Houses built upon the stacking principle, narrow lanes, wide entrances of the doors, moghul style air vents at one side of the walls of the rooms, Very high ceilings , two wooden partitions making a complete gate are some of the obviously observable traits. Apart from these, milling crowd which isn't milling by the way,people bumping into each other, tongas still plying in the alleys, a place where a pedometer of a man can easily beat the odometer of any vehicle.
Also its a commercial hub, whole sellers, intense business activities originate from here and regulating the inflow of currency in the market and contributing to the change of the micro economic variables to quite an extent.
Why am I writing all this?
yesterday I got a chance to explore the innards of this subset of old delhi.
A series of long twisted and intersecting lanes make this part of the city. I felt some kind of dampness in the air there. It was anachronistic .I closed my eyes and allowed my mind to settle down and produce a clearer image. Then I looked upward. I expected the background to get changed to sepia and me time travelling to the era, when the buildings there spoke of their owner. I found people busy in their chores.divide on the basis of religion was unknown here.
Some small kids scampered along the alley, their mothers calling them out and cursing them.
Street food is more mouth watering and worth savoring then ever here.on peeping through I can easily spot the oil wicks hanging in the middle of almost every room. seeing me is a female from a balcony above, a women ,a fair skinned as implicit by her face, her head covered with black robe like cloth,large black metal danglers are hanging majestically from her ears and she is smiling all the way looking at me.
Just then a pushcart, gave me a slight shove and this day dream at chawri came to an abrupt end.
