Humayun's Tomb and garden on a foggy morning in October

Humayun's Tomb

More about our neighbourhood; our home is situated around the corner from the beautiful Mughal tomb and garden of the Emperor Humayun.

From our roof we have a good view of the magnificent dome of 16th c. Mughal emperor Humayun’s tomb, set in a 30 acre garden that was recently restored by the Aga Khan foundation.

I call it "the Great-Grandfather of the Taj Mahal", as the innovative architectural design of Humayun's tomb later inspired that masterpiece of architectural grace, the Taj Mahal, which was built by his great-grandson, Emperor Shah Jehan.
Humayun suffered an accidental death, in 1556, after falling down the spiral stairs in his library, leaving his young son Akbar as heir apparent.

His widow, Haji Begum, began construction on the tomb in either 1565, or 1569 (sources disagree). She contracted a Persian architect, Mirak Mirza Ghiyas, to create the building in the Persian style, and he gave India it's first full double dome. Red sandstone outlined by white marble was a design feature indigenous to the subcontinent, as were the chattris (roof pavilions).

The interior is quite austere, but the surface designs of intricate geometrical stone inlay, play with the poetry of filtered light, entering from the multi-layered chiseled stone screens.

The morning sun lays a network of lace shadows in the eastern burial chambers, where the queen and other royal ladies are buried, and the setting sun sends molten gold jigsaw shapes across the west-facing starry-patterned floor. At each corner of the octagonal chamber, light filters in through three sets of separate carved screens, creating a somber dappled light.

The building is known as the "dormitory of the Mughals", as, beneath the massive plinth, hundreds of later royals lie buried. Each archway marks a burial chamber.
The complex contains 3000 meters of hand-chiseled sandstone water channels, pathways, fountains, several other beautiful tombs and a mosque. The Mughal garden is an earthly reflection of Paradise, divided into orderly quadrants, sectioned by sparkling running water in channels and water chutes and fountains, and ornamented by favoured trees and shrubs, cypress, neem, fig and other fruit trees, and flowering shrubs like jasmine.

The engineering entailed to manage the smooth flow of water by gravity from end to end of the 30 acre garden is mind-boggling. When the Aga Khan foundation undertook the extensive restoration project, much stonework, cleaning, and channel repair was required, but correction of the original water levels of the garden channels was minimal.

The peace and quiet in the garden is sublime.

Many residents of our neighbourhood enjoy early morning walks in the garden.

coming next; more about the restoration work, and other buildings in the complex

jungly heat and humidity

Delhi in maximum jungly heat and humidity.

Jungle (detail) by Andrée, watercolour and pastel

Delhi is extremely hot and humid right now. The monsoon is almost over, and after the cooling rain and clouds comes the blazing-sun-out steamer effect. Insect life (and other organisms) are in full glory, the trees and plants are fresh-bathed and flourishing, and one is soaked in sweat from the least activity. It is all gloriously GREEN. And damp.

It is mating season for peacocks, fanning their tails and filling the air with their clarion honks.

Here is the morning view from my window at Ninder Mahal, our castle in Rajasthan. Nature's most extravagant creature,

how did the peacock get designed thus? Over-the-top colour,

pattern, shine and glitter. A great National Bird for India.

I found a giant grasshopper last week at Ninder Mahal, sipping nectar by night on the Queen of the Night bush. The length of my longest finger, maybe 6", a King of Grasshoppers he was, and the most pop-art design you can imagine; chrome yellow and bright blue rings end to end! Just like a hallucination, or Alice in Wonderland. Then the details; delicate irridescent glassy wings, shaded yellow through coppery red, tiny sketched lines along legs, and stripey ringed antenna, and buggy blue eyes. The King was slowly picking up each tubular flower in both "hands", and sipping it back, as from a chalice. After a while he began to eat them slowly, like cucumbers.

(more about Ninder Mahal next post)

Monsoon Winds

Here comes a string of Tales, and lots of pictures, from the Belly of Delhi.

I will start with the view off my balcony,
during an afternoon rainstorm.
The big tree thrashing about is a NEEM tree.
Hundreds of birds visit it daily,
don't you wonder where they all are hiding now?



music; Shiv Kumar Sharma, of Kashmir