Delhi is an extraordinary place. It is a massive city, currently home to 25 million people, and has been inhabited since the 6th century B.C. It has served as the capital of many different kingdoms and empires throughout history, most notably the Mughal Empire. It was the Mughals who built many of the beautiful monuments that are scattered throughout the city. It is also home to countless Hindu temples, muslim mosques, and Sikh temples that give the city a distinctively diverse feel. And who could leave out the food? Delhi is home to some absolutely amazing food; spicy curries, delicious sweet treats, divine masala chai, and much more.

As a history buff, I really enjoyed all of the historical places throughout Delhi. The most impressive was probably the tomb of Mughal emperor Humayun, completed in 1572. It is a beautiful example of Mughal architecture utilizing red sandstone. Also impressive was Qutb Minar, a 12th century complex built by the ruler of the Delhi sultanate and home to the world’s tallest rubble masonry minaret. A stroll through the Lodi gardens gave us a little bit of respite from the busy city (but not completely), and was interesting as it is full of tombs of the Sayyid and Lodhi dynasty rulers of the 15th century.

It was also neat to see the religous diversity of the city. While the majority of people in Delhi are Hindus, there are plenty of Muslims and Sikhs, as well as a scattering of christians, jains, buddhists, and others. Because of this diversity, unique religious structures are everywhere. Easily outshining them all is the Hindu temple of Aksharam. The temple was built recently (2005) and is massive, yet remarkably beautiful. It is full of intricately carved columns and beautifully carved statues of animals, plants, dancers, and deities.

And I can’t leave out the food of Delhi. We had some wonderful meals while there. I love spicy foods, so the curries in Delhi were a highlight for me. I was also surprised to find so many homemade sweets for sale at streetside stands. I don’t know what most were made of, but they were quite tasty. I am also now hooked on masala chai.

Now on to the negative side of our time in Delhi:

The city is also an utter assault to your senses, and usually not in a good way. The first thing we noticed was the traffic. It is a sight to behold. The roads are completely packed with every manner of vehicle or animal imaginable: cars, buses, mopeds, auto rickshaws, pedal rickshaws, bicycles, pull carts, ox carts, pedestrians, cows, horses, dogs, you name it. And they all must constantly jockey for position in order to get anywhere. This constant jockeying leads us to our next sense that was assaulted: our hearing. If Delhi had an official sound, it would be the car horn. Drivers are constantly yelling at other drivers and honking their horns as they weave in and out of traffic avoiding animals, pedestrians, and potholes. When traffic is not moving fast enough for the drivers (and it never is apparently), they will simply lay on the horn. Sometimes literally for 30-40 seconds straight. There is no escape to this sound. There was not a single place we visited in the city where we couldn’t hear the blaring of horns.

These sights and sounds make Delhi unique enough, but truly setting this city apart from others we’ve visited are the smells. One moment you’ll be walking past a stand selling spices and it will smell heavenly, but literally seconds later you’ll walk past a man peeing into an open sewer drain that smells exactly like you think it would. Trash is everywhere, giving off a sweet rotten stench that mingles with the other smells. This made it hard for us to really enjoy the food that we ate. It was just too difficult to forget about the pervasive smell of human urine that is everywhere in the city. Even if you don’t smell it in the restaurant where you’re enjoying amazing Indian curry, you know that smell is waiting for you right as you walk out the door.

Another thing that was hard for us to get used to was the constant hassling we experienced everywhere we went. Our time in SE Asia taught us how to politely deal with pushy taxi drivers or shopkeepers, but Delhi is a completely different story. The taxi and rickshaw drivers are relentless. We would be followed for 5 minutes straight, constantly being asked “where are you from”, “where are you going”, “why don’t you take my taxi”. We’d have to say no 6-7 times, and that would work only some of the time. If we ever did take a rickshaw somewhere, we’d inevitably have to deal with the driver wanting to take us to “my friend’s shop” or “my brother’s restaurant” on the way to our destination. Again, we would be forced to say no another 6-7 times.

We completely understand the reasons behind the smell of Delhi, a lack of money for proper sanitation has forced people to litter everywhere and use the streets as toilets. It isn’t the fault of the people. We also understand the pushy taxi drivers and shopkeepers. They are simply trying to make money for themselves and their families and must compete with 25 million other people in order to do so. However, we never got used to the countless cheats and scammers that tried to take our money in dishonest ways. It was these people that made our visit to the city very difficult.

We have a habit of always counting our change after we’ve paid for something and for the two and a half months we spent in SE Asia we were never shorted once. In the few days we spent in Delhi we were shorted 3-4 times. We would ask for the proper change after we’d catch the discrepancy, and we’d always get it with an apology for their “poor math”. It happened too many times to be a coincidence.

We also ran into people who would try to scam us by selling fake train tickets. As we approaced the Delhi train station to buy our ticket to Agra, a man jumped in front of us and asked us if we needed tickets. We said yes, and he pointed around the corner and told us to follow him for tickets. We started to follow, but after a few steps we could tell something was up. We said that we would just go to the train station, but he protested and said we couldn’t buy tickets there. He produced a “government ID” and said he was an official ticket seller. We pointed to the sign that we saw at the station which stated “train tickets for foreigners” and was pointing in the opposite direction he was taking us. He said “that office has closed, you must follow me for tickets”. I had already read online about about the “it’s closed, let me take you somewhere else” scam, so I immediately knew for sure that this guy was trying to scam us. We turned around, walked back to the train station, followed the “tickets for foreigners” sign, and found the ticket office. It was open and selling tickets. Cheap, official tickets.

We tried not to let the hassling and scam attempts detract from our time in the city. But to be honest, it wore us down and made the city our least favorite of our trip so far. Even with all of the amazing history, architecture, and food that Delhi has to offer, we were still happy to leave this city of contradictions behind. Thankfully a quick 2 hour train ride from Delhi is Agra, home of the mind-numbingly beautiful Taj Mahal!

If you want to see more photos of our trip to Delhi, check out our Dehli photo album.