The streets of Delhi cannot be summed up in a single description. Just as it would be unfair for me to describe the streets of Los Angeles using only Hollywood, Skid Row, Watts, or the garment district as my guide, it would be unfair for me to characterize Delhi's streets based on the infinitesimal section I saw, but I can say that what I saw made me realize how much I have come to rely on my city eyes.
I am privileged to have traveled a great deal, and to have been submerged in many chaotic cities throughout the world. And when I compare my first time stepping onto the streets of Accra to making my way through the streets of Delhi, there is a palpable difference in impact. Part of that difference is just the fact that over time and with experience, it becomes easier to navigate through winding alleys, to dodge taxis and rickshaws that have no intention of stopping, to avoid breathing in the exhaust fumes and the occasional stench of filth, and to tune out the honking.
The unfortunate consequence of such confidence in the face of chaos is that you begin to tune out the people. Because the when you really see the people, that is the hardest part. It's survival really. Put on your city eyes and you won't see the woman following you with her mutilated baby in her arms, you won't see the fact that the vendor selling your chips on the bus is a child who can't be over six years old. You'll walk right past the man with no legs using a roller board to navigate the same streets that you find challenging on two legs and a full belly.
There are times when I forget my city eyes, and I see things and people as they really are. Like in Phnom Penh, a mother and her barely one-year-old daughter collected cans for money directly outside the cafe where tourists sat drinking afternoon mojitos and taking in the river view (no doubt through their city eyes). I had just gotten off of a video call with my sister and her beautiful children, and for a moment, I broke down. I saw this mother and her daughter as human beings instead of letting them blend into the scenery that had simply become the backdrop of my every day. In these moments, without my city eyes, I feel more human. More connected to the world I live in. But I am also paralyzed by the weighty reality of the challenges that face so many of our brothers and sisters.
And so, for better or worse, I put on my city eyes.
While I recognize that I cannot change the fate of all of the people facing unfair and incomprehensible challenges, I have decided that what I can do is make them not invisible. I can acknowledge their presence, smile at them, respond when they call out to me, and look them in the eye. I can treat them with the dignity and respect that all humans deserve.
As I finished up this blog, I pulled a random book from the shelf beside me and opened up to the first page. It was Mark Tully's No Full Stops in India, and in its first three lines, it bluntly and eloquently addresses the Western response to poverty abroad, and re-framed my thinking to a degree. Tully writes:
"'How do you cope with the poverty?' That must be the question I have
been asked most frequently by visitors to India. I often reply, 'I don't have
to. The poor do.' It's certainly true."
And yes, it certainly is true.