Writing this post...

Writing this post…

I sometimes wonder why I closely interact with other cities but remain content to intently glance at Delhi, the city where I live. As a result I know and understand Delhi more by eaves-dropping on it through the lens of my camera…

My laptop has folder after folder of photographs on Delhi and the way it behaves and probably evolves… and when I look at these photographs that I’ve clicked over the years I go back to the utterly readable description of Delhi that Sam Miller gives in his book: ‘Delhi – Adventures in a Megacity’.

Look at the way Sam gets into the heart of life in Delhi: ‘The bucket was full of water, submerged in which was a large and varied collection of wrist-watches. I asked the bucket’s guardian why the watches were under water. He looked at me as if I was very stupid, and said with a look of disdain, ‘because they’re water-proof’.’ This is one city where Sam and I agree that ‘sashaying and pirouetting in search of space and the possibility of forward movement’ are incidents that may seem ‘subversive, almost revolutionary’, but so essential to make it what it is.

So Sam, pardon me for using your own words, but ‘you may be travelling faster than me, but at least I’m in comfort’ because my pictures take me back to your text again and again and again…

This picture reminds me of the Bihari kid working at the tea-stall... and the way the owner reacts when told that child labour may soon be punishable

This picture reminds me of the Bihari kid working at the tea-stall… and the way the owner reacts when told that child labour may soon be punishable

Quote from the book. Page 216.
He screamed ‘Chai lao’ (bring tea) at a young boy who had been wiping the tables, very ineffectively. He could not have been much older than Ghalib. I asked the boy why he wasn’t at school. He didn’t answer. I told the restaurant manager that later this month it would become illegal for him to employ children under fourteen.
‘Well, he’ll lose his job, then. he’s useless anyway.’
‘Shouldn’t he be at school?’
‘That’s not my business.’
‘Where does he stay?’
He pointed to the bench I was sitting on.
‘So where will he go?’
‘Bihar, I suppose. That’s where he came from.’ The manager fell silent, and used his remote to flick through the channels.

 

Ah! the crowds that Sam talks about so fluently... well Sam, what would you say to two-wheelers hogging pedestrian ways in Delhi?

Ah! the crowds that Sam talks about so fluently… well Sam, what would you say to two-wheelers hogging pedestrian ways in Delhi?

The true face of this megacity that Sam mentions at many places...

The true face of this megacity that Sam mentions at many places…

This is so much a reality here... but I'm not sure if Sam even mentions it in his book

This is so much a reality here… but I’m not sure if Sam even mentions it in his book

Zooming away on a pedestrian FOB is such a common sight here... and I smile and remember the Miller adventures when I sight such citizen adventures!

Zooming away on a pedestrian FOB is such a common sight here… and I smile and remember the Miller adventures when I sight such citizen adventures!

Book details:
Title: Delhi – Adventures in a Megacity
Author: Sam Miller
Publisher: Penguin/Viking
ISBN: 978-0-670-08231-5

 

A post written  with a fervent hope to make it to the Jaipur Lit Fest as a guest of Random House!
Lit-Fest Calling! Win a Trip to JLF 2013

 

 

Arvind Passey
05 January 2012