Delhi: Human and Wild

This first day of the trip is also our only full one in Delhi, the national capital. It’s a huge city, full of life and activity. It’s easy to see the human footprint, but look a little closer and the place is also full of life for many other kinds of creatures. Our goal today was to get a little sense for both these aspects of Delhi.

After a quick breakfast, we headed out to the most prominent Sikh gurudwara (temple, lit. “gateway to the guru”) in the city, Bangla Sahib, a short walk from our hotel. We learned a few of the major tenets of this faith, including its inclusive monotheism, the strong drive to charity and service encouraged from its members, and its egalitarian approach to gender and class relations (quite striking in this cultural context). As one example of that everyone, regardless of gender, has to have their hair covered and take their shoes off within the temple. Some of the student memories are:

Afterwards, we had some time to shop at the famous Janpath Flea Market, pick up some items, and eat at Sagar Ratna, a South Indian restaurant. The highlight was the 4-foot paper masala dosa shared by a number of our group!

After a quick rest, we had our first official class, walked to the metro, and traveled about an hour to Aravalli Biodiversity Park. This is an inspiring example of ecological restoration, taking what had been degraded mined land and within 15 years (and a lot of work!) seeing it become a flourishing dry forest, full of plants and animals unique to this area. And more impressive, it’s truly been a grassroots initiative, with the idea, energy, and work for it coming heavily through citizens from the area committed to the idea of supporting a robust home for nature in the midst of their city.

We finished out the day with dinner at Drama, a fusion Indian restaurant, complete with a live band.