Travelling in... India: Delhi

It was inevitable that I would like Delhi, as it's not Dhaka. One of the advantages of living in the 2nd worst city in the world is that everywhere is better in comparison, even if the reasons aren't always obvious. Yes Delhi does have an astonishing Mughal heritage, but it also has bus stops. Even better, it has modern buses with reserved bus lanes. Yes Delhi may be the modern administrative centre of the sub-continent, but the city has a walkable sidewalks and a functioning metro. To prove that Dhaka hasn't turned me into a city transport freak, Delhi also rarely has powercuts but when they happen they are no more than a couple of hours a day. Even the rickshawallah's look healthy. This is all in context: the city still stinks in parts, and the whole place is covered in huge layers of dust as the place seems to be in a state of re-construction, but that re-construction is for city works and not just private flats, and there is the overall outward impression that the Delhi is at going forwards and is controllable.

The only disappointment was the Ba'hai Temple, which is the modern day contribution to Delhi's monuments. It's in the shape of a lotus flower, and being white is all modern and symmetrical looking. But unlike the other religious monuments we visited, such as the spectacular Jama Masjid which was dedicated to one God, this temple is for all religions by celebrating the relationship between man and God (our driver didn't know what a Jehova's Witness was so I can't actually verify this claim). I can imagine tourists half a millennia from now, visiting the temple in the same way we visited the Masjid in Old Delhi and laughing at the folly. After all this is the country of Partition, that only 20 years ago saw the destruction of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, and which invented communal rioting. So is a large building in which you are “able to access the stepladder to go and speak to God” really the most obvious solution for religious harmony?

My understanding of religion is that you have a faith, in the same way that you support a football team. No one supports football for the sake of the sport, but instead because they grew up loving a certain team, even if it doesn't make sense (such as supporting Aston Villa or Espanyol) and hating the local opposition. And that's the way it works (except for that supporting a football team is a much safer option anyhow as it they don't cause wars (except one), genocides, crusades and pogroms etc.). Therefore the Ba'hai Temple succeeds in being nothing more than I kind of Wembley or Camp Nou, both of which everyone knows are rubbish for playing football on. It's just a big empty space in which you're forced to sit in silence, probably to make sure you can't start discussing with your neighbour what little sense the whole place makes and where did they get the money to build it? It's not even air-conditioned.

The only reason we ended up there in the first place was because the driver needed to have his number plate registered in a tourist cooperative shop next door to the temple, so he certainly got something out of it making sure it wasn't a wasted trip. And it is too easily ignored as a distraction from the real monuments, even if in Delhi in April feels like someone is constantly blowing a hair dryer in your face.