The friends trip to India had been a long time coming, but 2019 was the year that it finally became reality. Mohit was planning to go back to India for several weeks for his mom’s 60th birthday party and to handle paperwork and other bureaucracy related to his work visa. The explanation I’ve been giving for how the four of us ended up going is that Clayton politely invited himself, which Mo was more than happy to oblige, and soon Erik and I followed suit. That seems about right.
We bought our flights well in advance, Mo invited the three of us to stay at his family’s home in Delhi, and we planned on filling out the rest of our 12-day itinerary with stops at the beach (Goa) and the mountains (Dharamshala).
We landed in Delhi before sunrise on a smoky Monday morning, bleary-eyed and tired from an extremely long travel day. Mo’s father graciously picked us up and drove us an hour to the family home while all of us tried to acclimate to the sights, sounds, and smells of India. The air pollution in Delhi is notoriously awful – some of the worst in the world – and it was particularly bad this morning. Within half an hour of being on the ground, my lungs were already feeling kind of tight.
We arrived at the house, met more of the family and the staff, picked rooms and unpacked, and ate the first of many rejuvenating home-cooked meals. As we ate, we tried to get our bearings and come up with a plan for the day, beyond the immediate goal of seeking out a caffeine fix every few hours. After breakfast, we decided to go to the tailor that Mo likes to use, since it was a joking-not-joking mission to have bespoke suits made on this trip. (Insert obligatory Anchorman gif here.) We spent some time at the shop with Mo’s mom, browsing fabrics and patterns, taking photos, and having our measurements taken.
After picking our fabrics and placing our orders, we spent the rest of the day hopping around parts of the city, hunting for coffee and food and wandering through parks and old temple ruins. Just before sunset, we found ourselves in Lodhi Garden, walking around with hundreds of other city dwellers also enjoying the evening, admiring the huge variety of birds, including peacocks!
Tuesday was our day trip to the Taj Mahal, so we climbed into our driver’s car for the multi-hour road trip to Agra. I don’t think there’s much I can say about the Taj Mahal that hasn’t been said already, so I’ll let the photos do the talking. It’s absolutely a spectacle and at times it’s difficult to comprehend how something could be so massive and so detailed and built in a time well before modern technology. It’s one of the man-made wonders of the world for very good reason.
Wednesday was our last full day in Delhi, so again we set out for the Metro – a well-run, modern, and inexpensive way to get around the city – to take us to various ruins, parks, cafes, and markets. We spent a good chunk of the day in Hauz Khas, a more well-to-do neighborhood with cute shopping, but also ancient buildings and architecture. We browsed art galleries and men’s shops, hopped among coffee shops and restaurants, and climbed over the ruins a bit before heading back to the tailor for our follow-up fitting.
That evening was Mo’s mom’s birthday party, a really fun event at the house with many dozens of friends and family members, a cover band playing “retro British” rock and Indian and Arabic music, and a phenomenal amount of food and drinks. We had all filled up on starters before realizing that a full dinner was being served around midnight, but we made it work. There were sentimental toasts and drinks and dancing well into the night.
