I have been living in Delhi for 7 years now and I had (till recently) never been to a Ramlila on Dusshera. Yearning for the sight of chaos,fire and a mela, I decided to embark upon a Dusshera trip to Old Delhi, with two of my buddies - Joshi (Amit Joshi) and Benji (Anurag Benjwal). Old Delhi Ramlilas are the grand daddy's of all Ramlilas in Delhi, with some of them going back to Mughal times, and of course we had full intention to not let go of this great opportunity to indulge our appetites.
As soon as we got down from Chandni Chowk Metro station we headed straight for our glass of 5-bucks-mango-juice, made from fresh mangoes, this is one of the best things that a 5 rupee coin can get you. We then walked to the Red Fort entrance, where we were greeted by the sight of the Ramlila Maidan. The place was super-crowded with thousands flocking in to catch the burning of Ravan and the final chapters of the 10 day festivities.There were joy rides - merry go round, Columbus, revolving chairs, the well of death, etc. at 30 bucks a ride, we decided to give these a skip, having had enough of Adventure Island. Then there was food - 70% of these were dedicated to the dish that signifies the modern booming India - Chowmein. Chhole Bhature, chaats nd kulfis also had a massive following, we decided to give all these a skip, lest we offend the culinary delights of purani dilli. We instead picked up 3 Rs 5 Sonu Super softies, which were utter rubbish, think what milk powder mixed with water,frozen and then piled on a stale cone would taste like.....now you know how bad they were, disgusted, Joshi flung his onto the grass, while the foodie in me and Benji compelled us to finish ours. Next we fought a rude and sweaty mob of bodies to emerge at the other end of the mela, there were two melas back to back which were exactly same except for the color of Ravan and his three brothers, they were pink in the first one and green in the next.
Next we were greeted by the sight of India Gate, built to exact proportions it looked an exact copy sans the inscriptions and Amar Jawan Jyoti, we walked right through it to emerge on the main road.
The normally busy Ring road looked deserted today, it had been sealed off for security purposes. We made our way to Meena Bazaar and up-to the stairs of the Jama Masjid.
There we found a man and his son selling buff tikkis, they looked inviting and so we ordered a plate, just then I heard a loud boom as one of the three Ramlilas reached a concluding point. I could make out a cloud of smoke rising behind the trees, I hurriedly ran to the main courtyard of the masjid to find a throng a of people watching a ten headed Ravan explode into flames, the sound could well have been mistaken for a bomb blast - but the look of amusement on the face of young kids wearing skullcaps clearly proved this was an occasion to have fun. Apparently, the Ravan which had just blown up was not among the two we had seen on our way up, I felt alarmed - I might just miss seeing the burning of Ravan up close!. I ran down to find Benji holding our ordered plate of buff tikkas, i tried one - yuck!, it didn't taste good, not at all!, i think the meat was under cooked, way under cooked, I felt nausea rising up, even Joshi couldn't take it, Benji alone managed to negotiate a few pieces before we put the plate down and paid 20 bucks. I desperately needed something to soothe my taste-buds and lo! i found it right in front of me - Roohafza - at 5 bucks for a large glass, it was dirt cheap, but it tasted delicious. It was cool, fresh, sweet (but not overtly), somehow it tasted better than what I generally make at home, even Benji doubled that.
We made our way back to find a serpentine que, obviously, this was not the way in for us. We found a back entrance at the parking lot, and even here there was que (after all, this is India), but it was a small one and we were at the checking post in 10 minutes, the policewalla seemed to take a particular liking to Joshi, asking him to half strip......to check him out. We walked into a couple of tents we had not seen before, a peek inside revealed dressed up girls dancing on a stage in front of hungry male eyes, we moved on. Then I spotted sugar candies, and without thinking twice we bought ourselves a stick each, as I bit into the frothy, hairy, pink sweet strands - childhood memories came back where i had one almost everyday.
We jostled our way to the main Ramlila maidan, but by now the crowd was ginormous, it was impossible to get in. So we found ourselves a good spot and waited, and waited......minutes passed by with nothing happening, then my elf-like eyes caught the sight of two warring chariots, they move back and forth, their occupants trading blows on each other. Nearby, a police havildar was caught up in a pickpocketing case . Finally, Meghnaad, brother of ravan burst into flames, he was soon followed by kumbhkaran and ravan himself. Each of them started with a massive chakri and quickly exploded with numerous firecrackers - the massive figures were turned into ashes in a matter of seconds.
We made our way out and started waling towards Jama Masjid once again, we stopped by for a refreshing glass of ganne ka ras, for 5 bucks a glass. we entered this time, through Aruna Asaf Ali Marg, I was tempted to try out the fried chicken being sold at many shops, but Benji and Joshi were not in the mood. I finally persuaded them to try out buff kebabs - seekhs, the thela had a throng of people around it - always a good sign!. We had to wait 15 mins for our plate, all the while the small chap kept replying "ek minute", to my "kitna time lagega". The kebabs were delicious - juicy,tasty with a nice meaty taste, they were different from any seeks i had ever had before, even Joshi who was hesitant to even try out a speck gobbled down two, they only cost 20 bucks for 5 kebabs.
Noticing a crowd in front of a stall selling phirni in claypots, we decided to try them out as well, we initially ordered two as Benji wasn't feeling so hungry, but one spoon later, he quickly ordered one for himself, we wolfed down the delicious phrini in seconds - it was perfect, not to sweet, light and garnished with dry fruits all for 10 bucks.
We started off towards Chawri bazaar metro station on Chitli Qabar, nearing the metro station we saw a couple of stall drawing huge crowds, although all 3 of us were quite full, we just couldn't miss such an opportunity - I poked my head into the crowd to find roomali rotis with a sabji on everyone's plate, after asking around one gentleman told me the sabji is called Kathi Kabab made out of soya bean, this was totally different from the traditional kathi kabab roll. He also urged me to try out the chaat stalls, saying all of them are excellent. We promptly ordered a plate for 20 bucks, the sabji was spicy and delicious and went amazingly well with the roomali rotis, even Joshi joined in and we quickly mopped it up.
Our next stop was the famous Ashok Chaat bhandar right in front of the metro station, we got a plate of bhalla papri for 25 bucks. The dahi was sweet and the papris were soft, they had been soaked in the dahi, this gave the chaat a unique taste which was yum.
Now there was just one thing left - Kuremal's Kulfi - The legendary kulfi maker just could not be missed. As soon as we entered bazaar sitaram, we were overwhelmed by a huge crowd, the street was lined by stalls selling everything and the place resembled the over crowded ramlila maidan we had just come from, after fighting our way into the gali where kuremal sits, we were pleasantly surprised to find kuremal's other shop, the one closer to the main gali open . A crowd was already devouring the frosty delights, we ordered chikoo, phalsa and aam.....the phalsa and aam as usual were great, but chikoo was fabulous, it not only retained chikoo's flavor, but also it's unique texture, Benji took a particular liking to it.
We finally walked back to the metro station satisfied and satiated. Mission Accomplished.
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