Hyderabad Revisited

hi everybody,


I am back after a long break. Also I have shifted base to Hyderabad, the city of nawabs.
It's a beautiful city if you dont mind the residents. The weather at this time of the year is mostly overcast, with a little bit of rain, rather like London. The city is centred around the hussain sagar lake, which I am told is about 100 mtrs deep (sufficient to accomodate all the unrepentant, impertinent cabbies and shopkeepers- but more of that later). The lake looks beautiful and often hosts a variety of Yatching events at Hyderabad. However, with untreated sewage flowing freely into the lake, a ride on one of the boats can be terribly smelly! The elite stay in places such as Banjara Hills/ Red Hills / Jubilee Hills. There are several palaces, some open to public and others since converted to Govt. offices. The most surprising thing about the place is the number of shopping malls. I am really amazed that all these malls are able to break even-it says a lot about the purchasing power of the residents. Another thing is the stark disparity of income. In the old city, people are desperate to make two ends meet. At the other end are the hi flying software people from the Hi-tech city.
By and large the quality of stuff is poor. fruits, sweets, clothes...limited choice and poor quality. The shop keepers are rude and extremely unhelpful. Another special feature is the shallowness of knowledge. That may perhaps be because I have not interacted with the software people here and the denizens are mostly into software......What I certainly like about the place is the bakeries....More numerous than PCO/STD booths. And the stuff they serve is good though expensive. Hyd also scores low on the greenery. Its about 5% of the city area, which is among the lowest in India. Coupled with this is the low level of awareness/ action against vehicular pollution. Places like Abids- a shopping paradise- can bring tears to your eyes in peak hours. In Delhi, it was worse, before the Supremee Court stepped in and forced the Government to take action. Here..I hope one day the High Court will sou moto take cognisanse and force the Government to be more proactive. Actually, in a way the bad roads and the traffic woes are a boon to the city. Hyderabad is a fast emerging medical tourism destination. The hospitals are burgeoning and it is hoped that sooner than later the citizenry will begin enjoying the hospitality of the hospitals...reap what you sow.

Air travel

It's been some time since I last posted anything on this blog. Not that the readers are waiting as eagerly for the new posting as people wait for the next harry potter book. I usually time my semi annual vacations around the festival of diwali. The trains run full at this time of the year. Thanks to my magnanimous employer, and to some extent the market forces which one full service carrier was trying to fight, I travelled by air. In hindsight it feels better to travel by train. If you are going on a two hour plane ride and the flight is delayed by three hours, much of the joy of arriving at your destination fades away. Besides, most air passengers are generally nose-in-the-air variety with whom any kind of civilised conversation is difficult. Several of them will simply not heed the periodic announcements like switching off mobiles/laptops, not getting up while the aircraft is taxiing. That's one reason I was not surprised when several Indian passengers were detained at Amsterdam for behaving suspiciously in the plane! Though I felt awful that members of a particular community were treated rather shabbily by the Dutch Authorities, I think most air passengers are never at their best behaviour. The jostling starts at the check-in counter, continues through the security check, the bus transporting us to the plane and till the luggage is stowed away. I am alarmed that a few low cost airlines dont allot the seat number at check-in. The passengers swarm into the plane and there is a free-for-all for the choice seats. The moment the plane lands, you get to hear the music of cell phones being switched on. People will get up and start hauling down their luggage from the overhead bins, while at the same time trying to maintain their position in the queue. Generally, I choose a window seat so that I am the last to disembark. When I get an aisle seat, more often than not, the little red devil sitting on my shoulder will whisper that I should pretend to be fast asleep. I have been avoiding doing that and limit myself to a exasperated glare when the passenger in the window seat tries to contort himself so as to reach for his luggage in the overhead bin. Once in the arrival terminal, there is a mad rush for the trolleys after which, the intrepid air traveller will try to jockey himself and his trolley to the best position at the lugage retrieval conveyor belt. Actually, thisis the best place to observe the passengers. Most ladies will be looking bedraggled; the gents will be trying to ogle at them while at the same time trying to keep their eye on the luggage arrivals. The business traveller will be loudly talking on the mobile phone. Once out of the airport building, you get to jostle with the touts advertising hotels, transport, and other wares, which I cannot elaborate here!

The best city

Asking someone which is the best city is like asking which of your neighbors children you love most. This analogy has a reason. Except in the rarest case, you would not the person responsible for the creation- of the city or the child. And then, the growth and development of the city depends on the surrounding environment- much like the children. Most importantly, you have as much wherwithal for solving the problems of the cities as much you have regarding the neighbors children-of course so long as you are not their problem!
I have, over the years, visted so many places- the 4 metro centrs, state capitals, smaller towns, even one horse towns. When I sit down and wonder- the doctor has advised me not to exercise my mind standing up because simultaneous activities cause double energy depletion- which city would be my No.1 favourite, I am unable to come to any decision. Each city has its own flavour. Delhi is rife with political machinations big and small, Mumbai is money and trains, Kolkata the fount of unionism, Bangalore the truly commercialised city with cinema hungry hordes, sleepy towns like Gwalior, Morena, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Nainital, Shimla, Pune, Nagpur, which have suddenly woken up to rampant commercialisation and dont want to retain the old world charm that we city slickers insist they do.
Once, while travelling to Nainital, I alighted at a place called Haldwani which is the second last stop. I had some lugage which I wanted to check into the cloak room. Unfortunately, the cloak room was closed. So I went to the Station Master's cabin. He wasn't inside. On reaching the booking counter, I found a person writing the accounts. Rather impatiently I asked where I would find the Station Master. He looked up, smiled & asked why I wanted the SM. I said because I wanted to okeep some luggage and the cloak room was closed. The smile was getting on my nerves.
He said that both the clerks were on leave and he being SM, was attending to three duties!
I felt bad-not about him working for three people, but about my impatience. Life is a learning experience.

Jodhpur

I was in Jodhpur recently. Before you start thinking that I am a wandering mendicant from Rajasthan, let me explain. I was in the city on official work. The city is in a valley with the Mehrangarh fort on one hilltop and the Jodhpur Palace on another. It is a dusty city that has grown and grown while the town elders slept, or waxed their curling moustaches. The city was once a princely city state. Built on the feudalistic design, it had the king's fort/palace on the hills, then the markets and residences of the traders and finally the rest of the populace on the fringes. Like any other city in India, this city too, has grown without any forethought. It is a tourist centre and hotels abound. The primary occupation is fleecing the tourists. Since my experiences in Jaipur, I was extra careful while venturing into shops for purchasing things. I went to a shop called "Rajathali". The shoes which are available all over the city for Rs.50/- were available for Rs.125/-. It was time to turn tail and scoot, leaving even the hard nosed salesmen wondering where they had gone wrong. There a shop called "National Handloom" which has several branches in Jaipur, Jodhpur, Ahmedabad. I would recommend it for buying anything from a pin to a camel. Honest prices, wide variety, and pleasant sales staff. So dont go and ask them whether they are the descendents of royal family or of the camel riding desert bandits.
April to September is off season and the hotels offer upto 30% discount on published tariffs or full meals in lieu thereof.
There's not much to see, a fort, a burial ground called Jaswant Thada, the Jaswantsingh palace which is now a heritage hotel cum part museum. Night life ends at 6.00 p.m. so you can return to your room and watch telly.
So what does this tell you about Jodhpur?

Jaipur

True to my name, I had recently wandered down to Jaipur, the city of princes. The first thing you notice at the airport is the terminal. There are no buses to ferry you from the plane. No airbridges either. You step down from the plane and saunter across to the terminal building- if the weather is mild. In summers when the temperature on the tarmac is a sizzling 45-47 degrees centigrade, you come out of the plane - temp inside the plane is around 23- and understand the meaning of the term "a cat on a hot tin roof"
Anyway, the airport is small, well kept and pretends to be international- there are immigration counters which nobody uses. I think Jaipur has a large number of people with large curling moustaches. I dont know whether the moustaches signify royal descent or camel riding desert bandit ancestors. And I am too meek to ask. The city itself treats you like royalty. They just want your money! I went to a well known sweet shop in Johari Bazaar. I must have stood out in the crowd because the moment I stepped in, a rather good looking lady ( I call all ladies goodlooking because the good ones expect it and others appreciate it) was at my side wanting to know what I wanted to buy. Maybe in Jaipur they are trained to smell out suckers. I started purchasing some sweets and the lady kept pointing out the postive attributes of the things that I had not bought. So I ended up buying sweets & condiments for friends, relatives, neighbours, office colleagues, et al.
The hawa mahal is in bad shape. It was meant to be a pink facade with windows through which the ladies of the royal household would watch processions etc. Now the pink colour is peeling off and no lady would like to be caught dead behind the windows.
The city itself is a tourist hot spot. Shops selling trinkets abound and the age old bandits have now reformed. They don't loot caravans in the desert anymore. They simply fleece gullible tourists!
Except for a few places, the traffic on the roads is light. In many places the city has replaced traffic lights and speed breakers with potholes which are far more efficient at managing traffic than the former.
I came away from city with the distinct feeling that it suffers from ennui. With all the resources at their diposal, the city still apeears to be basking in its past glory rather than moving on. This makes me sad.

Sudoku

Some of my friends who are keeping track of this blog, for friendship sake or because they feel that not doing so will invite my wrath, asked me why I have stopped blogging. The fact is that I have suddenly become a sodoku addict.
This blog is dedicated for those of you who are still innocent of this addiction. Many things emerging out of japan (the country not the acronym) have taken the world by storm - electronics, cars, beyblades and now sudoku. It comprises of a grid of 81 squares in 9X9 format. This grid is further broken into 9 sub-squares, each comprising 3 rowsX 3 columns. The player has to fill numbers from 1 - 9 in these squares in manner that there is no repetition in each column, row or sub-square. Some numbers are provided randomly in the grid and the player has to fill in the rest. Obvoiusly, there can be only one solution or every combination. At the last count, there were about 10 billion combinations. The game has caught on fast and is staple diet for the entertainment page of every respectable daily newspaper. I prefer the web based sudoku which comes with its own timer. For a couch potato like me, solving one game within the given timeframe is far more satisfying than doing push ups.
For those of you who are getting sold to the idea of trying out sudoku, there are two websites that I would recommend:
http://www.websudoku.com
http://colinj.co.uk/Sudoku_solve/sudoku_solver.htm
The latter provides you with a solver which you can use to solve the difficult variants also.

Hyderabad

I have come down to Hyderabad for a training program. This is a royal city in India. The place is built around the Hussain Sagar lake. the roads are broad and choking to the brim with unruly traffic. A simple drive can turn into an adventure of sorts. Of course the Hyderabadis are the politest people. First they will almost run their two wheeler into your car. Stop a few millimeters short. Smile ever so politely. Ask you to proceed and then overtake you from the wrong side! Being a visitor to the city, I dont want my car to run over anyone and let the cops have a field day. So I tell the driver to slow down - which is an affront to our Hyderabadi driver!
Anyway, the city is beautiful. I visited the Salar Jung Museum whic is full of artifacts collected by the erstwhile Nizam of Hyderabad on his sojourns throughout the world. and no, the collection doesn't include his wives. But there was a heavily guarded display of Nizam's jewels.
The Charminar is a classic example of the locational mistake. It is in a heavily congested area. There is a mosque abutting one of the pillars of the monument - and a brand new temple abutting the opposite pillar. Perhaps to maintain communal harmony?
There was a long queue outside the temple. A well-fed priest was attending to them at a fairly good pace.
Another place is the Lumbini Garden where many hyderabadis take the usual walk. It is full of trees. But upto a height of 8 feet the branches have been cleared and you can look thru the entire area at a glance. This of course precules any behind the bush activities which are so common in delhi's Nehru park - popularly called buddha garden. This is all the better as no one would want to give the senior citizens visiting lumbini garden a heart attack.
The raj bhavan is very dignified. There is a birla temple on the hillock.

Bush and the grope

The papers and the TV are full of the massage bush gave to angela merkel. My sympathies lie with the lady. I mean who would want a shoulder rub in the middle of a meeting? I have always found the americans to be friendly, unlike their cousins across the atlantic. But a shoulder rub or "grope" as the more conservative people put it, is definitely not on.
I kinda like Bush. Notwithstanding the countless number of jokes on him, the fellow is likeable in his own way- like a chimp. His bumblings have gained fame. So also the rumors that he has telepathic contact with G~d, who is guiding him in the wars. But then, you have to really hand it to the guy for keeping us entertained. Which other leader gives so much fodder for the cannons?
I wonder what Maggie would have done if she was in place of angela? maybe an elbow in his crotch? or catch his hands and somersault him onto the table? And what about the Queen of Togo...
It is said that the Queen of Togo was accompanied in the carriage by a frail gentleman. Someone in the audience asked Bernard Shaw the identity of the gentleman. "Her lunch" said he.
Imagine our good bush with her. Even though Texans have a penchant for large things, bush would have left her well alone!
This brings me back to my school days. It was our annual day, in school. I was in Class II. The teacher was wrapping a red ribbon on our wrists for the PT drill. The ribbon was held by an alpin. When my turn came she said "I'm going to put the pin now. If it pricks even slightly, just scream." And that's what I did. SCREAMED! at the top of my voice. The teacher was so startled, and embarrassed also, that she got up and went away, cheeks flaming.
I wonder what would have happened had angela screamed at the top of her lungs?

Sex and the Britisher II

I had written a nice blog about a british teacher in my school. The point was that school kids are vulnerable at the hands of their teachers. The brit in question used to target young boys and was thrown out of several schools. The school managements never initiated any action against him for fear of bringing disrepute to the school. I wonder how many kids he was able to lay his filthy hands on and get away with it? Today I find that the blog is not there at all! I wonder if some brit took offense and hacked into it? If that is the case shame on google and the free speech and security it preaches!

The mosquito

Well, I had last narrated a little bit about my "girlfriend". She was not the most beautiful person you have seen but the lack of good looks was more than made up by her effervescent nature. She would carry me around, sometimes on her hip and piggyback at other times. Her family members were not very happy to spot us together but thought it better to ignore both of us rather than risk the consequences of parting her from me-I could bawl the loudest and pitching stones was an art I mastered at an early age.
Actually, I was drawn to her because she was the only one who could insulate me from my landlady's granddaughter. This scrawny little girl- I happenned to meet her recently after a gap of thirty years and she is the still the ugly duckling who never grew up- was a pest. She was about the same age as I and would find new ways to torment me everyday. If I were to get the better of her, she would complain to her granny who would then yell at my mother to correct my behaviour. I remember once in an unprovoked act of vengence I quietly dipped her shoes in the sludge of the open sewage pipe running outside our house. She got to know of this only when she put her white sock clad toe into the shoe and there was a squelching sound- a silence-and then an earth shattering scream of cinderella being turned into a tramp on trying on a shoe. The landlady was very annoyed and gave a piece of mind to my mother who promptly locked me in the bedroom. I was released from my imprisonment about an hour later when my mother noticed that the radio placed in the bedroom (there was no TV in those days) was suddenly blaring a trifle too loudly for comfort. That was the day my mother came the closest to tanning my hide. Of course, I have seen the same expression fleetingly on the face of other people who have come in contact with me over the years.
Anyway, my "girlfriend" would always be around to defuse the situation and take me away to her house. Most of the time we would plot revenge on the "mosquito". Soon we shifted to a new house and the memories of the "girlfriend" and the "mosquito" became just that- memories.

My girlfriend

Hi,
This is my first effort at posting a blog. For those of you who have all the time in the world, this blog will read like Gulliver's Travels and Marco Polo chronicles rolled into one. For others, this is one of those strange places that you wander into inadvertently, and wish you hadn't!
Anyway, let me begin with a story. People always like stories-especially wicked ones. But being G~d fearing fellow, catering to a wide expanse of conservative masses, I shall desisit from any kind of salacious stuff. So all those who have wandered in here in search of "juicy" bits - out. That means OUT.
This story is about a guy who grows up in a small town in the back of beyond. His travails may bore the city bred types and leave the village based bumpkins red-faced- because the truth is out. I dont mean to be malicious - it is second nature to me and will reflect in my writings from time to time. Some people will find their reflections here. Others will get a feeling that they know the person being discussed. But I will not name any names and there will be no prizes for guessing.
Enough of the prologue for now. Let us begin on the journey.
Shortly after my wedding, my wife asked - "Did you have a girlfriend?" I don't know what prompted her to ask. Maybe all women ask this question-perhaps to ascertain the benchmark that they are competing against. "Yes" I said. "Really? And how deep was this friendship?" Her eyes had narrowed down to slits and she looked like a boxer aiming the "sunday punch". "I was absolutely crazy about her.We were the talk of the colony. Had it not been for our age difference, we would perhaps have married" By now she was getting visions of a lolita like affair. " and just how much was this age diference?". "I was three and she was twentythree". The wind went out of the sails of the armada. My better half retired in a huff. Maybe she doesnt like cannonball jokes which fall so close to all that she holds dear.But as any married person will tell you, the cannons keep pointing at you even after the bugles declare truce.
This brings me to the the first "girl" in my life.