The UNESCO heritage site. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Perched almost on the peak, this is a hamlet of gabled houses and fruity smells. Black and Yellow Grosbeaks whistle through apricot trees. Wild mongooses dart through cannabis bushes. The imperially slim men and women grow old working the slanting fields. And down the hill flows the sacred Tirthan river. Today this timeless shell of 80 houses is cracking open, its people waking up to new possibilities. At 2,170m, the far-flung Pekhari village in Kullu district in mountainous Himachal Pradesh is a gateway to the Great Himalayan National Park (GHNP). In June 2014, at a special session in Doha, Qatar, it was included in the Unesco World Heritage list. On its

Pakistan's charming bookseller. [By Mayank Austen Soofi] The bookstore was in Saddar, across the street from De Paris, my 273-rupees-a-day hotel in Karachi. This was my first journey to Pakistan. I had no camera then. Despite its American-style fast food outlets, the central Karachi neighbourhood of Saddar was a typical South Asian bazaar. All the jewelry stores were lined on one street, the garment shops were bunched together in another, and a separate lane was dedicated to photography studios. The pavements were home to refugees from Afghanistan. I chanced upon the shop while searching for a cheap eatery during the afternoon heat of Karachi. The book-lined room was situated beside an Iranian café. Inside, an elderly man

India's gift. [Text and photos by Solveig Marina Bang] A hundred and fifty years ago, on hearing that a thirsty child had been beaten for stealing a gulp of water from private land because communal ponds had dried up, the Maharaja of Benares (Varanasi) donated money towards the building of a well in the impoverished community. The needy boy was not in India but in the tiny village of Stoke Row in the Oxfordshire countryside. Ishree, Maharaja of Benares, had heard of the child from his good friend, Oxfordshire native Edward Anderdon Reade, who worked as a civil servant in India for decades. Mr Reade had had a well sunk and a mango orchard planted in a local Indian community, and, in return,

Made in France. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] In Paris, The Delhi Walla spent many many hours in streets, gardens, bookstores, restaurants and graveyards. I also visited landmarks associated with the life and work of novelist Marcel Proust. When it was time to leave the city, I wanted to stay back and lead a life colored with a new set of manners, memories, traditions and personal history. But I'm back in Delhi, along with souvenirs of Paris. Another world is here 1b. 1a. 1c. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 7a. 8. 9. 10. 10a. 11. 11a. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. (Photo by JMS)

The heart of France. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Its bell tower is the oldest in the French capital. The Delhi Walla is in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, one of the oldest churches of Paris. The ancient abbey has been standing on this cobbled ground for more than fifteen centuries. It has a cross, a 14th century statue of Our Lady of Consolation, a wooden statue of Christ, 13 chapels, a couple of paintings and an organ that was installed in 1813. According to a pamphlet I picked up inside the church, Saint-Germain-des-Prés was named after the bishop of Paris and it was one of the most important intellectual centers of Gaul before it was destroyed by the Norman invasions in the 9th century.

A tale of two cities. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] This is just like the Old Quarter of Shahjahanabad. This one has many churches; that one has many mosques. Both are rich in pigeons. The Delhi Walla is in Venice. The Italian town has the same sort of narrow and self-contained streets that you find in Old Delhi, the ones which curve at soft angles and show new vistas on each turn. But there are a few differences between these two cities. In Old Delhi, we take pride in our masculine culture of spitting out saliva in public; we have also succeeded in establishing an irreverent attitude towards the bourgeois concepts of cleanliness and manners. Venice is not a radical place

The painful history. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] It was raining. The Delhi Walla was in Nepal. I was being driven to Nagarkot, a village few miles outside Kathmandu that stands on a cliff and offers panoramic views of snowy Himalayan peaks. The car went up the hills that were carved into rice fields. Women, only women, were working in these paddies. Nepal felt magical in the heavy monsoon shower. Rain-soaked village children rushed down the steep curves of the road, screaming and laughing. At one place we came across half a dozen women huddled under a large red umbrella. From inside the car, they looked as real as a water painting. Next, we passed by a Buddhist funeral procession. The

The Nepal diary. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The devotees were sitting on the stone stairs in groups of families and friends -- some were talking to each other, others were quiet. They were looking down at the Bagmati, which was rushing down in gentle fury. Naked boys were swimming in the sacred river. A dead body was being prepared for cremation. While the evening sun was casting its golden rays on the pagoda-like spire of the Pashupatinath Temple. Here Shiv is worshipped as Pashupati, the lord of the beasts. The Delhi Walla was in Kathmandu. The Nepal capital is unlike Delhi. It has many ancient temples, and only two mosques. There is hardly any garbage on the streets. The day before I

Like a painting. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] If French novelist Marcel Proust had lived in India, he would have lived in Calcutta. The city is like a faded watercolor painting. The Delhi Walla visited it for a week. Unlike Delhi, the old houses in Calcutta still survive. The green shuttered windows of crumbling yellow mansions preserve a genteel elegance of literary conversations and afternoon naps. I visited a retired woman in Charu Market whose modern-day flat was steeped in the same ambiance. Hardbound works of Rabindranath Tagore were stacked under her bed. DVDs of Satyajit Ray's films were stored in a drawer - next to her plasma screen TV. A tanpura was kept beside her dressing table. The woman made

The Delhi Walla in Bombay. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] The Delhi Walla spent the final week of 2012 in Bombay. I had Bombay Masala sandwich and marzipan carrot cake at Leopold Café, hot chocolate at Starbucks, pomfret tikka at Mahesh Lunch Home, and masala tea at Kala Ghoda cafe. One evening crossing Flora Fountain, I pretended to look as absorbed as any Bombayite on his way to catch the evening local from Churchgate (but I could sense the scam was uncovered and the bumpkin from the interiors revealed). Earlier that day at the Search Word bookstore in Causeway, Colaba, I purchased the poetry collections of Fernando Pessoa and Paul Celan. In Juhu, I walked on Chowpatty beach, browsed at the bookstore