Trip to Old Delhi - I

Last week me, Harish & Sudhir went to Old Delhi. We took Delhi Metro to get to Chandni Chowk, the heart of Old Delhi. The idea was to visit weekly book market in Dariyaganj & Paratha (a kind of Indian bread stuffed with different vegetables & stuffings)shops in Parathe Waali Gali.
After getting out of metro station, we took one 'Rickshaw' to get to Dariyaganj.

This book market in Dariyaganj is very old & famous for its street book shops. This market has been there for more than 100 years I guess. Here you could find almost all kinds of books that you can think of & books that you cant even think of. Though I could not find anything for myself in the limited time that we had. Though I had nothing specific in my mind, but I did make a concious effort to find a book on Urdu Poet "Meer Taqi Meer". Just to mention here Meer is one the greatest Urdu poet of all times, he was from Delhi & lived here in late seventeenth century. Even the greatest Urdu poet ever lived, "Mirza Ghalib" kept a very high regard for Meer & once wrote,

रेखते के तुम्ही उस्ताद नहीं हो ग़ालिब
कहते हैं अगले ज़माने में कोई मीर भी था !!

(you are not the only master of Urdu poetry 'Ghalib', they say that in past, there lived some 'Meer' as well).

Coming back to our spree, after browsing through various book shops it was time to have lunch. So we headed towards parathe waali gali, we went in a famous shop that has been there since 1889. They are very famous & various photographs (showing some very big politicians, movie stars, bureaucrats ) & news paper cuttings posted on the walls only amplify this fact. As far as food is concerned, they make paratha almost out of every vegetable thing. They have around 30 different kinds of parathas on the menu. We had some 5-6 different types of them coupled with lassi (sweetened curd).

Food was good & then it was time for some roaming around....

To be continued............