Getting around in Delhi

If you don't want to walk.... which might a be a bit risky, since the sidewalks are full of holes, sleepers, cows and migrant merchants, you have the choice of taking buses, bicycle rikshaws, auto rikschaws and the metro, which seems to grow by the day.

If you are able to agree about the price, taking an autorikschaw or for short distances a bicycle rikschaw is the most pleasant way of transport if you are a hero and can get used to their way of driving like this chap, who works and talks on his phone in the roaring traffic

The buses bear an sign telling you that they run on clean fuel. In the beginning i thought that must be a joke, because the buses look like they would fall apart the next moment. However, all the rikschaws and the buses in Delhi run on compressed natural gas, which does not make the air clean, but at least more breathable like in other big cities like ahmedabad.

 

This guy is repairing his cycle rikschaw on the side of the road. There are lots of complaints in the guide books about rikschaw drivers. They ask prices, which are too high, they don't go to the right places, but leave you at shops and false information officies and afterwards they charge commision. I was never brought to a shop or the wrong place. I just told them that i would not pay him if he stops at a shop. And some of the guys were even good guides, entertaining and fantastic drivers

 

New Delhi

New Delhi was designed by the English Architect Sir Edwin Lutyens. The inauguration was in 1931. A bombastic avenue called Rajpath links the colonial seat and now presidential palace with India Gate, a monument for the Indian soldiers killed in the first world war. Office and Housing buildings line the avenues on both sides of Rajpath

 On sunday afternoons, the area around India gate is very popular. People go for a walk, families have a picnic and street vendors try to earn some rupies

 

A little further on is the exhibition centre. When I passed by, there was a car exhibition and big crowds tried to get in. It seemed to be the place to take out one's girl-friend for a day. At the moment there are comparably few private cars in India, and if they do not change their driving habits, it will be hell when everybody who wants one will get one....

 

 On the contrary, the enormous National gallery of modern Art is practically empty. Of visitors, I mean, not of pieces of art, which are packed into the building. Maybe some reader can discover a kind of specific Indian incarnation of modern art. I couldn't, but, OK, maybe I am not a specialist.... it looked all like another version of similar western master pieces.

The center of India.... Delhi, Connaught Place

Connaught Place is the commercial centre of New Delhi. It was constructed by R.T.Russell in 1932. With its central round square and two concentric ring roads it was supposed to resemble the Royal Crescent in Bath, England. It is named after the Duke of Connaught, 7th child of Queen Victoria, who visited the town at the time of Construction

Under the central square is the busiest of all of Delhi's busy Metro Stations.At the moment it's a real mess. The whole place and all it's buildings are reconstructed due to the upcoming commonwealth games.

A part of the workers and their families sleeps in makeshift tents and shacks on the construction site. See also http://eisstahl.blogspot.com/2010/02/struggle-for-life.html 

  This is how it should look like afterwards....

Of course there are a lot of people who want to clean your shoes, but nobody dared to smear shit on mine before asking me. And only the last day somebody finally wanted to clean my ears with a rusty nail... I was almost glad he asked me and he showed an impressing book of recommendations in all possible languages of happy people with clean ears. I was not able to read the one he showed me, because it was in Hebrew, and I do not understand that language. Sometimes it is good to tell people you are Israeli. They usually leave you alone immediately.

  

There are actually some cafes on Connaught Place, and some are even quiet enough to read the books one has bought in one of the excellent book stores around the corner. Altogether I was pleasantly surprised  and could not understand all the complaints of other fellow travellers who apparently were constantly hazzled here. There were actually some people who tried to be helpful and explained the complicated adresses to me.