Humayan’s Tomb, Delhi, India
History,  India

Capability Overdrive And Delhi By Default

December 6, 2025 /

Monday December 1st. It’s one of those very English days where the sky is heavy, rain falls in intermittent bucketloads and it never really seems to get properly light. The tube from St Pancras to Heathrow is ridiculously rammed, full of wheelie cases, backpacks and sweaty bodies in overcoats. I am a sardine in a tin, Michaela is trapped in a corner, overheating visibly.

We make it to Terminal 2 early for our 21:05 flight. 21:05 quickly becomes 21:20, then 21:45, then 22:00, 22:40 and eventually “CANCELLED” appears on the app and “GATE CLOSED” on the screens. Everyone crowds around the desk, haranguing the poor airline staff as if they have personally disabled the aeroplane, until four burly policemen – well, three burly and one little guy with attitude – appear, having been summoned due to the “possibility of a disturbance at Gate B36”.

Possibility. Of. Disturbance. Some passengers are admittedly a bit overly vocal, but police necessary? Not really. 

A hot meal will be provided, we are told. Hotels will be made available for those who need one, and we will all receive emails advising the departure time of whichever flight we are reallocated. Hot meals do indeed arrive – those which we would have been served on board had we left punctually. Cue chaos. Picture circa 400 people, the vast majority Indian, clamouring for meals which are being brought out maybe ten at a time. Orderly queuing this is not. Maybe someone should call the police. Ah. 

In their wisdom and, we have to say, their manful attempts to keep matters calm, Air India staff hand out the meals as swiftly as they can. Unfortunately, none of them twig that handing out cutlery at the same time might be a good idea, so now there are dozens of people juggling red hot foil boxes with no way of devouring the curried contents. Still forkless as the message that we can head to the baggage reclaim hall comes through, we leave our fine smelling curries on the counter, unopened and uneaten.

Bags reclaimed, we are ferried to a Radisson, tired enough to fall asleep despite our hunger – it is, after all, nearly 2am now. Somewhere around an hour later the phones ping, advising that we’ve been allocated a flight on Wednesday lunchtime. That’s Wednesday. Today is Tuesday. We have 36 hours to kill. At rain sodden Heathrow.

Be at breakfast 6 till 7, then we’ll see you tomorrow, the airline man had said. By 7 we’re fed and ready, but Air India are conspicuous by their absence. The Radisson staff, understandably, know nothing. What’s more, we’re now told the short shuttle bus journey back to the Terminal will cost £14 for two. “Didn’t Air India give you a voucher?”. Err, no.

So while some of our fellow passengers harangue hotel staff, call the Air India helpline, head home to kill 36 hours or just hang around grumbling, The Hungry Travellers hit the Capability Overdrive button. Uber to Terminal (LESS than £14, by the way!), straight to the Air India desk. All we want to know is what we do for a bed for tonight. But it goes something like this:

“You need a second night? When is your new flight?”

“Tomorrow lunchtime”.

“Hmm. Maybe I can find you a flight today. Hmmm…yes…I can put you on a flight that leaves in one hour, if you are ready and you don’t mind hurrying”.

“Whaaaat!? Errr…yes!”

About fifty minutes later we’re in our seats and about to fly to Delhi. We can’t help thinking about all the other passengers who have either accepted their lot, are still venting their anger at those who don’t deserve it and are unable to help anyway, or are just still grumbling about the unfairness of things. Whatever, we bet none of them are on this flight. Not like us two, smugly eating our second breakfast of the day just after 10am. 

Flight time and time difference added, we touch down in Delhi at exactly midnight, and are through Immigration and checked in at the Hotel Almate Inn within a couple of hours. Into bed around 2am again. This is becoming a habit.

And of course we aren’t supposed to be in Delhi at all. We had train tickets from Delhi to Alwar booked, together with a hotel in Alwar for our first two nights, all of which bit the dust when the “CANCELLED” word appeared. But with her Capability Overdrive in Supreme mode, Michaela had, during the short time at the boarding gate, managed to cancel the Alwar hotel (without penalty) and replace it with one in Delhi. Train fun will have to go on hold.

So we now have, unexpectedly, a day to explore a city which we already know, having visited twice before, but fortunately Delhi is a giant of a city and it won’t be hard to find something new. 

That something new is first Humayun’s Tomb, and second the Old Fort, aka Purana Quila. Both are havens of peace in this city of manic craziness, vast gardens providing karma and respite from the incessant noise of Delhi which, here in these two corners of tranquility, is no more than a distant hum somewhere beyond the squawk of parakeets and the squeal of pariah kites.

Humayun’s tomb complex, Delhi, India
Humayun’s tomb complex

Humayun’s Tomb is reminiscent of the Taj Mahal – indeed, the story goes that it was in fact the inspiration for its more famous counterpart, effectively the blueprint for the more majestic version built some 75 years later. It is, of course, nowhere near as grand or as spellbinding, but nor is it thronged with the huge numbers which crowd the Taj. 

Humayun’s tomb, Delhi, India
Humayun’s tomb

Splendour was clearly to the forefront of Mughal Emperor Humayun and his people judging by the grandeur of both the tomb and the fort, intricate decorative detail combining with follies like squat domes and roofed balconies to create any number of pleasing viewpoints. Mughal Emperors were, of course, fabulously rich.

Humayun’s tomb, Delhi, India
Humayun’s tomb

Humayun himself, by the way, died a rather unseemly death. Standing on the highest point of the roof of his fort, Humayun heard the call to prayer and realised he had left it a little bit late to reach the prayer mat in time, thus setting off in haste to observe the ritual promptly. In his rush to get there, he tumbled down the stone staircase and sustained injuries which were to bring about his demise only three days later. Divine intervention of a wholly different kind, you might say.

Old Fort, Delhi, India
Old Fort
Old Fort, Delhi, India
Old Fort
Old Fort, Delhi, India
Old Fort

Above us, sizeable flocks of the oversized birds of prey known as pariah kites circle and call – there must be a considerable amount of life here to keep quite so many sufficiently fed each day. One would perhaps normally say that the circling birds fill the sky, but here in Delhi there is no sky, merely the scarily heavy fog which is the pollution cloud hanging above the rooftops in perpetuity. Air quality here must be sub zero.

Old Fort, Delhi, India
Old Fort
Old Fort, Delhi, India
Old Fort

There’s something about India, and whatever that something is, it’s most definitely not for everyone. For us, we broke through the discomfort barrier on our first visit years ago and quickly found its glory and its hook. We can feel it again now, straight away, the deafening soundtrack of the city, the odours in its air, the fuzzy outlines in the cloying haze, the dirt, the poverty, the glory, the colour, the splendour. 

And beneath its unappealing surface, a magnificent, vibrant country full of history and character. Whether exciting or galling or both, India is never dull.

Delhi, we’ve met you before. Now new parts of India are calling….

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