New Delhi: the city that fears the air
You are going to feel the culture shock. That is the phrase that all of us who travel ever hear before arriving from a friend or traveler who already knew India. But when I landed I thought those words had been exaggerated. Indira Gandhi airport gleamed clean, with white floors shining thanks to numerous workers scrubbing their floors everywhere and top-notch bathrooms. Then I got on the subway that comes almost from inside and I thought the same thing again: «quizá han exagerado». It looked new, had spaces to store backpacks, air conditioning, electronic signs with the seasons, leftover seats and perfume.
It is clear that the true India I met her 15 minutes after, when the subway stopped at New Delhi Central Station. I climbed a long staircase and a heat wave shook my face. There the real arrival in India, the shock that those who told me about culture shock. I walked down a busy avenue looking for the Paharganj neighborhood, the area of cheap accommodation for travelers. Everything caught my attention. The number of people, the noises, the indisputable difference of being in the East and not the West. And the air. Whenever I talk about Delhi I leave a separate paragraph for air, vitiated by strange odors that lasted several days in my nostrils.
Generating a filthy and difficult to breathe atmosphere
The kitchens of the restaurants in the middle of the street boiled oil burned a thousand times mixed with multicolored seasonings. Clouds of black smoke billowed from the exhaust pipes of countless buses, autos, taxis and moto-taxis, mingling with rubbish piles on fire or piled in every direction he looked. Animals and people also left their own: the manure of the sacred cows in the middle of the street and the public toilets without doors where what was eliminated by the people was degraded on the asphalt, that burned from the rays of the sun with its 38 degrees that fermented everything creating a filthy and difficult to breathe atmosphere.
Delhi was declared capital under the control of the British Empire in 1931. The violent times of a city written with blood spilled by wars between Hindus and Muslims are long gone.. Today the city's problems are different.
Like many capitals of the world Delhi constantly receives internal migrants, residents of rural areas who go to the city in search of work and a better quality of life. And although it is true that in the capitals many succeed, It is also clear that many others do not: in less than a hundred meters I saw about twenty people living on the street. Delhi was transformed into a mega city, the most populous in the country after Mumbai, with 18 million. A human mass that does not offer the same possibilities to everyone.
In less than a hundred meters I saw about twenty people living on the street
One of the main problems is pollution. I walked and felt my lungs fill with thick air at every step and this was no accident, because this city holds the first place in a ranking published last year by the World Health Organization. The Indian capital is the most polluted city in the world, the one that more PM 2,5 got in the air, tiny particles that, when breathed, settle directly in the lungs.
When that happens the possibilities of suffering respiratory diseases increase considerably. Last year, after Diwali Hindu festival, contaminated air mixed with smoke from fireworks celebration so dangerous concentration of particles allowed for reasons of public health schools throughout the city were closed for several days.
They almost circulate 10 million motor vehicles
What was also evident is that there was too much traffic. Crossing the streets carried an unusual difficulty due to the crazy maneuvering of all the vehicles that were circulating stripped of any traffic law. A large part of the contamination is due to the fact that they circulate almost 10 million motor vehicles, although there are other factors that directly affect the thickening of the city air: using biofuels for cooking, burning crops, industrial emissions and the excessive use of coal to generate electricity.
Finally, after walking for a long time I found the Main Bazar shopping street, in the Paharganj neighborhood, where I stayed in a hotel in 5 dollars a night. Delhi is the gateway to India and preserves part of the country's history, capital city on more than one occasion in history, center of wars and episodes of great historical importance throughout many centuries. It is an obligation to visit it. But today is, also, unsustainable cities model that reproduce in several countries with emerging economies, especially in Asia, where the population overflows and where the air became unbreathable.
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