Learning the Ropes

We spent the afternoon in Daryagang—visiting publisher’s bookshops. There is one street in Old Delhi where Oxford, Cambridge and the big Indian distributor, Manohar, have their shops. These stores are packed with books—many of which are suffering from the massive amounts of dust that plague this city. Daud knows all these booksellers as he spends quite a bit of time here whenever he comes, and we had fun just poking around the shelves. Even here the books are only organized by topic, not by author.

From here we had difficulty finding an auto rickshaw to take us to the Siri Fort area, apparently they thought it was too far away. We’ve had this trouble once before, and it makes you wonder what the drivers are after. Short distances would seem to earn them less money. I’ve heard that in some Old Delhi areas auto rickshaws are banned because they clog up traffic. And maybe there are some rules about picking up people, even if you are driving through. However, it reminds us that we need to have a better sense of the city, since we always assume that we will have transportation home. Ultimately we did find someone who would take us to Kahn market to meet up with Daud’s friend, Nilanjan. He had a car and driver, and he was surprised that we were trying to get around by auto-rickshaw. He is an editor for Routledge and has lived for long stretches in England. It was incredibly helpful to talk to an Indian with such excellent English, who could help us sort out some of the interactions we’ve had with people here. He explained that the average Indian is primarily only accustomed to private interactions, with friends and those s/he lives near. So the kind of chit chat and social lubricating that we are used to is not as common here. This would explain the silences in exchanges between customers and service people at banks, chemists, markets…even my hair dresser. It would also explain the seeming socially acceptable staring that we find uncomfortable and the close sitting young woman at the Book Fair. And this moment at Firoz Shah Kotla, the pre-mughal ancient city that is now a tourist destination, when the guy who was painting the fence saw my camera and wanted me to take his picture. He indicated this without a single word, and then he just barely smiled. Yet I could sense his pride in his work and his happiness at seeing himself on the screen of my camera afterwards.

I’ve often felt here that my habit of immediately smiling at people when I come into contact with them is somehow out of place. My white face, a neon sign with a bunch of glaring teeth—like me! Talk to me! My smile comes too quick here, and it seems superficial.