[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":426},["ShallowReactive",2],{"tag-patiala":3},[4,201,265,336],{"id":5,"title":6,"body":7,"date":186,"description":187,"extension":188,"image":43,"layout":189,"meta":190,"navigation":192,"path":193,"seo":194,"stem":195,"tags":196,"writer":199,"__hash__":200},"blog\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind.md","A race car left behind",{"type":8,"value":9,"toc":182},"minimark",[10,14,21,24,27,30,33,36,39,44,47,52,60,65,68,71,74,77,80,84,87,92,97,100,105,108,111,114,119,122,125,128,131,135,138,143,148,151,154,165,170,173,176,179],[11,12,13],"p",{},"I did not ever imagine that I would have an association with the city of Patiala. Not to say that I had an inferior opinion of the city - I just never thought about it and myself in the same frame of thought at all. In fact – and this was a crushing realisation I came to in the last semester of my undergraduate years – I never thought much about myself or my career at all.",[15,16],"blog-image",{"align":17,"alt":18,"caption":19,"src":20},"right","Space frame","The small road to campus in Patiala","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fpatiala-1.jpg",[11,22,23],{},"Growing up, I was an unfettered, unfailing idealist (although some people used the words “unnecessarily emotional” instead). What that meant was that I spent almost no time visualising answers to practical concerns: What colleges should I apply to? What kind of career did I want?",[11,25,26],{},"Instead, all I had was the impulse to contribute to the problems around me. It’s how I got into building software: small apps to solve problems I’d see people running into at school. It’s why I spent a disproportionate amount of time reading and writing about ideas for better governance structures. It’s why I was fascinated by the lives of those working to bring change in society.",[11,28,29],{},"I’ve said this before (and at the expense of making this become a hagiography of myself, I’ll repeat) - I was a bright student through school, and had excellent results through almost all of it. As a result, I had a generous amount of self-confidence (perhaps too much in hindsight), and thus, very little instinct to course-correct on seeing unexpected results.",[11,31,32],{},"The single point agenda I carried through most of my years at engineering college was to claw back some of this self-confidence, since what was to be the zenith of my high-school academic career became, instead, its lowest point: through two years of trying to making it to the top engineering colleges of India, I suffered one academic disaster after another. While these were mostly my own doing and not much due to accident or misfortune, the result was that I ended up at a “Tier 2” institution in Patiala. I started the first semester – much like most other students there – with an enormous burden of discarded prospects and incessant pangs of guilt and comparison.",[11,34,35],{},"The mission, became, then, to discover as many opportunities that existed inside – or outside – the campus, so I could try and excel at them and begin redeeming myself in my own eyes. The “Formula Student” (student race car building competition) team at the university carried a solid reputation, and regularly competed at a global level – so I became intent on joining them as soon as possible.",[11,37,38],{},"I was a Computer Science student though, and the Formula Student team was almost exclusively mechanical or mechatronics engineers. Attempts to join in the first semester did not arise.",[15,40],{"align":41,"alt":18,"caption":42,"src":43},"left","Sanding the metallic space-frame of the car body","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fspace-frame.jpg",[11,45,46],{},"6 months in, I had more of a network at campus: news filtered in that they were recruiting a software engineer to work on a project to visualise engine telemetry through real-time charts, and that they were preparing to compete at Formula Student 2017 in Italy.",[15,48],{"align":17,"alt":49,"caption":50,"src":51},"3D printer","The privileged few students who had access to the campus 3D printers","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002F3D-printer.jpg",[11,53,54,55,59],{},"I interviewed with the captain of the team that year: a final-year mechanical engineering student named Utsav Mudgal. I hope he was atleast a little bit as impressed by me as I was by him, since it seemed like he genuinely knew a lot about building cars and, despite that, had a distinct humility about him (the ring-tone of his phone at the time, coincidentally, was ",[56,57,58],"em",{},"Humble"," by Kendrick Lamar, something I think about to this day whenever I hear that song). Humility, counter-intuitively, was a rare characteristic at the campus.",[15,61],{"align":17,"alt":62,"caption":63,"src":64},"Team Fateh car","The team's car on a drive test","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Factual-car-fateh.jpg",[11,66,67],{},"Utsav offered a role, I accepted.",[11,69,70],{},"What followed were nights of blood, sweat and tears: sanding the metallic frame of the car’s body and getting hospitalised in the process; all nighters at the campus workshop watching 3D printers churn out parts; building my first real-world web app with an Arduino, Angular.js and Node.js; and finally staying back in the emptied-out hostel after the semester was over in the hopes of getting the car ready in time for shipping it to “Autodromo Ricardo Paletti\" in Italy.",[11,72,73],{},"All to be told a few days before we were to leave for Italy that our car was going to be delayed in being shipped. Our flights were booked, presentations ready: so we left, hoping that it’d be a minor delay.",[11,75,76],{},"The first memory I have of the Milan Malpensa airport is being disappointed at the size; the second one is stepping out and being amazed at it being daylight at 8PM.",[11,78,79],{},"The car never made it. I realised only two days into being in Italy that a big group of seniors inside the team were running, essentially, a massive grift: funnelling funds contributed by members and the university out while pretending that they were using them to pay customs duties needed to ship our car to Italy.",[15,81],{"align":17,"alt":18,"caption":82,"src":83},"A good day in Milano","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fmilan-hostel.jpg",[11,85,86],{},"A lot more growing up was to be done on just the first day of the trip: the hostel that one of the seniors had “booked” denied us entry at the doorstep saying our payment had failed. My first ever night in Europe was thus spent walking around Milan with large suitcases in a big group of Indian college kids, being denied entry even by pizza places who were assuming we were homeless.",[15,88],{"align":17,"alt":89,"caption":90,"src":91},"Varano de Melegari","The beautiful hill town that hosted the event","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fvarano-de-mele.jpg",[15,93],{"align":17,"alt":94,"caption":95,"src":96},"Autodromo","Autodromo Ricardo Paletti","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fautodromo-2.jpg",[11,98,99],{},"On finally finding another hostel that had availability, the seniors immediately decided to find the nearest strip club. I did my best to pretend like I was only mildly amused at the offer and nonchalantly decline, while panicking internally at what I had gotten myself into.",[15,101],{"align":41,"alt":102,"caption":103,"src":104},"Parma Pizza","Pizza from scratch in Parma","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fpizza-scratch.jpg",[11,106,107],{},"The remaining days redeemed the trip a great deal from the incredibly low bar the first day had set.",[11,109,110],{},"At Varano de Melegari, the site of the competition, a series of remarkable experiences occurred each day, as if by clockwork: on the first night I ran into a man – a waiter at the restaurant we dined at – who was from the same village in Punjab that my dad is from. On the second day, we learned – from a family that had migrated to that town from Nagaur in Rajasthan – that there were barely any people, let alone young people, in the town: a bottling plant was their source of employment and income, and the competition was when the town sprang to life every few years.",[11,112,113],{},"On the third, I saw a man make a pizza from scratch by hand in a small shop in the Italian countryside and realised that I prefer Indian paneer pizza over what many would call an authentic version.",[15,115],{"align":17,"alt":116,"caption":117,"src":118},"Formula SAE","Students making final preparations before inspection","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fsae-2.jpg",[11,120,121],{},"The fourth and final day perhaps trumped it all: even though we had no car, we could still compete in “static” events which required presenting to the audience and a panel of judges. Our captain backed out of presenting citing ill-health, and I was asked to step up.",[11,123,124],{},"I hadn’t carried a suit for the trip, since all I expected to present was a small poster about my telemetry project. That presentation had already happened the previous day in one of the smaller tents at the venue. I was content with the few German and Austrian technical directors who had asked me interesting, probing questions about sensing oxygen ratios and temperatures in real-time.",[11,126,127],{},"The captain offered to lend me his suit, and it fit. It was decided. I was, along with another first-year member of the team, to present our case in the largest tent at the event venue.",[11,129,130],{},"We placed 6th globally in that event - the university’s best ever finish in any event at any version of Formula Student.",[15,132],{"align":41,"alt":18,"caption":133,"src":134},"A theater in Parma","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fparma.jpg",[11,136,137],{},"My first-year teammate and I had, at least for our own egos, snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. While the two of us traipsed through the second half of the trip through a random set of European cities we had selected based on vibes, for me, a sliver of the evasive, eroded self-confidence began to return.",[15,139],{"align":17,"alt":140,"caption":141,"src":142},"Qila-e-Mubarak","The refurbished Qila-e-Mubarak","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fmonument-culture.jpg",[15,144],{"align":41,"alt":145,"caption":146,"src":147},"Pt Vishwa Mohan Bhatt in Patiala","A Mohan Veena recital by Pt Vishwa Mohan Bhatt in Patiala","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Fconcert.jpg",[11,149,150],{},"I came back to a second year of engineering in Patiala with a shift in perspective: more respectful for the city, the campus and the students, professors and opportunities inside it.",[11,152,153],{},"The four years I spent there saw a comparable evolution in both my thinking and the city’s own urban form: footpaths (“sidewalks”) improved dramatically, new malls appeared, monuments were refurbished and new cultural festivals were patronised: I’ve attended a few performances by Ustad Zakir Hussain but his concert at the Qila-e-Mubarak in Patiala in Feb 2020 remains the best, by far.",[11,155,156,157,164],{},"This evolution was capped by the most remarkable architectural project I’ve ever witnessed being built: in what was to be my final semester in the campus, I stepped into the newly built library. It is a spectacular example of modern brutalism, and in my opinion, one of the finest libraries on any campus, anywhere in the world. (",[158,159,163],"a",{"href":160,"rel":161},"https:\u002F\u002Fwww.architecturaldigest.com\u002Fgallery\u002Fstunning-university-libraries-slideshow",[162],"nofollow","Here's"," Architectural Digest agreeing with me).",[15,166],{"align":17,"alt":167,"caption":168,"src":169},"Thapar Library","The new library on campus","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind\u002Flibrary-v.jpg",[11,171,172],{},"In some sense, I think it mirrored the evolution of my mind too: from a persistent spiral of self-doubt to a more calm, measured and yet realistic sense of confidence in my ability, and the realisation that audacity and ambition need not be limited by anything, least of all geography.",[11,174,175],{},"Over the years I’ve seen this held true: juniors, batchmates and seniors have gone on to do remarkable things that I – on the day I stepped in – did not consider people from that 250 acre campus capable of doing.",[11,177,178],{},"By the time I stepped out, though, I’d become a believer.",[11,180,181],{},"(Some disillusionment was in store for my first year as an employed person in 2020, but that is a story about Shimla that I may or may not ever tell.)",{"title":183,"searchDepth":184,"depth":184,"links":185},"",2,[],"2026-05-24","Of expectations, identity, and growing up in Patiala","md","default",{"comments":191},[],true,"\u002Fblog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind",{"title":6,"description":187},"blog\u002Fa-racecar-left-behind",[197,198],"Patiala","Parma","Auraq Staff","dfCIlh6t_ZFO8MhiP2rwUA4srppDG5k-7_Jmo7_Erss",{"id":202,"title":203,"body":204,"date":254,"description":255,"extension":188,"image":224,"layout":189,"meta":256,"navigation":192,"path":258,"seo":259,"stem":260,"tags":261,"writer":263,"__hash__":264},"blog\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-times.md","The Times",{"type":8,"value":205,"toc":252},[206,209,212,215,218,221,225,228,231,234,237,240,243,246,249],[11,207,208],{},"It is a reasonable truth, at this point, to say that times are hard.",[11,210,211],{},"The phrase \"times are hard\" was, till some time ago, evocative of a ravaged society trying to piece itself together post the second world war; now it is in every mass e-mail I have received in the past month: the word \"times\" prefaced or suffixed with whatever adjective seems most palatable.",[11,213,214],{},"In a cursory assessment of my inbox, 'uncertain' is the most popular, followed by 'unprecedented'. With this, there can be no disagreements. Times are uncertain, and they are most definitely unprecedented.",[11,216,217],{},"'Dystopian' takes third place: it is here that I cannot concur.",[11,219,220],{},"There are no strangers to dystopia in India. It comes to the northern parts of our country late each October: blankets of smoke covering city after city; the air essential yet toxic; the sky indiscernible in grey. In visualisations of dystopia, therefore, the present is a misfit.",[15,222],{"align":17,"alt":223,"src":224},"Times","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-times\u002Fcover.png",[11,226,227],{},"In October late last year, I made one such dystopian journey through three most-affected states of the northern part of this country to reach Patiala. Upwind of — and thus, unaffected by — all the smoke, it had, by the next morning, pristine blue skies and perfectly breathable air. It was a sight I could not bring myself to savour, since it is marred by the knowledge that tragedy was afoot, elsewhere, at the same moment.",[11,229,230],{},"A suitable parallel has emerged in the past few days: looking outside from the window of my room – a daily event even when the windows were not confines – has evoked a powerful nostalgia for times of childhood.",[11,232,233],{},"Spending two decades in the same house allows for an extraordinary longitudinal assessment of life: experiences are anchored to an environment that changes very little; memory, thus, exists in a stunning parallax of successive experiences studded against surroundings whose transformation is far more gradual.",[11,235,236],{},"Gradual, but inevitable. The house has changed, and so has the neighbourhood. Principally, it should suffice to say that there are far more people now; and consequently, there is far more of everything that we bring along wherever we go.",[11,238,239],{},"There are, certainly, positive entries in that list; however, the present has shone a spotlight on the negative - since it so starkly highlights what happens when we subtract ourselves from the mix. The trash on the road is missing; the permanent cacophony of traffic is absent. Surroundings are clean, and peaceful. The dogs are confounded.",[11,241,242],{},"It is a situation that closely resembles what I would have seen looking out of the same window ten — or perhaps even greater — years ago. In any other scenario, this redux would be cause for celebration. Now, however, an acknowledgement similar to the one in Patiala last October renders the prospect of any happiness illegitimate: that this is a temporary fallout of mass global tragedy.",[11,244,245],{},"There is no certainty around what the 'normal' will look like, whenever it returns to us. Perhaps it will resemble the old normal; on some days, there seems hope that it will be better. A newer normal whose contours will be shaped by sincere national – and global – introspection. Perhaps a constructive, bipartisan public debate about issues that truly matter will finally emerge.",[11,247,248],{},"Not everyday, however: it would be reckless to be hopeful everyday. Like everything else that is hard to come by, hope must also be rationed.",[11,250,251],{},"A sign, of course, of the times.",{"title":183,"searchDepth":184,"depth":184,"links":253},[],"2020-04-02","The best of them, the worst of them",{"comments":257},[],"\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-times",{"title":203,"description":255},"blog\u002Fthe-times",[262,197],"New Delhi","Auraq staff","orH8HHsQAmcho-lY8JgXT69CZXqjLtkY2X1P233qJLQ",{"id":266,"title":267,"body":268,"date":326,"description":327,"extension":188,"image":285,"layout":189,"meta":328,"navigation":192,"path":330,"seo":331,"stem":332,"tags":333,"writer":263,"__hash__":335},"blog\u002Fblog\u002Fschool-games.md","School Games",{"type":8,"value":269,"toc":324},[270,273,276,279,282,286,289,292,295,298,301,304,307,310,313,316,319],[11,271,272],{},"It is not everyday that one comes across a prodigy. That too in a nondescript bus journey from Patiala to Delhi. ",[11,274,275],{},"Bus rides back home are usually quiet – nowhere as adventurous as barely making it on time to board the Shatabdi from Ambala. They are also uneventful : earphones are employed to nullify the film beaming from the bus’ unwelcome entertainment system; serendipitous, meaningful conversation with co-passengers is eliminated as collateral damage.",[11,277,278],{},"Things are different today. I am in the late afternoon service to the Delhi airport, and there is no need for earphones : has the conductor forgotten to put the latest Salman Khan starrer on? Or has the television system given in?",[11,280,281],{},"In any case, a fantastic silence results, owing to which I can sense that the man seated beside me is eager to talk. He begins with informing me that Delhi is not his final destination – Indigo flight 643 will ferry him to Pune early next morning – and soon makes the reason for his travels clear.",[15,283],{"align":17,"alt":284,"src":285},"Archers","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fschool-games\u002Fcover.jpg",[11,287,288],{},"“My son, seated behind us,” he says, turning and pointing, and making sure I’ve placed him, continues, “is 14 years, 7 months and …” He waits for the Age Calculator app on his phone to tell him the exact number of days. The number that flashes is inconsequential to the story, because what he goes on to say puts his unusual specificity in mentioning his son’s age in perspective. “He is the three-time national U-17 archery champion. We are travelling to Pune to compete in the Senior National Championships. He is going to be competing against olympians.”",[11,290,291],{},"I can not tell if he can sense the pinch of salt I take his – as I do all – claims with, but he immediately begins scrolling through the photo gallery on his phone.",[11,293,294],{},"There is a story associated with each, and my doubts dissolve.",[11,296,297],{},"A picture of him on a podium, holding a silver medal up. “The youngest international medallist for the country, at the recent South Asian Championships in Bangladesh.”",[11,299,300],{},"Being honoured by the Chief Minister of Punjab, on Republic Day, 2018. “The Government of Punjab provides no support at all. Look at Haryana. Lakhs to its athletes, even for a junior national medal.”",[11,302,303],{},"Another picture on a podium; this time with a gold medal. “National winner at the Khelo India School Games in Delhi. The Sports Ministry has announced 5 lakhs per year, for 8 years, for all medallists at these School Games. The new minister needs to stay put for this to happen.”",[11,305,306],{},"There is a packed schedule in the year to come : a number of trials for the Indian team in April and May; international events in Europe and Africa in September and October, and covering all of class 10 mathematics and science in the intervening summer.",[11,308,309],{},"The bus glides along the highway. I hardly find time to gaze outside. The conversation is one sided, but there can be no complaints : I am soaking his sermon up. It ranges from advising me about health to motivating me about life in general. It is evident that he was born to coach.",[11,311,312],{},"The trip ends, but not before I am introduced to the rest of the athletes in their contingent. There are two girls – 16 and 17 – both national-level medallists themselves. I take a picture for posterity, and run a few Google searches as I deboard: Who has been the youngest Indian medal winner at the Olympics?",[11,314,315],{},"The result reminds me of the Age Calculator app. The number of days – that I dismissed earlier as being inconsequential – might yet be of consequence.",[11,317,318],{},"He surely looked the part.",[11,320,321],{},[56,322,323],{},"Written and first published in April 2018",{"title":183,"searchDepth":184,"depth":184,"links":325},[],"2019-05-30","Three archers on a bus",{"comments":329},[],"\u002Fblog\u002Fschool-games",{"title":267,"description":327},"blog\u002Fschool-games",[262,197,334],"Pune","R7HrDSdd8NixvBltsgb90-5KVG3Mf3KOp6Y3i3-64IU",{"id":337,"title":338,"body":339,"date":417,"description":418,"extension":188,"image":356,"layout":189,"meta":419,"navigation":192,"path":421,"seo":422,"stem":423,"tags":424,"writer":263,"__hash__":425},"blog\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees.md","The generosity of trees",{"type":8,"value":340,"toc":415},[341,344,347,350,353,357,360,363,366,369,373,376,379,382,385,388,391,399,403,406,409,412],[11,342,343],{},"A tall Neem standing across the road from our house meant that the Neem became the first tree I could recognise from afar.",[11,345,346],{},"This was, also, largely due to the Neem being, in general, a very easily identifiable type: its distinctive needle-leaves are unmistakably its own. It has, in addition, a large presence on the packaging of most products found in a standard Indian bathroom. For the first decade of my life, I brushed with a toothpaste named Neem: it had a disdainful taste, a colour that reminded me of surgeons' scrubs, and a large Neem leaf on the tube.",[11,348,349],{},"The Neem, thus, was squarely placed in the imagination right from the beginning.",[11,351,352],{},"For other trees, however, through a large part of my life, I had no special affection, or disaffection; through my years at school I managed to be able to identify only one or two more. I learned how to write detailed answers about the general role of trees in society, study their biology and draft letters to editors about their conservation: all for marks in examinations. The tree, in all those years, never managed to climb out of the textbook.",[15,354],{"align":17,"alt":355,"src":356},"Neem Tree","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees\u002Fcover.jpg",[11,358,359],{},"A special affinity for trees has only developed in recent years: it is due to a delayed realisation that the tree is the most deeply entrenched symbol of any city. It is an absolutely inalienable aspect of its personality – the arboreal profile of the city is a circumstance of a complex intertwining of its history, geography and polity. If cities had fingerprints, they would largely be defined by the kind of trees that are found in them.",[11,361,362],{},"In that regard, there is excellent scholarly work on the history of Delhi and its trees. The principal resource is Pradeep Krishen's 'Trees of Delhi,' the underlying primary source behind any contemporary writing on the city and the diversity in its greenery.",[11,364,365],{},"This contemporary writing about the trees of the city is, naturally, most accessible, and it inevitably circles around only a few popular varieties. Amongst them, it is the Amaltas that draws the maximum attention; that becomes the subject of the most decorative metaphors.",[11,367,368],{},"Not unsurprisingly: the Amaltas offers a remarkable yellow to the city's typically grey sky; through the tree-lined streets of New Delhi, which saw extensive horticultural planning during the construction years of the imperial capital, the Amaltas is a frequent sight, causing intermittent showers of golden in April and May – setting the stage for intermittent showers of another kind only a month later.",[15,370],{"align":41,"alt":371,"src":372},"Amaltas Tree","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees\u002F1.jpg",[11,374,375],{},"The Amaltas thus became, only about a year ago, the first tree I added – after multiple years – to the mental repository of those I could identify from afar. This, as anyone will invariably point out, is no achievement: the Amaltas too, like the Neem, has a very distinctive appearance.",[11,377,378],{},"This is true, but only partly. The Amaltas' yellow fever is limited to the summer; for the rest of the year it bears a completely ordinary appearance. The only giveaway then, as has been recently discovered, is to look for the fruit: either hanging on from the tree itself, or spread across on the patch of land beside the observer. Long, black tubes that do not befit the label of a fruit in typical imagination, but are highly regarded in traditional Indian medicine.",[11,380,381],{},"During the early part of this year, this character trait of the Amaltas helped the identification of a number of them in Patiala. A resplendent college campus during early April, thus, did not offer surprise; as to why I was never able to spot them earlier in my three years in college, I have scant response. Perhaps the eyes only see what the mind is primed to see: a point of view that is obstructed by a mind determined to look outside, crippled by the fear of missing out, remains unable to see what is available in plain sight.",[11,383,384],{},"An alternative explanation is that the Amaltas only began to register in memory when an association between the tree and Delhi was firmly placed in my mind. When the golden yellow became a symbol of the city, it began to stand out – even in places I was not expecting to see it.",[11,386,387],{},"Among the places I have always expected to find it are the romantic avenues of New Delhi - Amrita Shergill Marg, and others such. Among the places I did not, was the park located behind the building I live in.",[11,389,390],{},"A couple of months ago, facing the second-floor entrance to our house, whilst waiting for someone to answer the doorbell, a sight of the now-familiar golden yellow was chanced upon in the park. In an instant, it became clear that the tree is not the exclusive reserve of the more central parts of the city; as time has passed, I have now realised that it has an absolutely egalitarian presence across the expanse of our capital; it does not see class, and even borders: there are streets lined with it in both Noida and Gurgaon.",[11,392,393,394],{},"Curiously, the Amaltas jostles for space in that park with a Neem, and for attention amongst multiple event venues at India Habitat Centre, each named after a species of tree indigenous to the country. In terms of public adulation, however, there is no contest: although I could not find official records being able to confirm this assertion, it is often regarded as Delhi's 'state tree.' It is a regular feature on most of the city's chroniclers' dispatches about the city; as well as a constant-starrer on multiple Instagram accounts documenting the trees of this city, the apparent chief amongst which is ",[158,395,398],{"href":396,"rel":397},"https:\u002F\u002Fwww.instagram.com\u002Fdelhitrees\u002F?hl=en",[162],"@delhitrees.",[15,400],{"align":17,"alt":401,"src":402},"Amaltas Blooms","\u002Fimages\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees\u002F2.jpg",[11,404,405],{},"Within this context, then, there has been a remarkable evolution of my relationship with the trees of the city, and more specifically, the Amaltas: from juvenile indifference, to a love for the green aesthetic of an urban space, to a feeling of a deeply intrinsic connection – one that felt truly valid when the gradual extension of the Amaltas behind the house reached into our balcony; within touching distance of my outstretched hand. In being able to touch it, there was special meaning: entirely imagined, and yet, perfectly real.",[11,407,408],{},"In some sense, in that moment, it felt as if a sanction had been granted: to associate a sense of belonging, of home, with a chance sighting of the golden chandelier. Of being able to treat the tree as more than mere public ornamentation; instead as a complex teleportation device.",[11,410,411],{},"Within the Amaltas, thus, now vests the ability to take me home – if only to derive momentary comfort – from wherever I manage to spot it.",[11,413,414],{},"How remarkably peculiar then, given the very tangible service it provides to all of humankind, that it is this imagined benefit that I feel completely indebted to it for.",{"title":183,"searchDepth":184,"depth":184,"links":416},[],"2019-05-12","A personal history, intertwined with the Amaltas",{"comments":420},[],"\u002Fblog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees",{"title":338,"description":418},"blog\u002Fthe-generosity-of-trees",[262,197],"8WZYu5b4FlhtA1AQGKubh-FBMKKb-_aU1eYKSbzdRjg",1779676880693]