Sabarish

The first thing that stood out in Delhi apart from all the great places to visit was the intense heat. Coming from Bangalore, I hadn’t experienced this much heat ever and the afternoons can get very uncomfortable. I thought Bangalore was hot before coming here, but now I won’t complain once I go back!!

Afternoon Siesta

Anyway, Its only been 6 days here in Noida/Delhi and its been good so far! I’ve been going around and seeing a lot of new places, and met some old friends after ages and also made some new ones on this trip!

On my first day here last Thursday I met Animesh, who took me to Noida’s Sector 18, where all the malls and shopping and food places are and we had a great evening checking out different places and eating yummy road side food and getting a good experience of Noida’s night life (which does tend to die down rather quickly though!!)

Then on friday I met Animesh again along with another old friend from my Microsoft Academia days, Sayor and we went to Delhi – first to this place called New Friends Colony community centre for some great Dilli Chaat and later to Khan market for dinner at Chunas.

The whole market/community centre concept to hang out at is really nice and comes with a good mix of old and new shops, eateries and modern cafes, books and gadgets, corridors and narrow lanes and lots of people! I havent seen any similar areas in Bangalore to hang out at. Delhi is filled with places like this as I discover over the next few days!

A view of NFC Community Centre

Saturday morning I went to more ‘markets’ – the M Block and N Block markets in GK 1 – with Badri’s sister, Netra. She took me to a great place for lunch (Cafe Turtle), which had some good pasta and a nice ambiance as it was in a book store. As Niti said of the place, it was very comforting being surrounded by books!

Saturday was a long day (and night) – after lunch Niti and I went to Humayun’s tomb [more in seperate post] and in the evening I met more friends who took me to Connaught Place (CP) and then to India Gate for some awesome Kala Katta Chusti and finally dinner at a restaurant in Pindara road!

Sunday was relatively lazy in the morning and in the evening I went to Delhi’s Sarita nagar, from where we went to Dilli Haat, which is this government run bazaar kinda place with food stalls from every state in the country and a lot of interesting handlooms and handicraft items to shop.

All in all a great start to my Noida/Delhi trip!!