I'm back. Back in Delhi, that is. Was I sad to leave my beloved South India? No. Was I excited to return to Delhi, where I have a home and (at least a slight semblance of) a social life? No.* When I left Thiruvananthapuram, I felt oddly emotionless. Usually I feel
something when I leave a place, even if it's only for a short time. But nope, nothing. Weird.
*This is not to say I wasn't excited to see my friends. Of course I was. I just wasn't feeling particularly excited about the prospect of returning to Delhi in general.I had a flight at death o'clock in the morning from Thiruvananthapuram (woke up at 3:45am. Most painful moment of my life). When the flight descended into Delhi, I almost vomited at the sight. I swear, it took very bone in my body to not dry heave right there on the plane. Despite Delhi being a humongous city, I could barely see the buildings, only a faint outline. All I saw was gray. Gray pollution. It was like descending into a smoke stack or exhaust pipe. Suddenly my emotionless self was filled with emotions of "uuggghh why is this where I live?!" and dread of landing and actually entering this polluted city.
My feelings quickly changed when I got to my apartment (though not about the pollution). It was great to see Sam again and to be
home. Yes, my apartment really feels like home to me, and one of my favorite feelings in the world is arriving home after being gone for a while.
I decided I needed to get some returning-home errands done. I needed a Sri Lanka guidebook (obviously this was an immediate need. I mean, who doesn't need a SL book?), but the only good bookstore I know of is in Khan Market. As some of you know, the US, UK, Canadian, and Australian embassies have issued warnings of an "imminent terrorist attack" in Delhi's major markets--including Khan. Luckily, I have a roommate who researches South Asian terrorism for a living. Sam assured me that the attack would only occur between the hours of 5 and 8pm or on the weekend, because the terrorists want to kill as many people as possible. No point in attacking an empty market at 2pm on a weekday. In other words, if I wanted to go and not die, I had to go right then. So I did, and I'm still alive!
To get to Khan Market, I of course had to take an auto. Now, I had not taken an auto in a city where I can kind of speak the language in a month. In Kerala, the autowallahs only speak Malayalam, so my Hindi was rendered useless and I couldn't even hope to bargain. But here autowallahs speak Hindi! I cannot tell you how happy I was. A humongous goofy grin appeared on my face when I spoke the first Hindi words in a month. I giggled my way through the bargaining. The autowallah was utterly confused about why I was so happy-go-lucky. I think he thought I was high. And I was--high on Hindi! Hah. I got him down to Rs 30--only Rs 5 above the meter (that's the best anyone, including Indians, can hope for in Delhi). Apparently, I haven't lost my mad auto bargaining skillz!
After cheating death in Khan Market, I headed to Bhogal for some shopping and threading. I passed the
auto pimp's autostand, and all the autowallahs started yelling at me, "Hello madam! आप कहाँ
थी? [Aap kahan thi?/where were you?]" "मैं काम के लिए केरला में थी। [Main kaam ke liye Kerala mein thi./I was in Kerala for work.]" "
बहुत अच्छा!
हम खुश हैं कि आप वापस आई
! [Bahut achchha! Ham khush hain ki aap vaapas aayi!/Very good! We're glad you came back!]" I had pretty much identical conversations with the tailor, the threading ladies at the beauty parlor, the guys at Kadimi's (my favorite samosa place), and the convenience store owner. It was really nice that people remembered me and seemed happy to see me--it makes the neighborhood feel like home. I love Jangpura!
What I did not love, however, was the incredible amount of dust flying into eyes and covering my body this afternoon. Apparently I arrived back in Delhi just as the Loo is descending upon the city. And by "the Loo is descending," I do not mean a giant British toilet is raining shit on Delhi--though I'm not sure that would be much worse. The Loo is a dry westerly wind bringing in extremely high temperatures and mountain-loads of dust from Rajasthan's Thar Desert, and it occurs for a few hours every afternoon from May until the start of the monsoon in June. Some days the Loo will bring in so much dust it will create the illusion of an overcast sky. Oh, you thought the dark sky was clouds? Or at worst pollution? Wrong. It's DUST. And it's going to invade your apartment. Everything in my apartment is covered in a thin film of dust--despite daily dusting efforts--and I've read that we should put wet towels over our windows to reduce the dust when the Loo gets really bad. I've also read that we should not go outdoors during the afternoon Loo hours. It's only beginning and not terrible yet, but at its worst many animals and people die from heat exhaustion/strokes. The Loo is like the opposite of a cool sea breeze; it's the hot breeze of death. You can learn more about India's toilet wind on the all-knowing Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loo_%28wind%29 (yes, I know, I reference Wikipedia way too often on this blog. I fully intend to continue to do so.)
[On a tangent: I would like to summarize Delhi weather for you:December to February: cold winter (remember, no central heating in buildings) with fog so thick planes are grounded, trains move at a snail's pace, and I can't find my way home at night because I can't see across the street (not to mention the increase in pollution)late Feb - mid March: a few rare weeks of pleasant weathermid March - June: ridiculously hot summer, with temperatures reaching 120 degrees F and a daily afternoon hot dry wind carrying copious amounts of dust that can literally darken the sky and cause fatal heat exhaustionJune - September: monsoon season, with sticky humidity and heavy rains that flood the streets (except last summer when the monsoon was weak and Delhi stayed ridiculous dry and hot)October: still pretty hotNovember: the only pleasant month temperature-wise, but the pollution starts to get worseTo summarize the summary: fog/smog, heat the temperature of Hell, dust storms, street floods. In conclusion, Delhi may very well have the worst weather on the planet.]However, with the Loo comes mango season! Well, actually, the wind doesn't bring suspended or flying mangoes like it does dust particles. But the start of mango season just so happens to coincide. The main street of Bhogal is crawling with vendors selling mangoes and "mango shek" (mango shakes). Rumor has it the mangoes of early May aren't very good (don't ask me why, I don't understand these agricultural matters), but by late May they should be delicious!
Tonight I ate pizza and watched Zoolander with Alice and Pooja (neither of them had seen it!! I know,
completely unacceptable. Though Pooja couldn't get into the silly humor). You know that scene where Zoolander is being brainwashed and Mugatu pretends to be a little girl who loves child labor? And he mentions a bunch of countries that employ child labor while map outlines of those countries pop up? When he mentions India, the map outline includes Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan, despite mentioning Bangladesh separately! It also appears that Mongolia is included in the China map. I can't believe I never noticed this before, and I wonder if it's intentional or a mistake. See for yourself (pause at 1:32):
Anyway, obviously pizza + Zoolander + friends = the best evening I've had in a long time.
So I guess I'm happy to be back in Delhi? Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say
happy (did I mention the pollution and toilet wind??), but it's nice to be back.
