TURQUOISE CHILL

As promised, here are more pictures of Kolkata West from my visit on Sunday. I was just awestruck by the gate. It looks even more impressive with the sunset in the background. You'll also notice that work is on in full swing with huge earth movers working on the landfill.

As usual I spent the evening watching one of the movies I had got on saturday night. The plot might be a bit weak, but it's more than made up with the pairs of Mitsubishi's and the American muscle cars packed with NO2. 2 Fast 2 Furious is worth a watch. which just makes me wanna go out and get some more cars and bike flicks, like The Fast & The Furious, Gone In 60 Seconds and Starsky & Hutch . I've got to get me one of those machines. Maybe a Mitsubishi Lancer EVO VIII

Kolkata is truly seeing an upswing as far as development goes. Industry is being wooed into the state, IT is entrenched quite firmly now and only growing and with all of this housing is the need of the hour. With the influx of huge business houses and the standard of living moving upwards, the people of Kolkata are also looking at new age homes and are opening up to western lifestyle. With this boom, real estate is suddenly exploding in terms of the new projects and new areas being developed. When I left Kolkata 12 years back, Salt Lake was far out. Today it's part of the city and the Eastern Metropolitian Bypass, is now the hotbed of the real estate Boom. With two five star hotels, The ITC Sonar Bangla and the Hyatt on this road and several High Rise Apartment buildings already being occupied, EM Bypass is no longer a bypass, but a main thoroughfare connection "old Calcutta" to 'NEW TOWN - Rajarhat". Property rates as I found out are dashing skywards, the same w...

Saturday was quite a boring day at office, yet on the way back we witnessed the millions of people from our neighbouring state, Bihar, who had descended on the streets of Kolkata in all their decorative splendour to head to the River Hooghly for “Chatt Puja”. The drive with five of us burly people squeezed into Jaideep’s car was also quite hilarious, especially Amrit’s attempt at a puppet show with the Dog cushion. The poor doggy’s ears had to be used to shut his eyes and ears because of the level of humour had reached way beyond of his young “years”. Anyway later that evening I met with some of the young boys my dad is mentoring. Quite a nice young bunch! They were there to take last minutes tips on conducting the quiz at Army public School. Then I went to meet friend of mine from Delhi who was down on Holiday, and though this would break our tradition of Monday Night Partying, which had become quite the customary day for us to meet up, we decided Oasis on Park Street on a Saturda...

Today Jaideep was a bit disappointed and told me I had lost focus on my blog and the essence of the initiation was to be Kolkata centric and it had lost that. Well I do agree that was the objective, but after all it’s my blog and about my surroundings and so if my surroundings had temporarily become the wide roads, clean air of Delhi and the wide expanses and high rises of Gurgaon, gues I can’t help but write about them. Besides On my arrival I was glad to be back in Kolkata and it’s hospitality. A special mention of my Cab driver who kept me engaged in conversation all the way from the airport to my house. Yeah Kolkata is way ahead of a lot of the other cities in a lot of ways as Jaideep and I were discussing on the way to work this morning. A lot of things that have happened here have been taken to other cities. That discussion done, the rest of the day was quite uneventful, except the fact that I came upon a flock of pigeons outside my office during lunch break. Kolkatan’s rea...

From the time I arrived back home, Rahul my cousin started pestering me to take him out. I was dead tired in the evening from 4 hectic days in Delhi and decided to call it an early night with the promise of taking him for a movie in the morning. He had been dying to watch “The Fast and the Furious – Tokyo Drift”. So we woke up and got up, got dressed and headed out for the movie at INOX. I had a holiday for Id. When we reached INOX, I was told that Tokyo Drift had been changed and since I was there I wasn’t going back without watching a movie. So we ended up watching “Ant Bully”. It was a nice animated movie with a nice plot and message saying be nice to animals kind of thing. Effects were great though. Halfway through the movie I got calls from office telling me it was a working day. Wow! When did that happen? So I rushed to office after the movie, all the while thinking it was some kind of prank my colleagues were pulling on me, but sure enough the holiday had been called off yester...

Once back in Good old Kolkata, the temperature announced on landing was 31 degrees. Delhi was already below 20 degrees and plunging daily it seemed. Man what was I going to do with two suitcases full of Jackets and sweaters in Kolkata. Hey Kolkata has aerobridges and we alighted from the aircraft straight into the terminal. Sometimes I think it takes away the excitement of being on a bus steering through all those aircrat parked on the tarmac following all those dotted lines but then this saves so much time. Once out, I realized that the option of a prepaid taxi was eliminated. I had spent the last of my monies on excess baggage. So I went out of the terminal and tried hailing a cab, which for some reason seemed quite impossible. Then one guy caught me and asked me to follow him to his cab. I did, only to soon realize he was a tout and asked me to she out Rs. 375 for a ride to Park Circus. Are you crazy? I asked him. Then I swore at him in Bengali and unleashed my fiery tongue. Was th...

Tuesday morning, I got up and headed to the Radio City Office in Okhla as that would be the most convenient place to give to the Taxi guy, as Vinay’s place was a bit hard to explain. I had spent the night at his place and truly appreciated the hospitality right upto the cornflakes for breakfast. How did he know I loved cornflakes and it was my staple diet every morning? Anyway while I waited for the taxi at the office, I caught up with Siddhartha Prasad my friend from college, who happens to work for Radio Mirchi just a couple of buildings away. We chatted over a smoke and I also met with Abhijeet and Abhinendra while I was there. Then I caught my cab and headed to Gurgaon. On the way there Priyanka messaged me that her show was going to start and I tuned into Fever 104 FM. I was pleasantly surprised that Priyanka sounded so full of life and she had that excitement which was evident in every link that she did. They were short, crisp slick. Way to go girl. Radio needs more RJ’s like y...

The unusual suspects were Abhay Tikku, Aditi and gang. Monday night partying. Anyway if you must party on a Monday the party at Turquoise Cottage. Rock on people and keep the Spirit alive.

Vinay & Amrit I managed to fit in quite a hectic schedule on this whirlwind tour of Delhi. Monday mroning I headed for Delhi, a bit later than I would’ve liked, but all the same the day had started. I picked up my motorcycle from Praveen’s place at Chirag Dilli and headed out towards my bank which was in Okhla. Man this bank work can drive a normal person crazy. I wish I knew the finer nuances of banking. After two incredibly long hours in the bank, I still had no answers and they still hadn’t a clue about the whereabouts of my Gold Debit Card which I had apparently been upgraded to. So with no more cheques left in my cheque book and no ATM Debit Card, I had no way of operating my Account and the money I had in my pocket is what I’d have to make do with for the remainder of my trip. The money in my bank could stay there a couple of more days and I hope earn me some more interest, I hope. While all this was going on and I was waiting for some answers, I witnessed true Dilli cu...

I finally met Sheldon on Sunday Night and though he lived close by, my busy schedule made it a bit tough. So he came over late in the evening and after chatting at my brother's place, I went with him to his house to meet his mom. It would be outright harakiri not to visit Aunty if I had come all the way to Delhi and moreover if I was staying Gurgaon. We tipdoed into the house, but after going into the kitchen did manage to wake her up. Which I was glad for and I got to meet her and she was happy too. Then we went upto his room and had a couple of beers, which he keeps stocked in his fridge. Attaboy. Good thinking. Then, seeing the orange gravy and the chunks of meat, I couldn't resist the Mutton Korma and rice that Sheldon had prepared and had a good feast. I must admit, I've always enjoyed this chap's cooking. He ought to open a resturant soon. We guys then spent some more time chatting and finally we got in the car and headed back to my Brother's place. I clicked...

Though I had met Upa Uncle in Kolkata, before he headed out on his even more hectic tour of India, we met up in Delhi at my brother's place on Sunday after he had visited Chennai & Bangkok. We picked him up from his cousin's place in Vasant Kunj in the morning and we spent most of the morning chatting and him telling us about Canada and his life there and how India had changed. We had a great lunch or Biryani and Butter Chicken and headed out to Mayur Vihar . The Drive from Gurgaon through AIIMS and India Gate and over the Nizammudin Bridge really impressed him on how the city landscape had changed since his last visit many years ago and how India had become quite worlds class. All it needed to do as the next step was to eliminate the dust and the corruption and we were ready to be among the leading countries in the world.

Yesterday was the festival of lights and what better way to celebrate it than being in the city that celebrates it with such fervour. The buildings were outlined with strings of lights, the deep blue sky was being being illuminated with rockets breaking into sparking flowers of light and the streets were lit with lightbulbs the colours of the rainblow. We went down from our 20th floor apartment to the 17th floor visiting one of Faye's friends for the Puja and then went down into the car park to start the festivities adding to the already noisy, illuminated environment with all the other revelers. well not before I had popped one king size "Boondi ka Laddu" into my mouth. Well armed with a sugar high, I set about the task of lighting the "Phuljaris" and used them to set a few "Anar" and "Chakris" to excite the couple of kids hanging around. The fountain of sparkles into the air and the spinning wheel of fire on the ground were being thoro...

Last night after a near heart in my mouth situation on VIP road where I got stalled in a traffic jam and was cursing myself on not having taken the Rajarhat Highway. Anyway made it to the airport in the nick of time and checked in my baggage and headed straight to board the aircraft. IndiGo gets 5 Stars on my travel plans. This is the second time I'm travelling on the brand new Airbus A320 aircraft that they are using which are impeccable. The landings and take offs are without incident. I used to hate that thud of the wheels making contact on landing when I've flown other airlines. Not IndiGo. The Cabin Crew are very prim and proper and most of them quite pleasant to look at. Isn't it always a welcome sight to have a pretty girl attending to you or even if not attending to you, but you knowing that she is there to attend to you. Well not that I'm one for too much attention. If I'm not fast asleep (and alot of my colleagues envy me for that), then I'm glued ...

I don't know where the monsoon is retreating to. Seems like it's set up base in Kolkata. It's been raining every afternoon between 12 noon and 3pm. And then the sun comes right back out from behind the dark clouds. The Rain comes done quite menacingly too with the chorus of deafening thunder claps and bright flashes of lightening. More like a "Son et Lumaire" with a wall of water besieging the show. It seems we're getting more rain here than in Cherrapunji, so the Met Deptt. should really go back to the drawing board and study this change in the weather pattern.

Last evening when we were out, so Amrit and Kedar were engaged in animated conversation about their favourite cricketers and generally quizzing each other about the game. Well my reaction to the whole cricket thing was "I KNOW ONLY ONE CRICKETER, MANDIRA BEDI. SHE'S ON EXXTRA INNINGS"