The only signs of Christmas were these Santas "strung up" on the Gandhi Bridge that connects the new city of Ahmedabad with the old. I spent Christmas day and the next wandering around the old city, two main east west roads, Relief and Gandhi Roads lined with shops and an often disjunctured sense of architecture. Inside the "pols" or micro-neighborhoods are a combination of beautifully carved facades of Havelis, one of which I was able to tour and also see the equally magnificent inside in these airy courtyard buildings, there are also victorian and of course the characterless concrete block. Like other Indian cities, art deco had an impact on design. It's totally enchanting to wander these areas for hours getting lost, coming up upon, particularly on a relatively quiet Sunday, chauks, or central areas where people gather on benches, women sitting in doorsteps. Some people are curious about what I'm doing and ask, but most of the time I feel like I'm in a curious bubble in a world of my own.
Some of the photos show different aspects of the pols, and one, a "cow parking lot" I came upon in an area where several buildings look to have been torn down and another by the river where the slum that has been there since I started coming here in 1999, is in an interesting contrast with the billboard above it.
Carved facades on wooden havelis
Cow parking lot
interesting combination of architectural "style"?
The "Pol" entrances would have had a guard sitting in them watching the comings and goings into the area, many are more elaborate than this
This was a curious row of buildings with one "cut off "from the other
I like this house of doors
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