Field notes
What one pound actually buys you in Delhi
Back home it wouldn't cover a coffee. Here it's a full plate, a bag of warm peanuts, and change. Let me show you.
Back home, one pound does not really buy you anything. It will not cover a coffee. It might get you a chocolate bar if you are lucky.
Here is what one pound bought me in Delhi.
A full thali. Matar paneer, dal makhni, a bit of alu, some raita, rice, and the freshest roti you have ever had, still hot from the pan. One pound for the lot, and I mean a proper meal, not a taster. I sat there trying to work out how that is even possible and I still cannot tell you.
That is not a one off either. Fresh corn, roasted on the coals right in front of you and fanned with a bit of foam, is about fifteen pence. A bag of warm peanuts is small change. A cup of chai that would cost you four quid dressed up in London is a few pence at a roadside stall, and honestly it is better.
I am not telling you this to say India is cheap, because that misses the point and it is a bit rude besides. The prices are what they are for reasons that are not always comfortable. What gets me is the value. The freshness, the skill, the fact that a man on a bicycle can hand you something cooked better than most restaurants for the price of almost nothing.
It does something to your head after a while. You stop converting everything and you start noticing what you are actually getting. A plate of food someone is proud of. A snack made the same way for fifty years. Change in your hand and a full stomach.
Then you fly home, buy a sad sandwich at the airport for the price of that entire thali, and you understand exactly why I keep going back.
More later.