Our guide said that Indians have a saying which goes, “you can go anywhere in the world and you will always find two things: potatoes and Sikhs. Our next stop was Old Delhi’s most famous Sikh shrine. This is the Gurudwara Sis Ganj Sahib. It is built on the site where the ninth Sikh Guru was beheaded in 1675. He was beheaded on orders of the Mughal emperor at that time for refusing to convert to Islam. That sounds like it could have happened last week in some parts of the world. This Gurudwara commemorates his martyrdom.

This temple was built over a period of time starting in 1784 and they are still adding on to it today. Inside the temple, we heard continuous chanting of scriptures and there was a continuous line of people offering flowers. The inside of the temple was decorated with lines of colored foil and tinsel on the ceiling. You can see the main temple in the first photo. The main temple and floors were all marble.

The second photo was to the right of the main temple. This was a reflecting pool which was full of really large carp. You can see a few of them in the shallow water, especially near where the two guys are feeding them. This gives you a better idea of the size and scope of the temple grounds.

The third photo is in another area of the temple complex. I had to have a cloth covering my head to hide all of my hair. My hat didn’t cover the hair on the back of my head well enough. The Sikhs cover all the hair on their heads. I wanted Vicky to take this photo because the guy next to me in the photo had a curved sword that was about two feet long hanging from his belt. You can see the sword’s silver hilt in the photo, but the sword curved back around his body. Quite a few guys had swords and I believe they had to be entitled to wear one. Some guys my age or younger had swords too, but their swords were like six inches long. This guy really had a sword. None of these guys spoke English, so I figured I was taking my chances asking for a photo, but they seemed pleased to accommodate me.