Delhi: Day 2

January 4, 2010

So here we were after our first night in India ready to see more of the sights that Delhi had to offer and really dive into our experience there. After breakfast at the kitchen in our guesthouse (which was SUPER cheap-about 20 rupees, or less than 50 cents, for naan bread, a spicy and delicious potato soup, and chai tea!), we headed out. We took auto-rickshaws to our locations for the day. If you don't know what auto-rickshaws are, I took a video of one of the rides. This is one of the tamer rides: the more exciting (i.e. more dangerous and seemingly life-threatening lol) ones were at once terrifying and exhilarating, frightening and adrenaline-inducing.

Our first stop was Humayun's Tomb. Humayun was the second Mughal emperor and ruled parts of northern India in the 16th Century. His tomb is a huge complex that was pretty incredible.

This is just one of the outlying buildings and not even the main event. It's a tomb for another person and not Humayun himself.

This is a picture from the roof of the building in the previous picture-the building in the background is a mosque. The archway of the center opening is the next picture.

Even after centuries and centuries, some of the original tiles and decorations are still there on the buildings. Everywhere we went, the intricate details of all the different monuments were just amazing-so much care and dedication went into the construction of all of this.

Walking towards the main building (the dome visible just over the top of the gate).

On the way some of the girls in our group stopped to chat with some schoolgirls who were there on a field trip of some sort. Norbert (our professor) warned us that while the women in our group were free to talk with the girls it probably wasn't a great idea for us guys to talk to them. We therefore waited off to the side as they talked.

More outlying buildings-you really get a sense of the scale with the itty bitty people in the picture haha

Everywhere we went they had these step-wells called baolis. Basically they're HUGE wells that have steps in them so that when the monsoon comes they fill up. As they slowly empty over the course of the year you have easy access to the water-just walk down the steps!

Grayson walking down the aforementioned steps. Again, the scale of these things was pretty crazy.

Some of our group looking down into the well.

Humayun's tomb. Kinda evocative of the Taj Mahal in the sense that the Taj Mahal is the pinnacle of perfection in this style of architecture. Humayun's tomb, magnificent as it is, is just a step on that gradual development towards the Taj.

Pretty neat symmetry :)

Our next stop was a sufi shrine (the white building) which sat in the shadow of a mosque (the red brick building). Women aren't allowed into the shrine itself (and neither are cameras). So while the guys in our group got to go into the shrine, the ladies had to stay outside.

This is a Sikh temple. Sikh men are almost instantly recognizable: they wear turbans and have full beards. We got to go inside for a bit and observe one of the prayer rituals in progress. I wrote in my journal (that I bought later this day) about an experience I had during that ritual:

"We were sitting inside as they conducted their prayer rituals and I looked around. My gaze settled on a little girl who couldn't have been more than three. I found myself wondering if she was going to heaven or not and about the seeming 'injustice' that she was born here and doesn't have a choice in what she's taught. As I thought about it and [about] her a deep and profound sadness settled over me...it was a pretty powerful moment."

This trip really opened my eyes to the need that there is for the gospel, in India and (by extension) everywhere. God definitely was working on my heart throughout the course of the trip.

A pool of holy water that they have nearby. People will regularly walk down and dunk either parts or all of themselves in the water.

Everyone has to cover their heads inside the temple-they provided some head coverings for us.

Our group barefoot and wearing the matching head coverings.

Lodi Gardens-basically more tombs. They're all over the place there!

Close up the detail just jumps out at you.

I found the inside of this dome to be particularly interesting-all that white stuff is bird poop. How exactly it got up there I'm not sure....lol

Dinner! This was some sort of chicken tikka wrap. "tikka" is just the style of cooking or oven or something. For the whole day I spent about 130 rupees, or just under $4, on food. This was the day that I started really enjoying Indian food (didn't take long at all haha).

So that was the second day in Delhi! Tomorrow: MUCH more modern temples and a really old, really tall pillar!