DAY TWO IN DELHI

Our second day in India’s capital was spent exploring several aspects of the city’s history and religious heritage. Of the area’s eight major historical epochs, only the very first was under Hindu dominance. The rest were under the influence of Islam. This morning we journeyed out to the southern edge of the city to roam the grounds of Qutb Minar, an early Hindu religious site transformed into an Islamic mosque built around the second highest minaret in all the Muslim world.

Following a rewarding stop at a Kashmir rug showroom (lots of shopping going on!) and lunch at a cool and comfortable Chinese restaurant, we visited the national government center complex originally constructed by the British and now surrounding Rashtrapati Bhavan, the residence of the nation’s president.

We ended our day long tour at a nearby gold-domed Sihk temple full of faithful worshippers, international visitors and pilgrims from all around the country and the world.

Later six of us shared supper at the modest but pleasant apartment condominium of Ganpat and Veena Roonwal, a retired Metals Engineering professor and his scientist wife, again on the southern edge of Delhi. We drove out in rush hour traffic and raced back home on less crowded byways – I’m unsure which was more harrowing, especially after learning in the midst of the return trip that our driver had bribed the officials involved in granting drivers licenses so he could start driving when he was sixteen instead of eighteen as the law requires!