India, June 28 -- Even as the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is enjoying his big fat wedding in Venice, his company is actively seeking "illiterate to graduate boys" for "packing and scanning" in Purani Dilli's Kucha Nahar Khan street. The poster is plastered on a peeling wall, beside a flyer offering tuition classes in "computer, Punjabi, abacus, divinity course."

This afternoon, the pre-monsoon air in Kucha Nahar Khan is unbearably hot+humid. Nevertheless, the cook at Yaseen Bawarchi is sombrely braving the heat in his street-facing kitchen crammed with pots and ladles. While the adjacent stall's poker-faced Yusuf Chai Wale is preparing one more round of chai. Close by, electric appliance repairer Yaseen is trying to revive a battered toast...