This photo gets two labels: it's a bike shop (knife sharpening) but it also qualifies under Ed's mini-series of cool people doing cool stuff - he took it. Notice it's a chef who is having his knives sharpened ...
Around the corner from our house, Durga Puja Park has come into its own with the installation of this Durja Puja pandal or display to celebrate this important festival. Durga is the female goddess - extremely powerful and the counterfoil to the male gods, Vishnu, Shiva and Brahma. No one messes with Durga.
During the festival, devotees fast for nine days and on the last day the images of the goddess are immersed in water. It's actually celebrated twice a year, once at the beginning of the summer and once at the beginning of the winter. It's most prevalent in Western India, but it seems to be celebrated all over (except maybe not in the South). For the winter Durga Puja, the last day also coincides with Dussehra - more on that in a couple of days.
I'm not sure whether I wrote about it before or not, but Hindustan Motors has ceased production of our beloved Ambassador cars. For now, there are still fleets of black Ambassador taxis in Delhi (and yellow ones in Kolkata - see Day 500) but I imagine they will disappear before too long. They're already being replaced by small Maruti vans. I'll try and post a picture of one of these soon so you can appreciate my disappointment.
The inevitable has finally happened - the house opposite us is being demolished and a new one will be built in its place ... construction is the plague of south Delhi. Luckily so far it hasn't been too noisy, but I may eat my words ...
I visited a Catholic church near the hotel I was staying in, built in the early 1900s. There were stalls selling candles outside, in different shapes. Apparently people buy a candle in the shape of the thing that they want, then burn the candle inside the church to invoke their desires. Common shapes are children, houses, cars and offices. What shape would you want to buy?
Meanwhile I have returned from Chandigarh and am now in Mumbai. I'm used to seeing cows, chickens, pigs, horses, camels and elephants (more rarely) in the city. But this was the first time I'd ever seen sheep, surrounded by people and traffic, just wandering around.
Ed has joined a group called 'Seven cities' which takes turns doing tours of the seven historical cities that have been absorbed into Delhi over the centuries. This is of a visit they did to Begumpuri Mosque. Ed's group is leading the tour to the Civil Lines area of Old Delhi ... more on that soon.
Chandigarh today for a convocation to celebrate the achievements of the Master Trainers on our project in Punjab. I somehow ended up at the train station an hour before the train was due to leave, at six o'clock in the morning. Ugh. The platforms were full of life, as always.
I went to Le Meridien hotel today to have my hair cut. It's a very odd hotel: the design brief seems to have been'70s / space age'. I took the lift to the salon. The elevator music was the James Bond theme.
I have a feeling I've mentioned the shoe thing before but I liked this painting of one on the back of a truck. Drivers hang shoes or paint pictures of them onto their vehicles to ward off the evil eye. It's the same thing as the chillies and limes thing that I mentioned on Day 194.
Having jinxed myself by thinking on the way home a week earlier that we never, ever seem to get ill ... the whole family was struck down with a variety of illnesses. Three days off school for Louie, one day off for Oslo, two days in bed for Ed and one day off work for me.
I've mentioned these samosas before, but I think good to tell you about them again as they are an occasional treat on my way home after a long day at the office ... and despite its blurriness I quite like this photo.
I loved this patterned vinyl seat covering inside the auto I took home this evening. It's a bit grubby but so brilliant!
I'm posting this on the wrong day because it's taken at a restaurant I went to with some friends called Indian Accent - hailed as one of the most innovative restaurants in the country. Anyway, we had the tasting menu and one of the courses is this pomegranate kulfi, served in a teeny tiny pressure cooker. That's a teaspoon next to it. So cute!
Ed took the boys to this new pump track with our friends Matt and Baz. It's a bit of a drive away but they loved it. Apparently it isn't better than the one at Welshmill, Fromies will be glad to hear.
The Hindi transcription here is, as usual, not translated, just transliterated. I always think that's funny.
Apparently there's a book of Indian matchbox designs. I'm going to ask for it for my birthday.
We finally got around to framing the textiles that I bought at the shop I mentioned on Day 497. They look great. I'm in love with the carved wood that we found to make the frames. I'll try and remember to take another picture of them with a bit of context for a later post ...
It was nice being back in camel country again. I think camels are my favourite animals.
We also visited some schools to see the educational programmes being watched and speak to the teachers. We popped into a couple of classes for younger students where they are using a relatively new method of teaching based on the 'activity based learning' approach started in the South of India. The children work in small groups using prepared materials, according to a set sequence which they follow through pictures on a chart. At the moment the method is being used only in early primary and for learning Gujarati, environment studies and maths.
I was in Gujarat for a couple of days this week, looking at different technology that are being used in education. It was very interesting. This is a studio where educational programmes are made and beamed out to schools in several districts around one of the largest cities in the state, Ahmedabad.
Another day, another matchbox. 'Chameli' is the Hindi word for jasmine. It's interesting that they didn't translate it when they wrote it in English.
We had 'brunch' (I hate that word!) at a friends' house today, stopping at this flower stall en route. The boys were more interested in a very intact and very large dead frog that was just in front of it. I couldn't bring myself to take a photo of it.
In other activity news, a new indoor climbing wall has opened. It also has a trapeze, Sophy :-)
We're now on our third Taekwondo teacher, this time in a properly set up 'dojo', but with the disadvantage of being completely the other side of town ... let's see how long we last. Oslo is standing next to one of his best friends from school. He is Korean. In Korea, your age is calculated differently, with the day you are born counting as '1'. It all gets rather confusing and we're still not 100% sure whether Oslo's friend is a year old or a year younger than him. However, he is definitely shorter.
