Report from India, Part 6: Day 2 Qutb Minar, Garden of 5 Senses + Dilli Haat

Qutb Minar was a large Mughal** complex that is reminiscent of the Greek Acropolis.

Macro mode!! and flowers :)

There were pillars and walls, a very large carved tower,

and fun nooks and crannies.

This is how we do windows :)

We were amused by the friendliness of some of the guards who offered to take pictures for us and showed us good spots. Without them we wouldn't have taken such 'typical' pictures (similar to the typical push over or cower beneath the falling Tower of Pisa), but there you go.

Only after the second guard took pictures and then asked for a tip, did we realize that their friendliness had a motive. We gave him some small change but then avoided guards after that.
Here are some of the beautiful carvings,

some of the strange chipmunk-squirrels that are everywhere,

The one on the right seems beat...

and some 'yog' in picturesque places (and, it's India! What better place than this?).

Last but not least was my favorite sighting here. See that girl in the middle (in red+green)? See what she's wearing? Yup, that's no sari or kurta. That's a dirndl (traditional German/Austrian dress...) Awesome. We come from Germany to India and this is what we find :)

The Garden of 5 Senses was not built up like a sensory path ('Here's a smell portion, here's a feel portion,' etc.), but all 5 senses were somehow involved.

There were sweetly-scented flowers,

The rightmost flowers look lovely, but the bark says don't get too close! In Argentina these trees are called 'palo borracho' (drunken stick)...so the question is, do drunk Argentines grow spines? Or do you just want to be extra careful around this stick when drunk? Who knows.

many plants and sculptures to see,

and a bell 'tree' which maybe rings sometimes, etc.

What most intrigued us about the garden was how many young couples we saw.

We were definitely the only white people there but we fit right in the age group. There were tons of niches and corners for couples to sit together. We wondered how dating works in India, what the young-people-getting-to-know-each-other culture is like. Were they here, because it wasn't acceptable for them to be together at home? Or here they could at least have some peace and quiet? Or was this just a favorite date spot? Who knows.

We also found amusing 'animals'--Snail Man,

a live camel!!,

stone elephants (one with his trunk in a knot)

and many birds of various 'species'.

In Dilli Haat (“Dilli” is the Hindi pronunciation of Delhi, “haat” means market) there were food and handicraft stalls from all over India.

There were many beautiful things, but too many insistent salesmen. Therefore we didn't take much time to linger and enjoy but kept a fairly brisk pace and only glanced left and right, lest we be attacked with henna or a rug or a bag or a sari or a stole or an elephant carving or a silk painting or, or, or....You get the idea. Still, we enjoyed some food (See the food post for day 2) and some lassis.


**Something interesting to note about Indian architecture and other 'high culture' artifacts is that many are not Hindu but actually Muslim. Quick, think of a building or other work that, for you, exemplifies India. Chances are you thought of the Taj Mahal or Red Fort or some other 'Indian'-looking building. Yes, these were built by Indians but not Hindu Indians.

F went to the Akshardam on his tour of Delhi before I got there, so we didn't go again, even though many suggested we should. It is a giant complex that was built in 2005. So, nothing ancient. It has a theater with a film about a Hindu saint, monuments to the Indian war 'heroes and martyrs', as they were called, a giant temple with a giant gold statue of a guru, etc. All very impressive and not problematic on their own, but taken together it creates a certain picture of the architect's intent. They seem to have the main agenda of saying: Look! Hinduism is cool too! F supposes that, because all of these other quintessentially Indian buildings are actually Muslim, they finally wanted something quintessentially Hindu.

However F found it noteworthy that at Akshardam the other Indians in his tourist group acted like tourists, even in the temple with the large sculptures, seeming to say 'Oh, this is interesting' and  were then ready to move on to the next attraction. But in the smaller Birla temple, there was an entirely different sense of devotion, a reverence and a desire to remain.