the day when thousands of devotees come to offer prayer at the mosque within the ruins of the fort. This is the oldest mosque in regular use in India. The immaculate lawns are full of hundreds of devotees, children, ladies in shining black burqa. Great handis of food are brought in and distributed to the poor. A kind person hands over freshly baked cookies to Yash.

Our next destination is the colonial Delhi that exists around India gate, President’s house and parliament. The so called New Delhi.
I tell Yash that there is nothing called NEW Delhi, it just doesn’t exist and no sooner had I said this we come to the Gombuz of Arab ki sarai with its blue ceramic tiled dome now serving as a round about. A short drive from here and we pass the wall of more than seven hundred years to find ourselves roaming around the tombs belonging to the Lodhi dynasty. The palm trees are now casting long shadows as the sun begins to set and the parrots and mynas return to their nests. The tombs are silhouetted  against the back drop of New Delhi. The wind has stopped. Time for the Dijnns to wake up. So decide to loose New Delhi and step in to the world of the past.
A few hundred meters of walk is the time machine that brings us in the narrow lane where hardly two persons can walk abreast. Like the Delhi of the Sultans we navigate our way through the crowd of Indians, Pathans, Baluchs, Lahoris, Moroccans in their robes and fez caps. The shops lining the lane are full of bright green beautifully brocaded chadors, incense, fragrant surma and roses…. Roses every where. The air hangs heavy with the heady fragrance of flowers, ittar, insence and sizzling kababs.
The quwali singers hit the harmonium keys as we enter the Dargah of Nizamuddin. The Thursday Sufi music has just started.

We remain mesmerized as the music goes on. The audience is a mix of penniless Dervishes, devotees from so many places, a few rich families of Delhi. All swaying with the rhythm of the wonderful Sufi music in an ambience that simply cannot be described but only experienced. The chandeliers burn bright as throngs of devotees come to receive the blessings of Baba Nizamuddin. As the music reaches its crescendo, first a whiff then another… and then the gusts of chilly winds coming from the northern mountains blowing through Shajahanabad flow in. Riding the winds come the mists rolling in. The Dijnns now gather around us as the stain of Sufi music spreads further carried by the mists.
Its almost simultaneously that Yash & me feel that our bare feet have frozen stiff on the cold marble floor.

[dzibead]

Wonderful!

[digital drifter]

You write beautifully sir.  Thank you for making me be there.

[Shashank]

Yesterday even I was planning to be there at Nizamudin's, however was not able to make it !!

[Leith]

If only I could close my eyes, click my fingers and be anywhere in the world next Thursday! I'd be in your car and heading towards the Jama Masjid.

Leith

[batistuta]

Excellent Post, Jyotida. Beautifully  Written. Thanks.

Edited by batistuta, 05 January 2008 - 07:32 AM.

[Hyderabadi]

After reading this, I think I need to do my own small time reverse '7 Year Itch' thread around here.... (I've been in the US 7 Years now and guess I'm qualified to have an authentic itch.)

Quote

We decide to feast like a badsha so we order seek kababas and roomali roti for starter and a whole leg of mutton roasted in burra style.

Look who's talking - he who rolled eyes at an humble Hyderabadi breakfast of chicken curry and poori...

Please update more, and pictures please!

[Judi]

Oh, Jyoti .... you had me right there with you!  I could smell the mist and feel the cold marble floor ..... thanks.  Lucky, lucky Yash ........  

[cyberhippie]

Sigh, wonderful piece Jyoti Da, nearly made me change my ticket and fly into Delhi as usual but I've got to give Mumbai at least one visit, no.

[gautam]

JD has the perfect timimg of a master storyteller: leaves us on tenterhooks at the cliffhanger: just as the feet were getting frozen! Just as the green monster peeped around the darkened widow! Comeon JD, don't be cruel! more more!

[Now We are being cruel, judging from the  probable state of someone's head, after the meetup! There was something to be said for the Count of Monte Cristo's style! No ethaldehyde.]

[dzibead]

I think Jyoti should start publishing these pieces in travel and/or food magazines (with photos by Hyderabadi and Shilpa!)

[jyotirmoy]

cyberhippie, on Jan 6 2008, 09:53 AM, said:

Sigh, wonderful piece Jyoti Da, nearly made me change my ticket and fly into Delhi as usual but I've got to give Mumbai at least one visit, no.

Definitely bhai Ch... anyway you are coming to Delhi are'nt you?

[jyotirmoy]

dzibead, on Jan 6 2008, 10:19 AM, said:

I think Jyoti should start publishing these pieces in travel and/or food magazines (with photos by Hyderabadi and Shilpa!)

After my retirement I am to take up that no? And you would be the US agent, right? But before that the agent must have a first hand experience, isn't that dear Pardnor?

[jyotirmoy]

gautam, on Jan 6 2008, 09:59 AM, said:

JD has the perfect timimg of a master storyteller: leaves us on tenterhooks at the cliffhanger: just as the feet were getting frozen! Just as the green monster peeped around the darkened widow! Comeon JD, don't be cruel! more more!

[Now We are being cruel, judging from the  probable state of someone's head, after the meetup! There was something to be said for the Count of Monte Cristo's style! No ethaldehyde.]

I think Yashodhra will take it up when she goes on-line, she left at 4:30 AM today and have visited the sights in Agra and might have collapsed at Bharatpur tonight & I think we should as we had been awake till the wee hours watching films and music.

[gautam]

What are you doing to my mata Yashomati?!! 4: 30 a.m after a Jama Masjid evening?? Before an all-out  Agra, Sikandra, Fatehpur Sikri et al. humongous schedule? I was worried about exhaustion, she should have done that in 2 days, subtracted 1 day from Rajasthan. But anyway, those are the same genes that built all those buildings, so the stamina is there! Hope she has the printout for the Jaipur Zaika forwarded to her upthread: nice chilly season to enjoy kachoris and creamy lassi!

[jyotirmoy]

She is cooling her heels in Bharatpur

[cyberhippie]

Hmm Bharatpur, Bala and carrot sweet MMmmm.

[vinayverma]

Jyoti-da.
perfect, after living in that area for 20 years and numerous visits to the dargah, you made it 'live' for me.
thanks and when do we meet next ?

[dzibead]

jyotirmoy, on Jan 7 2008, 06:36 AM, said:

After my retirement I am to take up that no? And you would be the US agent, right? But before that the agent must have a first hand experience, isn't that dear Pardnor?

Yes, yes.  All true.  But there's nothing to stop you from doing some publishing pre-retirement.  And what good marketing your articles would be for the future Delhi tours venture!

[jyotirmoy]

Since I started this thread so let me end it.
I had been successful this time, moonlit night in Old Fort.....
Had sent away my car so a chilly ride in an autorickshaw as no taxis could be had....
left side of my face frozen in the cold wind.... a few restoring gulps at home and then a tumbler of steaming hot Rasam and a crisp papad at Sagar ratna.... followed by Uttapam.... Dosas..... back home & Satyajit Ray's Pikoo followed by Bappaditya's Devaki. Its Friday already.