Thursday, June 25, 2009

Dilli-Willi

It’s a colorful city…Dilli…but different, very different from my Calcutta. There is literally too much of color here…one wakes up to the howling of car alarms…and sees multiple of them lined up and glistening in the sun…so very different from the coconut trees and rickshaws that greeted Calcutta mornings…as always, I love some things, and I hate some…no middles please…

I love the wide, wide roads, the chat and paneer tikka, the green, lush parks with the Dhillon and Bindra aunties in chiffon salwars and Reebok shoes…the slim, slim maidens with baby clips and i-pods intact…markets full of lovely earrings, shoes, bags..(err…here I go! )...all very colorful indeed…to the extent of a slight overdose…

But the breeze here hardly picks up…like the mad gust in Calcutta…there are hardly any road-side golgappa shops…rickshaws aren’t that great either…and there are of course no Calcutta-mark Mishti Doi and Rassagolla available...These are testing times I say!

Chopra Aunty is great! I love her temper and her jhappis...The only problem is her Tommy (Tommy dear, I have been with many sweet pets…but you’re the rowdiest of all Tommies I have ever seen…)...her son comes a close second…read my blog you…(did anyone say moron?)…and see how I can’t stand you for some reason…

I have just about begun loving this independence…the impromptu cooking of French-fries at 2 a.m., the rounds of carom all night, the discussions, agony-aunt sessions, confessions till dawn, learning up the varieties of mangoes and buying them after haggling too!...not to forget Chopra Aunty’s recipes of Butter Chicken and Dahi Chicken, which, by-the-way, I don’t need being a veggie…

I am of course the same…though I did land up here thinking I was a naayika straight out of a Sarat Chandra novel…going to live stoically, quietly, in self-exile…but some things never change…so here I go…jabbering again…working, shopping…cooking….of course putting up with neighbors in florescent-orange night-gowns…and Chopra Aunty’s recipes and lo!...I hear our dear, ol’ Tommy barking again…

3 comments:

shah_of_blah said...

Simply awesome

Monica said...

jodi mishti khete ichche hoi, GK1 er M Block Marketae Annapurna Sweets try korte paaro, kimba CR Park-er Main Market-er duto dokaan aache...dutoi bhalo!

BTW Delhi has its own charm!!!! Nostalgia nostalgia :-)

Iridescent ... said...

@ Shah of Blah- Thanks.

@ Monica- Thanks a lot :-)