CommonWealth Games in Delhi

New Delhi welcomed the XIX Commonwealth Games with a grand Opening Ceremony. I had booked tickets few months ago to attend some competitions and visit the newly built venues.

Sunday, October 10: Wrestling in Indira Gandhi Sport Complex. We went by metro and then bus shuttle, ride free with all CWG tickets! There were many matches, and sometimes two in the same time; the ambiance was very good with a strong support for Indian wrestlers; their performances were really good with 1 Gold medal, 1 Silver and 1 Bronze. Only Pakistan did better on that day with 2 Gold medals; while one Canadiand from Indian origin was dancing with punjabi music after winning the Freestyle 120 kg Men Final!...

Monday, October 11: Weightlifting in JN Stadium (also by metro but only 2 stations from Lajpat Nagar!). The competition was very interesting with 13 athletes in the 105+kg category: one first round with 3 Snatch attempts, and then second round with Clean & Jerk; the winner is the one who lift the heaviest total. An athlete from Turks and Caicos Islands reached a mediocre total of 210kg, compared to almost 400kg for the Australian Gold medalist, including a 221kg in clean & jerk at its first attempt, the new CWG record.

Tuesday, October 12: Athletics in JN Stadium. A huge crowd attended different finals competition: Pole Vault Women just in front of me, Javelin men throwing from the other side of the field, Triple Jump men on the left (National record of 17.07m for the Indian athlet and Bronze medal), and many runnings. Kenya did a hat trick in the 5000m women final and a just a double for the 1500m men final; there were also the 4 relay finals: 4x100m men and women both won by England with a 3rd place of India, 4x400m women won by Indian runners under massive applause from the stadium.

Wednesday, October 13: Boxing in Talkatora Stadium (very far from the closest metro station) and only 5 finals. The arena was rather small but the ambience was disappointing; the crowd was conspuing England, but not the other UK boxers. There were some very strong guys, but the matches are too short in this Olympic format (win by points in 3 rounds of 3 minutes). Anyway, Indian boxers won Gold medals in the Light Welter weight (64 kg) and Super Heavy weight (+91 kg)


Now it's time for corruption scrutiny after the rush completion of the facilites and over-extended budget allocation!

Jaipur

We spent our first week-end of October in Jaipur and stayed there 4 days. Jaipur was founded in the desert by Maharaja Jai Singh II in the year 1727;it was the first planned city in India and Jaipur is also known as the Pink City. It is now the capital city of Rajasthan and is popular for the charm and cultural heritage the city provides.

Early morning on Friday (5h), we boarded a train from New Delhi Railway Station to reach for lunch time. Then we had city tour by autorickshaw to visit the City Palace, where the King was staying, Jantar Mantar, Amber Fort, and Jahangal Mahal before sunset...

On the next day, we started our visit inside the city walls, in Babu market next to the city palace; the streets are full of shops of clothes, jewels and other stuff for decorations, but pieces are highly overpriced. To take a break of the market frenesy, we enter the Hawa Mahal, the palace of winds as cool and opened rooms are kept fresh with the shade even in the scorching summer. We also went later to the white and shining Krishna temple.

We book a taxi for the whole Sunday as we went to the Nahargarh Fort, the palace for the 9 wives of an ancient king, and the Old Fort with the largest canon in the world. After a good lunch in a Indian restaurant, we visited the Albert Hall Museum and its brilliant artistic collections, but then our taxi driver took us back next to our lunch place to visit a jewels' shop (which was not really good and too expensive).

On Monday, we directly drop our bag in the train station's locker room. We had some nice time in a mall for chill over a coffee; but also in the old streets of the Pink city. We had to take the afternoon train to reach Delhi at night...

"Au delà du Réel" Paintings' exhibition

Au Dela Du Reel (To See Beyond What Our Eyes Can See) Solo exhibition of images by Boishali Sinha Massot depicting her stay/rendez-vous with France, the people around her & the day-to-day life using a technic called Marouflage in French.

The inauguration of the solo show by Mrs. Maneka Gandhi and Mr Tom Alter went very welll, and the exhibition received an unanimous good response. The show is on till 22 August, please come.....

Holidays in Manali

For a well deserved retreat, we decided to head to the Himalaya mountains. Manali, in Himachal Pradesh, was supposed to host us as a base city for some trekkings. But as the weather conditions were reluctant, but thankfully not as tragic as in Ladakh, we slept every night in hotel and enjoyed lost of good foods.

We succeeded some beautiful day hikes, on some footpaths, inside the forests or in the numerous apple orchards, in the hills or in the valley next to rivers, or in between near amazing waterfalls. We'd always find local people, mostly older ladies knitting while keeping cows, providing us the right directions, after ineffective deviations!

During the day of rain, we were playing a typical French card game called belote.

Transportation by bus was largely delayed (23h) on the way to Manali because of some landsliding on the roads; but on the return journey, that we preponed by a couple days to enjoy Delhi humidity in advance, was on time (13h).

Pics in the gallery August 2010: Manali

Pole Mallakhamb

Mallakhamb is a traditional Indian sport in which a gymnast performs feats and poses while hanging from a vertical wooden pole.

Delhi Metro in Lajpat Nagar

Last Saturday night (June 26, 2010), the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation lifted rail coaches to the track for trial runs on a new line Central Secratariat-Badarpur border (20 km).

Scheduled time of opening: September 2010. I can't wait to have metro next door of our place!

Fête de la Musique : World Music Day

On the occasion of the World Music Day, The Alliance Francaise de Delhi brought the celebration of music on Saturday June 26, 2010 .

The evening witnessed mix genre of indoor and outdoor performances at the premises of Alliance by three musical performances namely – Jaipur Beat’s from the heritage of Rajasthan’s city Jaipur, Bangla Natak.com’s Folk Orchestra from the rich land of Bengal and Sridhar /Thayil- the cutting edge band from the metropolitan city Mumbai! The evening will be kick started by some French songs by Antoine Redon.

Adding more festivity to the World Music celebrations were the delectable food and drinks. It shall be celebrated the French way with cheese, wine and other French delicacies.

 

Census of India

The Census 2011 has just started, it is the 15th of the country; never before in the world a government have tried an exercise of that scale to count, identify and issue identity cards to more than a billion people.

A National Population Register is created to form a comprehensive identity database : every person above 15 and residing in the country will also have a Unique Identity Number and a National Identity Card.

Some figures:

- estimated population in 2011 = 1.2 billion;

- about 2.1 million Census takers;

- projected cost = USD 1.3 bn;

- quantity of papers = 11631 metric tons

- instruction manual printed in 18 languages

...

Article in French : Aujourd'hui l'Inde

HAIR India

In the Garden of Five Senses, the Broadway musical classic HAIR celebrated the Sixties.

The theme of hippie movement in the US isn't just a celebration of the counterculture. The characters reflect the heady political times they live in and speak about love, peace and harmony.

It was really entertaining and the final scene under the storms rains was a height!!!

Subho Nobo Borsho

Bengali new year (Subho Nobo Borsho) is being celebrated today on April 15, 2010. The day is being celebrated across West Bengal especially and also by Bengali people across the globe. People worship Lord Ganesha and Goddess Luxmi on this day. People celebrate this day with rangolis and making sweets at home.

This year also marks the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore.

I wished Bengali people all over the World this new year bring prosperity and happiness in their families. I send my warmest greetings to all those celebrating on this special day. Shubho Nobo Borsho!

Come-back in India

After a much awaited period, Boishali and I are back in New Delhi.
This transition time has been spent in France for professional reason, that is also the case for this return.

To assimilate the heat and the city-life, a particular event was well indicated for this come-back: a defeat of the Delhi Daredevils cricket team in its Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium. The ambiance was great at the beginning, but vanished progressively with the team's inability to perform (111-all out) !