The Capital Cities: Flight to New Delhi and Canberra

In Flight No. 1, we covered Jakarta . Read on for my take on New Delhi and Canberra.

New Delhi: This is where I confess to not knowing New Delhi all that well. In my defence, with the NCR booming and ballooning and the Metro's recent development, most Delhiites don't know the new New (see what i did there?) Delhi all that well either. Most people who talk about 'time slowing down' in India probably haven't been here yet, as New Delhi is active enough for even a hardened city boy like me. The apartments are ugly remnants of an earlier time, and could be prettier, to say the least. The food, of course, is amazing. I find that New Delhi, to me, is more interesting in the way it differs from Jakarta. The public transport is lightyears ahead (the Metro is a huge point of pride for me as a Delhiite, and the best defense against the dreaded Mumbaikers, but not for long), the roads are worse (although less packed and marginally better for walking on), the malls have a long long way to go (I compared them to my beloved MKG in Jakarta and they all fell short), Indian poverty is of course absymal (if I could wield a wand...), and I don't think I've ever encountered the characteristic Delhiite rudeness that people speak of. On a completely unrelated note: how come Delhiites don't stick together like Maharashtrans, Bengalis, Kashmiris, Punjabis, etc. do?

                Canberra: It occurs to me that I shall soon spend more time here in my first year than I ever have in Delhi: how do these things happen? I like to call Canberra 'the capital in the middle of nowhere' (I mean seriously, no international flights?) and as Australia's capital city one would expect quite a bit from it. In the way it (as a developed country capital) differs from Jakarta and New Delhi (stereotypical rapidly developing developing (and I did it again) country capitals), I find it fascinating. It can have a very quiet, sleepy, suburban atmosphere, with five populated clusters separated by undeveloped natural land. It is orders of magnitude more walkable than Jakarta and New Delhi, but strangely has absolutely terrible public transport (bad bus service, no other options). One has to actually call taxis (are you kidding?) and there is one mall in the city centre, confusingly titled Canberra Centre Mall. One. Thursday nights here are incredible (if you're a fan of the heavy heavy drinking culture or simply enjoy watching people get smashed like I do), and I think this is because civil servants (government is the single largest employer) get paid every second Thursday. This means cheap drinks (the holy grail of every starving, but at least now not thirsting, college student). The people here are surprising in the extremity of their niceness, and as far as racism is concerned, I feel quite safe, or at least no more unsafe than anyone else (college students vs. townie tension + lots of alcohol = this won't end well). Canberra definitely doesn't have a big city feel to it, and in some ways seems less full-featured than either Jakarta or Delhi, but is definitely not dull.

                So there you have it. In conclusion, both Jakarta and New Delhi beat Canberra in terms of big cityness, but Canberra has charms of its own. If you stayed with me through all that, congratulations! You have earned the 'finished imposingly long article' achievement award.


-Vaibhav Sagar

The CAPITAL Cities - Flight No. 1

Some people long for the seaside, the hillside, or the riverside (am I stretching this too thin?), far from the constantly grinding infernal machine that is the city. I, on the other hand, have grown up in these cities, and love their polluted air and concrete-sprouting tarred (but not feathered) earth. When those around me express their desire to commune with nature I idly wonder how long they could bear to survive without internet access and the creature comforts that they have, at great expense, appropriated for themselves. This means that I'm either a spoiled brat who wants no less than instant gratification or a sophisticate who has learned to love the metropolis (it is obvious which explanation I prefer). I was born in New Delhi, moved to Jakarta at the ripe age of 2 months (what implications this has on my claim to Indianness I shall leave you, dear reader, to decide), and am now pursuing an undergraduate education in Canberra (it's ok if you've never heard of it, I'll try not to *sniff* take it *sniff* too hard). By some bizarre coincidence, all three of these are capital cities, and as the self-proclaimed expert, allow me to take you (in two parts) through these capitals I have been fortunate to call home. Why two parts for three cities? Well, because I said so.

Jakarta: I grew up here, and love this place in spite of (and perhaps paradoxically because of) its many flaws. Having said that, though, I increasingly find myself advising people not to visit as a tourist. I mean, 'Sightseeing in Jakarta' would make a very very short book, and Jakarta seems to me to be fairly tourist-unfriendly (Bali, on the other hand...). If you have friends or relatives or, even better, if you live here, then you pretty much have it made. The lovely people, readily available domestic help, drivers (more on that in a minute), the shopping (more on that too), etc. The roads, however, will make a man (or woman) out of you: few activites will imbue you with zen-like calm faster than the first-hand experience of Jakarta traffic, and this is why great drivers are indispensable (I know this because I learned to drive there: good times, good (oh-my-god-I'm-going-to-kill-us-all) times...). The mind-boggling number of malls, however, means that if you wait long enough, eventually one will pop up next door: I posit that a mall can be built in the time it takes one to visit all the existing malls in Jakarta. One never walks in Jakarta unless one is desperate or lacking, as the roads are very pedestrian-unfriendly. Jakarta's poverty is extremely depressing, but in this respect it is slightly better than, say, New Delhi. The Indian community here is small (3-4%, Sindhis not included because they've integrated themselves so well that we consider them Indonesian: if you're Sindhi, you probably know exactly which relatives of yours are here already) but extremely tight-knit, and as an Indian you will be in great company. I could go on, but I seem to have something in my eye (I’ve been also been chopping onions, and don't you dare ask me how I can chop onions and write at the same time, it's a gift).

And that’s all for now, folks! Tune in soon (very soon) for Flight No. 2!

- Vaibhav Sagar