The little comic shop. All of us knew one such. We use to go there and
find indescribable treasures. And then life went on the fast lane and
we stopped turning the corner where the little shop used to be.
Sometimes we wanted to, but it was too small a corner of too small a
street and cars would not go there. So we forgot all about it.
The little shop stopped waiting for us too and turned a page and the
chapter said, The End.
We need those little comic shops. Those little hidden gems in the
small corners of the small streets. They make our lives interesting
and turn our travels into adventures.
Let's get out of our cars and let's walk. Let's walk a new street,
turn a new corner and discover a new comic shop, a cake shop, a
curiosity shop, a hidden little place in our big little world, every day
Hemant
Walking in Delhi
(by Anvita Lakhera)
To ask someone to walk in Delhi sounds preposterous and is often dismissed with a laugh. That was the reaction we got from our friend when we walked for the last time in Delhi. It was 2004. The event wasn’t so momentous that we’d record the date but it so happened that we left Delhi after a few months. So the stroll from Saket to Aurobindo Place Market on a winter afternoon is the last time we walked purely for the pleasure of walking in Delhi. The soft afternoon sun, the smell of roasting peanuts, small thelas piled with cheap woolens, even the languidly moving traffic seemed to add to the pleasure probably because we could navigate it so easily and quickly. We would have loved to say that the skeptic friend became a convert but in reality he too remembers the walk for precisely the same reasons as us.
Another memorable walk was some 10 years earlier when the IIT U special didn’t turn up and the three of us, all girls, decided to walk to Pragati Maidan from Pandara Road to catch the Noida special. That too was winter and Delhi looked so beautiful in the liquid sunlight that we ended up walking all the way to Miranda House for we were only nineteen and Sociological theory wasn’t something we looked forward to first thing in the morning. And what a wonderful walk it was. There were a few strange looks but for the most part we completed our journey unmolested, which is commendable considering one can’t walk a few steps without fending off unnecessary comments and unwarranted glances these days. The fact that we had clearly demarcated space to walk for the most part too helped. We tried to recreate the journey in the opposite direction but it was monsoon and that year safety of women was a major news item. So we caught the bus back home from ITO.
Having lived for over 12 years in Delhi we walked in all kinds of weather for all kinds of reasons. Along ruins, in gardens among chrysanthemums and roses, under Peepul trees with their leaves turning pink, up and down the Delhi University campus eating bhelpuri, on Prithviraj Road with bats for company, in Sanjay Van with the twisted Vilayati Keekar creating a mini Mordor, along roads densely packed with cars honking and the auto rickshaw we had abandoned getting swallowed by the smoke, on Kamraj Marg when the Amaltas colours the sidewalk gold, in Tughlaqabad with the moneys watching us even as we watched them, in JNU under the trees singing in the rain, to Khan Market to Aurobindo Place. A million walks in a city that seemed to be best explored on foot to enjoy its timeless beauty. But that was before Delhi became the city of a million roads and nowhere to go.
The only regret. Never being able to enjoy a walk along the Yamuna to truly appreciate the city that was built beside a river.
I shot this video walking along a pedestrian path from panchsheel park to savitri cinema in Delhi. It was heaped with building material and left me no space to walk.
Not to seem dramatic, while I attempted this feat, three cars and a bus narrowly missed running into me. Right then, I noticed the path giving way to a structure. Saw a similar one across the street. Put two and two together to discover a subway…an empty subway.
Wonder, whether it is the crime in the city or the time of the day that kept people away.
About a year back, we brought our daughter a cycle. It was a sleek sports model and our daughter was not beyond flaunting it. She took a few rounds of the cooperative society, we stay in, to show off. And then zipped of to the nearby market...actually she wanted to. But she stood no chance.
It was different in the mid 1980s. We stayed in Rajinder Nagar in West Delhi. Cycling down the Shanker Road which bisected Old and New Rajinder Nagar was amongst our after school pleasures. There was little traffic: a few buses, some trundling ambassadors and their somewhat swifter cousins, the fiat. The Maruti was yet to become a fixture in middle class homes: in fact, you would have been apt to see an hapless specimen broken down somewhere in the middle of the road.
We walked to school three kms away, and walked back home, swinging our school bags in gay abandon. Our daughter takes the school bus, on days she misses it, she insists being driven in our bright red Santro...her school too is 3 kms away.
We rarely walk, ourselves. Even a trip to the market about a km away is on a rickshaw, sometimes we even take the car. After all it makes no sense to lug in groceries. Our morning walks have almost stopped since a speeding Honda City, knocked my wife down. A few weeks in the hospital she was wiser. So was I.
Its sad but true that most people walking the streets of Agra have come to accept the littered sidewalks and indisciplined horn blowing motorists. The stench from the numerous open sewage drains too we have now come to accept. But what angers me is the fact that despite the number of pedestrians on the streets, like most Indian cities, Agra authorities are hacking down old trees which gave respite from the heat.
MG road was once a pleasure trip. Now there is lack of signage and traffic indiscipline. This makes it doubly difficult to cross busy junctions.
I think we just have traffic issues in Agra. Otherwise personally I have no complaints. Ok it's not quite London but its my city.
I am 73 years old and although my son has provided for a vehicle, I choose to walk to the market each day. The old city was built in a manner conducive for walking; it was a lifestyle. The planning authorities and youth of today lack this 'walking gene'.
There should be a research project in Delhi to identify pedestrian and cycle barriers and then a commitment on the part of the government to address them. You need a mass education and awareness campaign to reverse the 'imperialistic' attitude of drivers towards other road users - something as big as Gandhi's movement needs to tackle this (could the driver who does not observe signals and pedestrian crossings be likened to some of the more chauvanistic members of the British Raj - their attitude is probably just as dangerous.....??!!).
Having said that I think many of the colonies in Delhi are very good for pedestrians and cyclists as there are few long straight stretches and plenty of junctions where the right of way is unclear. This forces drivers to think, something the state often does too much on their behalf in my country (UK). A few traffic calming treatments here and there and they could be like 'woonerf' in Holland.
I used to cycle to school till I was in class tenth.So did all my classmates. By the time we reached higher secondary, most of my contemporaries riding on their above average showing in the board exams were demanding for bikes and scooties.
The school had to build extra sheds to cater to this sudden spurt in two-wheelers, so much so that the teachers didn't have any space to park their vehicles!
The school administration has recently responded by passing a decree not allowing students to drive to school...in an attempt to discourage under age driving.
Well now, most of us are driving outside school. There is so much to do, running errands for parents, coaching classes (you need to start out much earlier if you want to travel by bus).
Guess, the problem can't be solved by a simple memorandum issued by some authority. Its about rethinking the signs with which we associate achievement and progress.
I grew up in Delhi - I have been used to going to school 40 minute commute either way - but the best respite was cycling - The morning /evening walk to the nearby park was so important( we would spend hours playing there laughing at people going for a walk in their cars) Now we laugh at ourselves - there is no way one can walk down your own lane. Loud horns, speeding cars - people behaving like hooligans- living in a south Delhi colony is pure hell.
I now have a small child - taking her to the nearby park is an impossibility.
People have to be dealt with the way Chinese do - implement a law that forbids people to honk and drive so fast in colonies. We have all voted but anybody who dares to implement such a law will be vetoed in no time - can we not all agree to decide and do something to live and let live
The little comic shop. All of us knew one such. We use to go there and
find indescribable treasures. And then life went on the fast lane and
we stopped turning the corner where the little shop used to be.
Sometimes we wanted to, but it was too small a corner of too small a
street and cars would not go there. So we forgot all about it.
The little shop stopped waiting for us too and turned a page and the
chapter said, The End.