Delhi graffiti.
Graffiti is a greek word latinized; romanized more like it as the latins were a pretty stolid lot unlike their cousins over the tiber, and probably would never have scrawled on walls.
One reads it like writ.
On the wall in my hostel in delhi there are comments about India and Indians left by travelers and those who may pass for travelers…(suffice it to say that) its not a 5 star hotel. The travelers have been the addicts and the lost.. the wide-eyed and curious.. the fortunate and the unfortunate: (and just plain travelers like your humble editor.)
Most of the comments are negative. Indians are impolite, noisy, dirty, stupid, cheater, disgusting, superstitious… a couple of people wrote ‘I will never return here.’.. there are dialogues.. like threads.. one person described India as an addiction; a sweet one. One person said that travelers here come only because its cheap.. they come to meet other travelers and don’t give a stuff about the disgusting indians…
There is condemnation of the horrid middle class that has arisen here recently.
there are prayers mostly om. Glyphs of anarchy.. infinity symbol, peace symbols, gay activism, others I don’t recognise at all. There is the buddhist wheel of dharma.. .. some Korean .. some Japanese characters/kana. Some French.. one good one reads ‘qui sait se contenter est riche.’ He who is content is rich. The double meaning of which speaks loud and clear in this hostel.. it has a bleak side.
It is actually not a bad spot.. its quiet ( from traffic noise at least)..bug free… it could do with a good dust out and wipe over but its not to0 dirty and is cheap.. centrally located in paharganj.. delhi’s tourist ghetto.
The trip up here wasn’t very good..
There was a 6 hour delay. Which meant a 8 hour wait at the station after 3 hours of jarring 4 wheel jeep down the hills from Darjeeling.. guh!..
That wasn’t so bad .. the waiting room in Indian stations are often fairly exhausting but usually interesting enough. This one gave me the impression that the new jalpaiguri junction was totally organised and controlled by the elderly, benevolent Bengali woman in a yellow and orange cotton dress who hobbled/floated up and down flanked by 2 overweight retainers who evidently cared for the old lady .. but then the train was slow.. .. very slow.. in fact over 30 hours longer than the trip should have been which was 33 hours.. so it was well over 60 hours by the time the mahananda express rolled into old delhi station.. I could only get a sleeper class ticket and it was not comfortable, it was not adequately policed either and though nothing was stolen I was harassed a fair bit.… I arrived quite exhausted.. travel here is not for the infirm. Trust me.
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