“Nehru-mancer”
I remember, oh so many years ago, reading William S. Gibson’s “Neuromancer” for the first time, and thinking how cool it would be to live in Chiba or some other place where you might see the latest tech being sold by some little old ama under a worn tarp, next to a wok of stir-fry, or having some Mission:Impossible-style repair job pulled off by a kid on a street corner. Now, of course, I’ve experienced the reality, and in this post I’ll do my best to describe it, but I’m not sure I can really do the place justice.
In Delhi, you flag down an auto-rickshaw and after a bit of haggling with the driver, have him take you to Nehru place. Nehru Place is kind of a road, kind of a neighborhood, and definitely a desi Indian experience. You want to go the bazaar, a strange amalgamation of office buildings jumbled together around a couple of plazas. The first two floors of each building are a rabbit warren of wallahs selling everything from shoelaces, biryani, cell phones, computer cases, fruit juices, used paperback books, recordable CDs and DVDs, sandal repairs, luggage, software, flash drives, printing facilities, and other tech too arcane to name. Should you be in the market for printer cartridges, the plaza is filled with boys stationed here and there, ready to sell you cartridges of somewhat dubious provenance, or simply doctor up any cartridges you already own with a syringe filled with anonymous black toner. These boys compete for space with women roasting ears of corn over small braziers; the finished ears are placed as invitingly as possible on a piece of cardboard balanced on a styrofoam packing element. It’s all about proven technology–the brazier allows one to manage a controlled fire on any level ground; the cardboard insulates the styrofoam from melting; while the styrofoam keeps the corn warm and off the ground. At other strategic plaza positions are bhel-puri wallahs, ready to concoct a customized street snack of puffed rice, nuts, and spices for the peckish shopping nerd.
Seeing all of this involves moving through crowds, along balconies and hallways, passing entire walls of used monitors, stepping around the inevitable piles of garbage, and the groups of small boys industriously scrubbing plates and glasses at public faucets for the nearest dhaba.
After a while, it begins to dawn on you that you have truly reached the “souk” for geeks. No matter what tech you are seeking–a new CPU perhaps? A stylish new flatscreen?–somebody, likely ensconced in a 6-foot by 12-foot stall, has it and is ready to sell it to you. True to form, because this is, after all, India, any exceedingly heavy purchases can be transported by one of the waiting cart-rickshaw drivers in the plaza. Simply pack your space-age tech securely, place it in the worn wooden wagon, and off it goes, trundling home at the 5-10 miles per hour a rickshaw can manage in Delhi traffic.
