The Green Auto...

What comes to your mind when you hear the word auto rikshaw? If you are a true Indian, I am sure the words like "air pollution", "sound pollution" and "word pollution" (abuses) are synonymous to auto. If you are from a western country, "auto" word will bring back the memories of a roller-coaster ride for you.

Let us look at the state of affairs in Karnataka (especially Mysore and Bangalore). I was always wondering why there are so many KL (Kerala) registered autos in Mysore. Finally got to know from an auto-driver that Kerala has strict norms against the old autos, so they push all the old autos to Karnataka (Mysore being close to Kerala, it has become a natural place to dispose off the waste). But from last few years, even Karanatka government is pushing for Green auto - the one which runs on CNG, which will atleast help to reduce one of the pollutions autos are known for. But, looks like this initiative has not gone well with all the "Green auto" drivers. May be they are forced to shell out more to buy a Green auto. May be they cannot fill the tank with low cost fuel (a.k.a. Kerosine) anymore.

Anyways, while coming to office today, a Green auto caught my attention for the message it was carrying on its back. Look at the above image carefully for the message : "ನಮ್ಮ ಬೆಂಗಳೂರಿನಲ್ಲಿ ಹಚ್ಚ ಹಸಿರಾದ ನಿರ್ಮಲವಾದ ನೈಸರ್ಗಿಕವಾಗಿ ಸ್ವಚ್ಚ ಗಾಳಿಯನ್ನು ಕೊಡುವ ಮರಗಳನ್ನು ಕಡಿದು ಮನೆಗಳನ್ನು ಕಟ್ಟಿ, ರಸ್ತೆ ಅಗಲೀಕರಣ ಮಾಡಲು ವೃಕ್ಷಗಳ ಮಾರಣ ಹೋಮಗಳನ್ನು ಮಾಡಿ ನಮ್ಮ ನಿರ್ಜೀವವಾದ ಆಟೋ ಗಳಿಗೆ ಹಸಿರು ಬಣ್ಣ ಬಳಿದರೇನು ಪ್ರಯೋಜನ?" (What is the use of painting autos Green, when the trees are cut in the name of road-widening and consturction of houses?)

Well, I wanted to tell this driver that each one of us can really make a difference - however small it is, but did not dare to do it as I was driving alone in my car with AC on :-(

Bharat Sangeet Utsav

What happens when the likes of Nirupama/Rajendra with Kathak sequence, Sangitha Kalanidhi R.K.Srikantan with Carnatic vocal, The Manganiyaras (of Nimbuda Nimbuda fame) with Sufi music, Vidyabhushana with devotional songs, Manasi Prasad with music & dance, Anuradha Sriram/Sriram Parasuram with Jugal sangeeth come on stage & perform one after another for 2 days? Stage is on fire? Well almost yes (although real fire  happened elsewhere), it was an enthralling weekend at MLR convention centre in Woodrose club, packed with these music & performance from the best of the artists in their own field. It was called "Bharat Sangeet Utsav", it really did live upto its name & expectations.

I was fortunate to witness some of the great performances, special note goes to Sufi music by The Manganiyars (Jameel Khan, Mansoor Khan & party). It started at 10 in the night on Saturday & went on till 12 in the night. It was absolute hysteria at the venue when they sang "Nimbuda nimbuda" and "Dum mast kalandar". Crowd was literally on their feet & the kind of standing ovation they got at 12 in the night was just awesome & have never seen in any of the concert before. Same goes with Nirupama & Rajendra. It was a jam packed house on Sunday evening to witness this Kathak-couple dance in tandem for some lovely music. Overall, music lovers had a weekend that they will remember for life, for sure. Let there be more such events, more such entertaining weekends. 

Beggar Free Bangalore?

Government has launched a month long program to observe "Beggar free month" in Bangalore. Lot of our money already goes in beggar rehabilitation (to the tune of 6 to 7 crores per year). Not sure how this money has been utilized till date, but government now wants to make some use of this money. As per Indian laws, begging is a punishable crime & beggars can be sent for 1 to 3 years of imprisonment. 

Definitely it is a welcome sign, considering that even begging has its own mafia. But, I was wondering why government is targeting only the one-rupee-beggars, while the other bigger beggars getting in thousands & lakhs per day are left free to loot more. Government, can you do something with them too?

By the way, I had an encounter with another kind of beggar few months back  (refer to http://vikki-pedia.blogspot.com/2009/06/curious-case-of-ramanath-iyer.html).  A man & daughter posing as lost in Bangalore & wanting to get some money to go back to their home town. Some of us in the apartment had helped them with 2000 Rs. Now there are reports from different parts of the city that these beggars are looting people with the same story with little twist. Be it a rupee beggar or a sophisticated beggar, it is difficult to trust anyone. 

Just some thoughts on how to tackle this kind of situation if some really "lost" people approaches you for money & promise to return the money back after reaching the place:

• Easiest thing to do is to neglect them (with heavy heart, assuming that they are begging)
• If you really want to help, help them, but ensure that you also take few snaps/vidoes of them (with your friendly (Nokia?? :-)) mobile phone). If not it helps in tracking or giving complaints to police later, it will atleast have an impact on the beggar. You can find out if he/she is genuine or not by looking at their reaction to taking the video/photos.
• Offer them the help of local police to go back to their place. (You can just tell them that you know the inspector & inspector can help them).

These were some thoughts which came to my mind after I got duped. I wish I had taken any of the above steps to avoid that beggar. I hope you can take these precautions when you encounter such a situation in future. 

The one stop sports shop - Decathlon

This place rocks. If you need any sports equipment (be it camping, archery or even surfing), you get them all here. This is not like any other shop that you have been to in Bangalore. Shop is quite huge that you can try cycling inside the shop itself, before you buy the cycle. If you want to try hockey/football, you can do it all there. Staff is courteous, they can even play a game of TT with you, if you want to test your racquet before purchasing. This is a place called "Decathlon" on Sarjapur road. It is a must visit place for all sports buffs.

But, all good things in life come with a condition too :-) This place is meant only for the retail merchants / business establishments. So, you need to have a membership card there. To get this card, you have to prove that you have some business (by showing your business receipts/accounts) :-(

In India, for every rule, there will also be equal and opposite workarounds to overcome the same. So, I have seen many normal janatha like me having the card and enjoying the benefit. All you need to do is to catch hold of a card holder in Decathlon, go along with them & shop to your heart's content. Some of the must-see-must-get items in this shop include "Golf Umbrella", Water bottles, variety of torches etc. Stuff yourself with enough cash on you before you enter this place, as they accept card payment only from their "members". More details in this page - http://www.decathlon.in/

Directions to reach Decathlon:

From Silkboard, go on HSR layout ring road -- Agara junction -- Sarjapur road -- cross Wipro corporate office -- Go past railway crossing -- Reach Decathlon (on to your right, 50 meters from railway crossing).

Devara Betta - Enchanting hills

Last week, some of us in the apartment (Hitesh, Ramesh, Mukund and me) decided to go on short treks atleast once a month. We decided to have our first such outing on yesterday (Sunday, 19th July 2009).

It was early in the morning, as early as 5:30 AM that we started our drive towards a place called "Devara Betta", situated somewhere close to Anekal, but in Tamil Nadu. Initially I had this feeling that its gonna be real cold and I was ready with jackets, monkey cap (if needed) etc. But surprisingly it was not that cold.

Hitesh had been to this place many times before and thanks to his sense of directions and memory for remembering the roads and crosses, we reached the destination by 6:30 AM. One more pleasant surprise awaited us - Hitesh had packed some hot hot tea for all of us. Wow, it was so refreshing to drink the tea and start the trek.

The place is having some monolithic rock formation, few small hills and ample forest across the hills. It was really picturesque with green covers everywhere. Added to that, weather was so pleasant.

After having the tea, we took the path leading to the forest, just to explore the area. None of us had any idea about where each of those trails will lead us, but we just followed on. We could hear so many different kinds of sounds and songs from so many different birds. Hitesh being a veteran in bird-watching, he named many of those birds, none of which I can remember :-) We walked for almost one hour going past many "decision points". Typically after somtime, each of the trails used to fork into multiple different routes. We had a thumb rule that "when in doubt, take the right" and went on :-)

After one hour, we kind of reached a dead-end, where we could see the valley and a thick forest range of Bannerghatta. We enjoyed this scenery for about 15 minutes and started trekking back. This time, we took some short cuts, did some rock climbing to reach to the top of one more hill nearby. We relaxed there for some time, had some "chikkis" which Mukund had got and walked back towards our car. By 8:45 AM, we had finished our morning walk in the forest and were all set to return.

We took a different way while coming back. There is a place called "Thalli", about 5 KMs from Devara Betta where we stopped by and had some yummy breakfast. Then we took Maralawadi--Harohalli--Kanakapura road -- NICE road -- Bannerghatta road to reach home by 11 AM. The drive from Thalli to Harohalli is just fantastic, passing by forest range, agricultural lands, lakes etc. For miles together, we were the only ones on the road. With some Kishore Kumar numbers being played on the FM and a fantastic weather, it was definitely a drive to remember. If you want to try this weekend get-away, you can get more information in this link:

http://www.dreamroutes.org/southern/devarabetta.html

Next, we are planning for a jungle trek in Bannerghatta national park sometime during August.

Bangalored !!!!

(This article is dedicated to all the wonderful people of a beautiful place called - Bengalooru)

Well, I got "Bangalored" in the year 1996, soon after my graduation. Ever since then, I've witnessed a sea of changes not only in Bangalore, but also in many of us, the way we have become so mechanical, the way we we have got used to the poor infrastructure at Bangalore, way we have got used to longer travel time to office and also there have been lot of changes in what we discuss when we meet people.

So, here is my own version of changes Bangalore has witnessed in last 13 years or so !!!

1996 to 1998

I used to stay in RT nagar alongwith my two classmates (Harsha R.A and Harsha R.A) in a small room. We used to pay 1000 Rs / head as rent, which at that time was considered to be too high. Well, that was just the beginning. Many people like us got "Bangalored", many more houses were taken, much more rent was demanded and given. During those days, general discussions in our friend's circle used to be around which IT company one worked for, what technology one is working on, who went for higher studies etc. General public in Bangalore was looking at IT sector with lot of respect. I even remember instances where traffic policemen even left some of the traffic offenders free, just because they worked for some big IT companies in Bangalore. 

1998 to 2001

Few years passed by. Around 1998, the IT sector was getting more business, lot more people started coming into Bangalore. Y2K was the buzz word. 

We had moved to BTM layout (Harsha, Anil, Tushar, Ajay and me) around that time. Our subject of discussions changed to "USA". People started visiting US either on a project OR left their jobs in India and relocated to US. So, invariably our discussion was around who is visiting US, who is leaving the job etc :-) 

During this time, occasionally we used to have some traffic jams, but it was mostly restricted to some parts of Hosur road. Travelling on two wheeler was still safe. During this period, I also bought my own vehicle (a black Kinetic Honda) for the first time in life. Well, during that time, the race for the bikes was only between Hero Honda splendor and Suzuki Samurai. Most of my friends had either one of those bikes.

General public realized that IT was here to stay, already some dissent started in people, complaining about rapid growth of city, shooting real estate prices etc. Hmm... it was just the beginning... People of Bangalore was to witness a big big surge in real estate in the coming years.

2001 to 2003

Little bit fast forward, come 2001. Most discussed topic used to be "marriage" and traffic jams. Every leave taken in office, every absence to meet up friends during weekend had some suspicion that "Kuch Kuch ho raha hain". Well, by 2002 most of us had got married. And ofcourse, traffic jams spread like virus. Hosur road was the most dreaded road. BTM layout got affected as well, government started building fly-overs that seemed like a never ending story. Most of the people also changed jobs. So, it was a time to "start a new zindagi" for many of us, either with our spouse or with new job.

2004 to 2007

Time for people to get "responsible" :-) Many of our friends had their kids, people bought house / site, people changed jobs at will. Invariably the discussion during this period was around house, kids and traffic jams :-) When two people met, usual discussion was around which road to take at what time and which one to avoid. It was also time to explore each possible route, however small the road is to commute to office and back. Real estate prices doubled, tripled and what not in these years. General public in Bangalore started hating IT guys. IT guys were not "favoured" anymore with police :-) IT guys took all the blame for the mess in Bangalore. There was a popular saying : "If you throw a stone in Bangalore, it will hit either a dog OR an IT guy."

2008 till date

Slowdown !!!!!!!! Its the latest buzz word. Who has lost jobs, how much did we loose in stocks, when do we see an end to recession... Uh... these are the hot topics !! 

On the traffic jams, some roads indeed got the facelift in last few years, also government was considerate enough to make those alternate roads better. So, it is not as bad as it was few years back. And of course, most of us also have got "mentally prepared" for longer travel times, so that also helps :-) 

Future

Metro rail, more flyovers, junction-less / signal free main roads.... list of promises go on.... let us wait and see... 

As they say "Change is the only constant thing in life", so change is here to stay. Lets hope everything changes for better :-)