Sights, Smells, & Sounds

A recap of my first week in India

SIGHTS

Colorful and crowded. This is Central Market, a big market only a few blocks from my house where you can get almost anything you need, from clothes to kitchen appliances to jewelry.

SMELLS

There are five chief smells I’ve identified so far with India. The first is a particular scent that I associate with Indian people in the U.S., and it carries over to clothes and bedding here, too. The second is the food, which is amazing. I usually only notice this when I’m eating but I am hoping as I get out more that I will experience it more.

That was butter chicken...and it was awesome.

 The other three are not good smells. Some of the sidewalks, especially when they border a deserted lot or park, reek of urine. Imagine the worst area you walk past in D.C., multiple it by 10, and you might be getting close to the smell. There is also a terrible reek as I come out of the Jangpura metro station on my way to work. I believe it’s related to some sort of canal behind the metro that doesn’t seem to serve any purpose. It’s either the water or lots of people are going to the bathroom on the banks. It’s a pretty terrible smell, but after learning last month in IHL that 55% of people in Delhi don’t have access to a toilet, I’m not surprised.

The final smell is smoke. When I first wake up (~7am) the air is fine, but by the morning commute people have begun to smoke. It accumulates all day and the air just sits heavy with smoke. There are about 25 people on my floor at work and it seems like at any moment, someone is coughing. Later on, when the fireworks go off (it appears to be a daily thing around 10pm), you can feel that smoke in your lungs, too.

SOUNDS

The sounds Do. Not. Stop. There’s a continual chorus of car horns and rickshaw bells blended with vendors advertising their wares, punctuated by the occasional dog bark or parade. My third morning I asked my landlady about the melodic chant I heard each morning from down the block. Was it part of a religious ritual? She laughed very hard, and only when she recovered her breath did she tell me what he was saying: “Vegetables! Vegetables!”

Cars are another story. Honks are used as a basic form of communication – I’m behind you, I’m passing you – and “please honk” is written on the back of trucks. Because there are no lanes and bikes, autos (3 wheeled), cars, and trucks are constantly passing each other, there is non-stop honking. Also, all cars beep constantly as they back up, and drivers do plenty of the New York-style leaning on the horn when the car in front isn’t moving. Some scooters have a funny duck honk, but the rest are pretty annoying.

(my rickshaw pics so far are blurry, so I'll add one later)

Rickshaw drivers ring a bell as they pass if they are looking for a customer. They also slow down and come rather close, which can be disconcerting at first. It seems they ring the most at women, and I’ve been getting a lot of attention, probably because I look lost and foreign (which is often true).

Several times around 5pm what sounded like a parade passed by my work, but it’s the next block over, and I haven’t been able to figure it out yet. I’ll investigate further next week.

Home is a little bit quieter where I am staying with a landlady. My room is on the roof, and the building behind is under construction, so there is a dull roar that occasionally peaks into annoying from approximately 5am – 11pm daily. I’m guessing they work such long shifts to complete construction during this ideal weather. During dinner my landlady flips from a soap opera to Big Boss (Indian Real World) to Kaun Banega Crorepati (Who Wants to Be a Millionaire) and there is lots of random Bollywood music.