In addition to the two Mughal monuments we experienced in Delhi, we also took a walk through Asia’s largest spice market and found the cremation site turned memorial of Mahatma Gandhi. At the end of our three weeks we returned to Delhi for a day and got to see a bit more, but that will come in a later post.
Khari Baoli – Asia’s largest spice market
In the heart of Old Delhi stretches an Indian institution that is essential to the identity of Indian culture. Spices are integral to the food and worship of the subcontinent. They provide color and flavor to otherwise drab and ordinary things. Spice markets are a very important part of this tradition of ground seeds, barks, flowers, and whatnot.
The market in Delhi is considered the biggest in Asia, which probably means the biggest in the world unless somewhere in Africa or Europe has a bigger one since the Americas and Australia don’t use that many spices on a regular basis. Khari Baoli, the market, is teeming with people. There are porters with yokes carrying massive sacks of spices and rice and other goods. Some have the bags on their heads. Tuk tuks are slowly maneuvering in an out of the throng as people of all backgrounds and classes mix and stew in the sweet and savory scents of just about every spice you can think of.
Raj Ghat
Mahatma Gandhi is revered today as the father of India. He led the way to a free and independent India, and he did it through peaceful passive resistance. He inspired Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela in their fights for civil rights. And like Dr. King, Gandhi’s life was taken in a brutal act of murder, though he had lived a full life at the time of his death.
The young nation mourned his loss and honored him greatly. He was cremated at a place called Raj Ghat, a park near the Red Fort in Delhi. A memorial has been erected around the spot and people reverently remove their shoes and walk around the plinth and eternal flame in its center.
On our India trip, we would encounter Mr. Gandhi a few more times in various places. We watched the Richard Attenborough’s biopic with Sir Ben Kingsley, and I started reading his autobiography. A trip to India would not be complete without learning about this great man and his efforts to lift his fellow men and their homeland.
