Capital life

Delhi has a charm of its own, which makes people from all across the world fall for it, making the city of ‘glorious contradictions’ their favourite place. Let us talk about those who come from far off countries like Europe, leaving aside their comfortable life, to live in the crowded city. And it’s not out of compulsion that they do so, but out of choice.

The city is infamous for its extreme weather, its crowd and congestion, its alarming pollution levels and what not. But despite all odds, Delhi is sort of a melting pot—which accepts people from varied cultures, backgrounds and ethnicity.

Not just the Nigerians or the Afghans, even French, Italians and Germans to name a few, have their own little hangouts — where rooftop parties are being held in the evening, where local cuisines are served with wine and beer, native languages are spoken. “It’s a city of contradiction. And I love this fact,” says Giulia Ambrogi, a graffiti artist from Rome, who’s the co-founder and curator of St+art India, that endeavours to ‘make our streets more interactive through the medium of urban art festivals across India.’  

Giulia has got huge murals painted in the city’s public spaces, and now wants to replicate this project in other cities of India. She was 29 when she moved to Delhi, four years ago. “Delhi is horrible for a tourist”, she feels, “but if you know someone here, it’s a different experience altogether.”  She is of the view that if one wants to hang out with their own countrymen even in a foreign land, then it’s better to stay back in their homeland. Many, like Giulia, have Indians as lifelong friends. They consider Delhi their ‘second home’. This is all because of the profound impact the city has on them.  

Before coming to India, Giulia was a control freak. She had fixed ideas about how things should be done. But Delhi, in its own ways, taught her to deal with the element of uncertainty. She realised that not all things in life can be controlled. “This city pushes people out of their comfort zones. When I’m pushed out of my comfort zone, I feel comfortable,” she explains.  

Straw hat on head, sipping coffee, Ina Ross comes from Berlin. She says, “I’ve been here for four and a half years.” Approaching 50, she resides with her journalist husband in South Delhi. Every day, Delhi adds something new to her great pool of experiences, she believes.  “Working for the last 30 years in the field of art, I was fairly confident that I had seen it all,” she says almost apologetically. Then she came to India, that offered her something radically new. “Initially, I was having difficulties understanding,” she acknowledges. She has, over the few years, developed a special interest in Gond art, which is mainly found in Madhya Pradesh.

Ina is also a teacher at the National School of Drama. Back in Germany, she had the special ability to look at her pupils and understand them. “I could read them like books,” she says, “but I can’t read my Indian students because they are from a different background, and have been brought up differently.” 

At a personal level, she’s a changed person. “I’m more empathetic now,” she says and adds, “I’m a happier person.”  “Adventure and engagement,” is how she describes happiness.  Her stay in Delhi has “broadened horizons” about people and things alike. She was over-particular about certain things. She gives the example of her coffee drinking habit, it had to be of a certain brand and precisely roasted to her linking. “It’s not important now,” she says. Her stay in India helped her overcome the fuss about perfection. Now she takes up assignments even at a short notice, and delivers it in the best possible way in the given time frame. “These are all first world problems,” she adds with a smile. She’s not averse to staying in Delhi after retirement, though pollution remains a nagging concern for her.

Julia, a writer from Finland, spends half of the year in India for many years now. She’s interested in stories that touch the lives of people. She has this incredible ability to empathise from a distance. She is in her early 30s, tall, assertive and a Hindi speaker.  Her stay here has been an intellectually-stimulating experience. Delhi challenges her, while the familiarity and the predictability back home seem monotonous. In Delhi things are changing fast, all the time, “is a place where all the action is,” she says and asserts, “I feel I’m alive here.”

An easy well-paid job back home would be uninspiring, less fulfilling, while staying in Delhi helped “me put my own life into perspective,” Julia says, wiping perspiration from her forehead. To give an example of how Delhi eventuates before her, she narrates the story of a middle-aged woman who’s a help in her South Delhi apartment, whose husband left her and their toddler to become a monk many years ago. “These give me a perspective in life. But when staying in Europe for too long, I was losing this touch with life,” she emphasises.    

Delhi is a place that grows on you, once you learn to deal with existential irritants like hiring an auto rickshaw without losing your cool, among other things. Thomas Ellis, from Marseilles, in his early thirties, has already lived in India for almost a decade. He wears many hats: journalist, documentary filmmaker and entrepreneur par excellence. His ability to get things done is admirable. Amongst many significant things he has done in the capital city of India, ‘Delhiiloveyou’ stands out. It’s an independent socio-cultural movement of love in the city, which is a heady mixture of history, environment, art, music and social initiatives, aimed at celebrating the city through an extensive programming of collaborative projects. It was his brainchild. Recently, when Thomas opened a new office in Paris, he hired a Brahmin to perform a Hindu ritual.

Clearly, Delhi offers a unique experience. Famous Urdu poet Ghalib rightly described Delhi as ‘life’, if the whole world is the ‘body.’    

This article was first published in the Patriot.