Delhi trip

Last weekend, I witnessed a bonafide world-wonder; a taxi driver who didn't honk once over a 30km ride! I'm not sure if the holidays had something to do with it, but the whole traffic situation was heartening. I must say I came away with a very good impression of the Metro too. Can't wait to have that in Bangalore.

Of course, I finally saw the Taj too. I thought it couldn't surprise me, after having seen it in so many times in print and film, it still got me nodding in absolute admiration. I was imagining what it must have looked like 350 yrs ago, with none of the tourists and the clamour around and with an unpolluted Yamuna flowing by its side, and the marble still sparkling clean. Must have been some sight!

What's with Agra though? Do they deliberately keep the city in the 18th century so that the firangs can come here and say things like "India attacks all your senses!"?

The highlight of the trip was my visit to the Bharatpur bird sanctuary which was nothing short of birdwatching nirvana. Even more heartening than the enormous diversity of birdlife is the knowledge of the rickshaw drivers here!


Pratap Singh, the rickshaw driver we hired could identify every goddamn bird that we saw. He won himself a tip of Rs. 10 for every new entry into my bird blog.

Besides that, the weekend was a heady mix of soaking in awesome northie humour and effortless hospitality, conjuring liquor parties out of thin air, a lot of driving and a little wallowing in existential angst.