Old Delhi

After or visit to Jama Mashid, we head off to the Red Fort where we had a great Indian lunch in a very nice restaurant in the Fort gardens. Food was delicious; we had spicy rice, chicken and paneer served in beautiful bronze plates. We enjoyed the Red Fort very much. It was very pleasant to walk in the gardens along the palaces. A big group of students found us looking at them and they called us to pose with them in their pictures. We had thousands of pictures taken with them.

Then we decided to explore Chandni Chowk in search of the Indian bazaars with spices and silver and all the nice things I had read. A guy in a rickshaw found us lost in the middle of the crowd he asked us if we wanted to go to the spices market. We felt relief that we did not have to find the way ourselves, so said yes and sat quite amused in the rickshaw. He took a picture of Borja driving the rickshaw and Julian and I sitting behind, and then he drove us all the way down the road to tell us at the very end that the spice market was closed because it was Sunday. The driver was so nice and smiley, that I could not feel annoyed with him. I could not help but think of how difficult life must be for a rickshaw driver. I think he was happy with the rupees I gave him, but still he chased us for over one hour while we were walking through the Muslim street shops, asking us if we wanted to visit other places of interest. Julian was tired and felt like going back to the hotel and rest, but Borja and I were fascinated, and although we were also exhausted, and the Muslim street shops were not what we expected to see, we did not want to miss a thing so we kept walking along the street looking everything at every single shop. Julian was very patient, I must say. We passed by some interesting places though, like two men behind a counter in the middle of the street filling plastic colorful cups with water for the people passing by. We also found some marble stairs leading to a temple, and in the entrance many Indians washed their feet in the running water to prepare for prayer.

After our visit to the Old Delhi, we met Jitu and Mrinalika in a fancy shopping center where we had dinner and a great time with them both. I suppose it is still difficult for them to understand why we enjoy the Old Delhi much more that any modern and fancy shopping center, but it was interesting to see the contrast. It was hard to believe that we were still in the same city. Then we went back to the hotel to get ready for our visit to Agra the next day.