Hauz Khaz

Today, after a long haitus, I walked around Hauz Khas.

Now, just to clarify, I don't mean the poshy colony where 21 year old married paedophiles reside, but the real deal, where 21 year old Mughal Emporer paedophiles and their young harem used to reside.

I have spoken at length about deer park. Now just before deer park is the Hauz Khas district part, which is full of swings, and skating rinks, and general bonhomie. It is also home to Hauz Khas, The Special Tank.

Well, to be quite frank, there not much special about the tank now. Its a big hole in the ground, lined with concrete, and where its full of water, it looks like a miniature swamp, with trees growing out through the murky, algae-green water.

What, however, is nice is the ruins of the surrounding settlement of Hauz Khas. This dates back to the Tughluq's, and also houses the tomb of one Firoz Shah Tughluq, who apparently renovated the place.
Now, Mughal ruins abound in Delhi, and most of them, like this, go unnoticed and unkempt. They are taken for granted, I believe, because there are way too many of them. I was walking through them with Haripal, and he through this is sharp focus when he pointed out that we were damn lucky to have this kind of stuff just lying around, as Chandigarh was a shit-hole(well not those exact words) with nothing to see.

Back to the point. Around the tank is a summer retreat of the Tughluq's. The complex has living quaters, something which we presumed to be stations for guards, and the northern side apparently had a mosque, though we couldn't really make out what that was exactly. We also noticed that renovations are underway, which is a good thing, as some of the buildings are really crumbling away.

Now, walking through ruins is really quite fun. And this was more fun, as they were quite deserted, and didn't have the usual "Rupa Loves Rahul" type of shit written all over them, and hordes or pokey visitors who like to go into the domes and yell out obsceneties to get the echo back.
Going up and down the narrow steps is quite an experience. One wonders whether Mughals were really thin, really short, or just really lazy builders, who didn't want to waste time broadening the passageways.

The only sad thing about Mughal Ruins is they all have this terrible bird shit smell about them, owing to the lovely domed areas, where birds, and bats can stay and make merry.

All in all, it was a fun experience. Again, I would just like to point out how lucky we are to have a lot of history just lying around us. Mebbe we should occasionally take time out to give it a look see.