Our Morning Commute

A taxi pulls up in front of our building at 7:30. The gatekeeper swings open the gate for us, and we come out and get in the taxi. The driver does a U-turn and wheels out into traffic, very light at this early hour. Only school children leave home at this time. The only adults out are street sweepers and other cleaners. As we drive out of our enclave, it’s hard to see other people’s homes and apartments because every block and every home is behind a high wall.

Out on the main street, we drive by shanty towns here and there. These homes are all improvised—one wall of stacked bricks, a plastic roof, some canvas walls, a wooden pole in the center—but they have the look of permanence. You can see inside some of the shacks where there are cots piles high with thick blankets. In one or two places, a cluster of people has been spending the night on the sidewalk, their blankets spread on the pavement. We pass by several small impromptu bonfires built right on the sidewalk from castoff lumber and cardboard boxes; a person or two is warming himself by the fire. We may see a man or two bathing next to his shanty, squatting down, wearing big loose shorts, and pouring water over his head, dipped from a large bucket.

As we get on the large Ring Road, we see a man on the opposite side of the Ring riding on an elephant. It is the first elephant we’ve seen here. We have seen several men using a horse as a normal means of transportation, right in the midst of city traffic.

It’s too early for the sidewalk barbers to be set up and shaving their customers. By 9:00, they’ll be out on the sidewalks, with a chair for the customer, a mirror hung from the fence railing, and an upright box on which they put their basin of water and soap. At this hour, we may see some of yesterday’s laundry left out to dry on the fence railings. The fence that divides one side of the traffic from the other is a many-mile-long clothes line for those with no yard of their own.

Getting off the Ring Road and onto neighborhood streets, the sidewalks, driveways, and doorways are being swept by men and women with long-handled twig brooms. There is a never-ending fight against dust, dirt, and litter here. After sweeping, they’ll swab the sidewalk at the doorway with a bucket of water and the twig broom. Then as passersby come along, the day’s littering begins again. No one seems concerned about using litter baskets.

There are dogs out in the street, most of them browsing through piles of trash on street corners. The dogs aren’t fierce and don’t come up towards people. Most of them are a medium size with either golden fur or black and white mottled fur.

Cows are out on the street, too, though only here and there. They, too, eat from the garbage heaps. The heaps aren’t smelly (though it’s not warm weather yet) and don’t look like old garbage piles, they seem to get renewed daily. The cows are completely unperturbed by the flow of traffic around them. They walk slowly down a street that flowing with the traffic of cars, bicycles, cabs, and motorcycles.

As we approach the school, we see more and more students arriving by foot, car, or bus. They’re all in the maroon and grey Mount Carmel School outfits. Many of the girls have on additional leggings due to the cold winter weather (45 degrees low, 68 degrees high). Many boys and girls are wearing a hat or knit scarf; this degree of cold seems to make them very uncomfortable. The very young children are quite bundled up by their parents.

Adelaide and Owen get out at the school and tell me goodbye, their first day in their uniforms. They are relieved to be wearing the same clothes as everyone else today. The cab driver will return for them at 2:00 this afternoon when school lets out. Mr. Singh, a cabby near the school, has become our driver for now. We have a regular arrangement with him, and we’ll see how it works out after a week or so.

He drives me on to JNU, only 5 minutes’ farther from the Mount Carmel School. Many of the workers are arriving on campus by foot. The taxi stops at the security gate and I call out, “School of International Studies.” They note it in their ledger, and we drive on. Mr. Singh drops me at the Administrative Block, where the only persons in sight are the grounds crew. They all wear warms scarves around their head and winter jackets. The sweeping and raking begins for the day, and will continue all day long.

I enter my office building, dark and unheated. It’s the coldest place in Delhi so far. I am the only faculty member or student in the building. The housekeeping staff look at me questioningly. I feel somewhat embarrassed to be here at 8:10, but here I am. I unlock the padlock to my office door, turn on the light, and look at the bare walls and desk. I’ve arrived. Time to work on my first comments for Thursday’s class. The day has begun.