Cities I have lived in. Part II

So there is the concluding part of my Cities post....

Chennai

A negative image crops up to many people’s mind once they hear about this city. That image may be all about idlis, humidity, lungis, coconut oil and depressed old people. Well this city does have that, but its not just about all that!

I stayed in Chennai for a brief period of 17 months. I must say the city slowly grew on me. Perhaps it was the fact that my office was 7 mins drive from my residence (mind you a full 10mins in the evening on the way back!). Perhaps it was the fact that I loved my job when working there and the office atmosphere was conducive. Perhaps it was the fact that I was staying in the ex CM’s area Gopalapuram, which is awesomely posh. Anyways, things I liked about Chennai

1.       Good roads, uniformly good roads. Be it RK Salai, Beach Road, ECR, Anna Salai. All damn good! And devoid of speed breakers (are you listening Bangalore?)

2.       Proximity to locations I loved – Bangalore was 5hrs drive away, connected by an excellent 4 laned NH all the way (thank you Mr Vajpayee!), part of the Golden Quadrilateral. Pondicherry was connected by the scenic ECR and a mere 2.5hrs away. We had lot of other places like Tiger Caves with a pristine beach about an hour away and so on

3.       Food – Yes! Even Chennai has good food! Be it those uber soft idlis at Murugan Idli Kadai or Neer Dosa at Sarvana Bhavan. I loved that and the non veg south Indian food at Karaikudi. The malls also had decent Arabic fare and other Northie stuff. Honourable mention for Rayar Mess &

4.       Reasonable power and water supply

5.       Well networked buses and roads

6.       Lots of lovely parks. Had one near our house to walk in with a pond in the middle filled with ducks. AH BLISS!

7.       Beaches – Marina Beach & Elliots Beach. Former for walks and latter for chilling.

8.       Localities – Amazingly calm areas in Poes Garden, old Mylapore, Srinagar Colony, Beasant Nagar, Adyar, Gopalapuram, R A Puram.

Things I did not like

1. 1.       Humidity! Worst place in the world…will sweat in 3 nano seconds without the AC. I kid you not!
2. 2.       Language barrier – even though I can understand tamil and speak a smattering. It does get irritating at times especially when you want to express yourself
3. 3.       Not as cosmo as other cities so can be claustrophobic at times.

Namma Bengalooru!

Back to my birthplace after ages. Perhaps 2 decades. Things have changed. Earlier this place used to be green, cool and we could cycle all the way from RT Nagar to Sadashivnagar for our swimming sessions. Now there is an evil Mekhri Intersection (Still called Mekhri circle but a circle no more) in between with tons of traffic. Our calm area is now bustling with buses, 2 wheelers, autos, aliens and what not.

However there are still things I like about Bangalore –

1. 1.       Weather – bearable in summers (even tho its getting to be a tad hot!), cold during winter without the biting cold of the North and pleasant during monsoons/spring. Even during summer we get a spell of good weather when it rains a bit. Difference between Bombay/Chennai rains and Bangalore is that when it rains here it actually gets pretty cold
2. 2.       Food! – yes the typical sheekaaan and phalaan! (Seekh n Phaal). Apart from that the REAL dosa joints (not wannabe white tasteless ones produced by our neighbours!) like Vidhyarthi Bhavan, CTR, MTR etc. Good non veg from oldies like Imperial and Empire.
3. 3.       Getaways – Lot of scenic getaways from Bangalore though they tend to get crowded – Mysore, Ooty, Nandi Hills, tekking spots
4. 4.       Relatives and Friends. Chilled out people. More cosmo than any other city except Bombay.

Bad Stuff

• 1.       ROADS! Augh! Worse than Tier II and III cities and towns. These are craters with some tar in between…..damn it pisses me off. The screw ups in BBMP are soo busy emptying our coffers they are bankrupt to build good roads! And speed breakers every 2cms apart! WHY WHY WHY? 90% of them are illegal and the asswipes do nothing about it! Not a single…I repeat…not a single good road in Bangalore…it sucks man! The dimbulbs have even put speed breakers on a highway! (Bangalore Mysore). Dunno how many cars have been damaged that way…and its ironic that the road tax in Bangalore is amongst the highest in India. What are we paying for?
• 2.       Power Cuts and Water Issues – In a city full of lakes, water scarcity is sooo bad its almost funny. We can not call ourselves a metro unless you solve these things! Sucketh to the coreth!
• 3.       Policing – One of the most lackadaisical forces in the country. SC comes out with a rule on having lighter tints for cars, the jokers here altogether ban it! Why? Coz they are too lazy to check for the right tint with their light meters. And the list goes on…I guess a lot to do with it is the current government, where there has been no governance since the last 1-2 years with them busy infighting or trying not to be docked by the CBI.