Delhi 2005

When Virgin Atlantic added a free ticket to my frequent flyer account, as a result of the number of flights I had made with them in the previous 12 months, Marisol & I decided to treat ourselves to another trip to Delhi, to spend some time with Dad and Mum, who were apparently feeling a bit lonely due to our beloved Aunt and Uncle Ji having departed for a long stay in Australia to sort out their visa requirements to be able to freely visit our cousins in Sydney.

Mamaji & Dad

As it turned out later the missing Uncles decided to return to India just in time to coincide with our trip, which made our stay much more eventful (as you will see in a minute). Even more useful was the last minute requirement for me to do some work at a company that we are doing some collaborative work with in Delhi, and whose offices are about a half hour drive from Dad’s place. This meant that I could charge a couple of my days in Delhi as work, and that there would be a hefty contribution from Air Products towards the cost of our trip.

As on previous occasions our trip was pretty hectic and a few stories will get your travel juices flowing. It was nice and warm, and we felt as if on a summer holiday. Delhi was looking beautiful, a lot cleaner than in the past, even old Delhi looked positively charming.

                                 An Old Delhi mansion.

Kalka Ji Market above

(Soon to be like Shanghai?) 

Marisol’s purchases

It became clear early on that Marisol wanted all sorts of exotic items to bolster the installations she is usually known to dream up. We were walking down the Chandni Chowk part of the Old Delhi, when she spied a Clock shop. Wanting to purchase some clear domes for displaying her ceramics she walked in and asked if she could purchase five ‘anniversary’ clocks, (would have to be ordered), and if she could leave the clocks behind and just take the domes!! This was obviously beyond the shop staff’s understanding. Later Marisol managed to get something approaching domes without the contents.

Another trip to the local market was devoted to looking for some rat trapping cages! And yet another for bird cages!! Imagine if someone at the customs opened Marisol’s suitcase and found all this weird stuff! I could imagine being considered insane.

The display cases in use (Broken Hearts) at                                       ....and the Rat Cage in use in the same exhibition

Marisol's Hidden Voices exhibition in London                                                                   (Trapped Memories)

Executive Club

Now Uncle Ji is a very socially and businessly active person and with his contacts come a few perks such as the membership of many clubs around Delhi. As we were planning to spend one of the days of our trip on an outing with the folks, the Uncles suggested we should have lunch at the Executive Club, of which they were members. We decided to visit one of the Sikh shrines in Delhi in the morning then head for the Lunch. We ordered a large Toyota, to take the six of us around and headed for the shrine. At India gate, not far from our destination the driver seemed to lose concentration at a crucial moment and bumped into a car which braked suddenly in front of him. As it happens there was also a policeman nearby, and needless to say there were several doubts about our driver’s license and registration papers. The other car appeared to have seen better days and may even have improved its appearance with the bump. The policeman appeared to be rubbing his hands in anticipation and our driver looking as if he was in for a long day, when Mamaji (usually a reliable arbitrator) decided take a hand. We don’t know what resources Mamaji used but within a couple of minutes we were back on the road on our way.

Bangla Sahib                                                Fojan (forces)                 Volunteers                                                   Boys

The shrine visit went off without further mishaps apart from the amazing sight of hundreds of volunteers trying to pour concrete, without the help of any machines, to help with the construction of a large underground car park adjacent to the shrine.

Now we headed for the Eclub, and we drove for what appeared to be ages out of Delhi, until I almost believed we were near to Agra (150 miles away). Finally we see a sign for the club still 3 Kms away. It took for ever to get down narrow tracks, out in the back and beyond, before we arrived at the gate of a disappointing looking collection of buildings, with a reasonable sized lawn, and a few people like us present to have lunch.

The Sun was blazing and we needed shades that kept falling on us and one shade was being propped up with a fork (no less) but still some of us were in the sun. Finally we moved to a shaded corner, and placed our orders. For some reason most things that Dad wanted to order were not available. Fish, Mutton and Dad’s favourite Ice cream – we joked endlessly about these. Everything tastes great specially to us the visitors. The afternoon was rescued by Mom and Aunty ji winning prizes in an unexpected game of Tombola (AKA Bingo).

Auntyji at the Executive Club                                                   And Mom at Home.

Shanni Devta

As you go around Delhi, and we did this a lot usually in a Taxi, and whenever you are stopped at a traffic light, you are likely to be met with a fair selection of magazine sellers, beggars, and people just asking for your contribution to a temple. Usually this can be a photo opportunity for the foreign visitor, however the plight of these citizens trying to make a meagre living by these means is not to be treated lightly. Often on our outings I offered pens and pencils to little kids, but usually got blank stares, or quizzical looks as if asking ‘what would I do with that’. Every so often a kid would nod and we would hand over the pen.

On one such occasion a boy who may have been in his early teens offered a home made temple for us to make a donation. There was a small vessel with a figure cut out of a flattened tin which had been cut in such a way that it sat on the rim of the vessel. There was a liquid in the vessel and neither Marisol or I had any idea what the arrangement meant, except that it was a Hindu deity, and a contribution was being solicited.

Marisol at once asked me to ask the kid if he would give the tin cut-out to Marisol for ten rupees. After a few words, the kid surrendered a somewhat dirty but curious deity to Marisol. At this point the Taxi driver asked us if we knew what we had bought. As we confessed our ignorance he proceeded to tell us all about the Shanni Devta.

The Shanni Tin cutout                                           Marisol at the Shanni shrine in a temple.

The deity gives the name to the Hindi word for Saturday, and is considered one of the most powerful of the twelve principal deities of Hinduism. Shanni was the son of the Sun, who abandoned his child, which was adopted by Shiva and Parvati, who heaped many powers on this deity. Shanni flourished in the Shiva fold, married and was a very devoted to spiritual pursuits. One day the wife came to talk to Shanni, but found him deep in contemplation. She waited patiently for a long time, but as Shanni showed no signs of opening his eyes, she got angry and put a curse on her husband. The curse was that when Shanni opened his eyes, anything he looked at would be destroyed.

That is exactly what happened, and Shanni kept his gaze down and would not look directly at anything. When Ganesh was born to Shiva and Parvati, they invited everyone to come and bless the child, including Shanni, who sent his apologies saying he wished no harm to the child. Shiva assured him that Ganesh would be strong enough for any harmful spells and that Shanni should come. Reluctantly Shanni agreed, however when he looked at Ganesha, the child’s head severed from the body to great embarrassment for Shanni.

The fact that Ganesha is always represented with an elephant’s head is said to be because Shiva ordered that if a child could be found whose mother slept with her back to the child, then that child’s head could be transferred to Ganesha. And the only mother in the land who could be found sleeping in this non-maternal position was an elephant! Shanni also received the power to be able to see with his heart, but more practically is expected to look at reflection in a pool of liquid instead of looking at anything directly.

Fast Forward…In London I looked up the story on the Internet, only to find that the published tale is quite different, and poor Shanni has been framed by a variation on the story. In the other story Shiva is supposed to have got angry with Ganesh and did the ‘deed’ himself.

Khirki Gaon, Khoj and Puja Sood

Having met Uppinder’s friend Puja, who turned out to be someone who was a friend of some artists we know in London, we decided to look her up this time also. Marisol was quite interested to attend an evening of presentations by various artists in residence at the art studios, and several Indian artists had also been invited. We had our trusted Taxi driver (not thankfully the one with the mishaps in the earlier story). When we explained where we wanted to go, he asks ‘is it the same place where I took you last time you were here!!’. No matter he had no idea where we had gone last year. Khirki Gaon (in Hindi Window Village). It took uo 2 hours to find the place. Its in the middle of nowhere literally, and the roads have no names and can not be really called roads. So noone knew where, there was only a reference to a temple, and you know how many temples there are in Delhi. Even when we were at the temple it was touch and go if we could find the location.

Any way we arrived, the session was already going, there was too much noise from the street, and the birds in the trees in the courtyard were celebrating the sun down in a noisy style. After a while the birds became quiet and it was time for the Mosquito attack!! The artist presentations are only a distant memory. A Mexican artist was showing a clip from Gladiators, where he had removed all humans from the clip except the Gladiator. Seemed sort of interesting but a lot of work for no purpose. His story was to remove all rental videos & DVDs from a certain area of the town and replace them with his modified versions. We had some Pakoras, Tea and left early. Pooja and some other artists we know in delhi are trying to put a Delhi Biennale Art event together. Marisol will be interested in participating I am sure.

Pali & Co, Exhibition of Anu's work at the Habitat                     The Gang out for a dinner (Dad's Invitation)

In between we met up with Pammi, Chanda and the boys and Pali and his family plus various other family folks. I made it to the offices of Technip India, and did my work, and we did the usual rounds of the markets in Lajpat Nagar, Dilli Haat, Hauz Khas Village and Connaught Place. I also made a few calls at the Internet shop near home where the installations need to be seen to be believed. They worked though, even though you could not read the letters on many of the keyboards. It was 30 degrees, and it hot and sweaty in the basement, but it was cheap, and when the equipment worked it was good, though Fire safety was non-existent.

Chappals in Lajpat Nagar Market                                                    Marisol buying Glass Bottles in Old delhi

Now we are safely back in Epsom, and looking at all the photos and video images, enjoying the after taste. Marisol has a fever, and we are sort of hoping that its nothing  to do with trip, or the fact that because we felt ill from taking them, we had stopped taking the malaria pills before departing for India, hoping that as Dad had said that there was no known cases of malaria in Delhi yet.

 So there you are, another Delhi trip safely over (I hope). Next time Mom and dad will hopefully come our way, and we will continue the meetings in Europe and in thye US. We also extend our invitation to Uppinder and Paramjeet, so that they can come and see us, and if possible make it to our Spanish connections, which would be a great event, considering that only Jasvinder, Birinder and the ladies have met our folks in Laredo, and Montse is the only one who has met everyone in our family.

 Arvinder & Marisol in Epsom, March 2005.