If there were ever a place to overwhelm your senses, it would be New Delhi. We came here wanting something completely new and different, and I think that’s what we got. It’s also exhausting.
From the heat, to the people constantly coming up to you to trying to get you to buy goods or follow them, to the traffic and the honking, figuring out what you can and can’t eat and drink, the pollution, and the noise. All of it, wonderfully stimulating. It’s no wonder yoga was able to evolve in a place like this! Staying present is easy with so much going on.
Joe was feeling under the weather, so I spent the day exploring New Delhi by foot. Within five minutes of walking, I’d already had two people come up to me to start friendly conversations. Inevitably, you reach a point in the discussion where they tell you you can’t go where you’re trying to go, and they try to divert you to the marketplace or tourism office. At first this caught me off guard, but eventually it became easier to distance myself from these people and actually understand what was going on. I actually asked one of the guys who came up to me in the afternoon about how the system worked. He was my age, and he said they received commission 2-5% commission for taking people to stores if they bought products. We chatted for a little while about our respective lives before we went on our separate ways. Knowing it was just a way of getting people into stores and not something nefarious made it easier to deal with the ongoing stream of people who approached.
I regrouped at the hotel in the afternoon before heading out again. I found a good looking place to eat lunch and had a delicious daal curry with naan and rice. Two local women at the table next to me gave me some recommendations for places to visit in northern India, and I thanked them before heading north to Kaser Walan and a long stretch of market there. There was an incredible amount going on–people, shops, dogs, cats, monkeys, every smell imaginable. It was certainly the change of pace we came to India looking for.
The constant bustle, though, is overwhelming. I collapsed into bed early at night. I’m happy to see New Delhi, but it also seems clear that it’ll be easier to get a feel for the local culture in more rural places instead of big cities.