INDIA: Day 3--Delhi, a City of Cities

Rajeev, our guide for our day in Delhi, is probably one of most-learned men we have ever met. On our drive through rush-hour traffic to Old Delhi, he told us that Delhi is a city of many smaller cities. Old Delhi was built during the same era of the emperor under whom the Taj Mahal was built. Old Delhi, with more than 3 million residents, has 10,000 people per kilometers, making it seem very congested. Monkeys also add to the congestion because our guide informed us that man had invaded the monkeys' habitat and not vice versa.

After Indonesia, India has the world's second largest Muslim population. Our guide quoted Martin Luther King, "It is Jesus who gave us the message but Mahatma Gandhi who gave us the method." Gandhi encouraged people to give up their jobs and join his movement. Because he promoted nonviolence, women joined his movement in large numbers.

Our guide told us that he would not need to tell us when we crossed from New Delhi, where our hotel was located, to Old Delhi--we would know immediately. We certainly did. Old Delhi had been a walled city and had a very different feeling from the modern New Delhi. Our first stop was the Red Fort, which was built in 1639 until the reign of the same ruler when the Taj Mahal was built. Forts in India were basically palaces but were constructed to look like a fort on the outside. The Mughals ruled very effectively in India. When they conquered an area, they let the existing rulers remain in power and pay a large tax. Fighting was very civilized with a bugle being blown to start and stop the battles. A skilled soldier could shoot 12 arrows per minute.

India did and still does consider itself a subcontinent of Asia because it is cut off from the Orient by the Himalayas. Visitors enter the Red Fort through a "covered bazaar," a mall of shops outside the fort that started when stores were established to sell milk and other essentials after the British destroyed most of the palaces and built barracks following World War II. The caste system in India is part of the Hindu society in which young people had to learn a trade from their family, and the country had a different caste for each trade. Our guide explained to us that India is like a big onion with so many layers to peel. The citizens speak 1,652 languages and dialects.

In the fort, all the flowers on the outside walls used to be gold gilded. The inlay work on the benches consisted of precious and semi-precious stones in white marble completed by Indians who were wonderful masons. In the Hall of Public Audience (Diwan-i-Am), the king, seated on a gold throne, received the general public and heard grievances on which he passed judgment. While the gold throne was no longer there, neither were the beautifully woven oriental rugs and hanging tapestries. A moat around the fort kept out unwanted visitors.

After leaving the Red Fort, we were treated to a bicycle rickshaw ride to the Mosque. Try to imagine being driven down narrow streets with cars, other bicycles and motorbikes coming at you in all directions, while you are whirling past the most amazing array of shops selling everything and anything. You need to hang on for dear life and pray that your driver will not hit anyone else and no one else will bang into you. Amazingly, we did not see any vehicle accidents in Delhi!

Because it was Friday, we could not enter the 17th century mosque, built under the rule of the same king who was on the throne when the Taj Mahal was constructed. The mosque holds between 25,000 and 50,000 worshipers. To call the people to prayers, a blind man was sent to the top of the minaret because the women were often in the open courtyards in their homes so a blind man could not see them.

Next we stopped at a government shop for what we have termed the "Sorry Sari Saga." The four women climbed up on a platform where the sales clerks showed us how to wrap a sari (also seen spelled as "saree" and "sare." While Pat, Kay and Diana were treated to one-colored saris with beads, sequins and brightly colored stitching, the clerk told Sara that she had a "print personality," so she was wrapped and pleated into a blue and green floral pattern. No one bought a sari.

The most memorable stop on our tour was Raj Ghat, the place where Mahatma Gandhi was cremated after he was assassinated in 1948 at age 79. In the center of the park is the black granite block on the spot where he was cremated with a flame that was added later. More than 5 million people attended his funeral. Today people from all over the world come there to pay homage to him. One of Gandhi's many memorable quotations is, "The villages is my world for all my material needs. The world is my village for my spiritual needs." After the cremation, the close family members come back to the site the next day and shift through the ashes for small pieces of bone. Sixteen days later they travel to a river and scatter the remains--water to water, because the Hindus believe in five elements: air, water, fire, earth and ether. If they travel on a bus, the relatives purchase a seat for the urn.

We had a photo stop at the Gate of India, which was built to honor the 90,000 Indian soldiers who died during World War I. Our last stop was Humaijuni's Tomb, the first specimen of Mughal architecture in India, which is called the "Taj Mahal of Delhi." As we walked through the double gates, we watched as the dome seemed to disappear as we came closer. Yes, that is a Star of David on the arch because the Muslims have never denied that David was a prophet. This tomb was built after Humaijuni's death by his senior wife who was a Persian so it reflected much Persian influence. When the Muslims in the eastern hemisphere die, their faces are turned to the west to face Mecca.

On our way back to our hotel in an upscale section of New Delhi, we marveled at what we had seen in India to date--the good, the bad, the ugly, the sad, the unthinkable and the unspeakable. Our guide commented that "in India, you not only see poverty but you see despairity and you also see contentment."