Bangalore Rising

Street Names Are Fun   Naming of streets has always invoked passions in India. For Bangaloreans though, Gandhi and Nehru are passé. Back in the 70s, when new suburbs were mushrooming, city planners decided on the grid structure, a la New York. So when time came to name those new streets, they left dead netas (and their road signs) secure in their graves and instead opted for the Main and Cross street system. That worked fine for a while till our elected officials decided that urban planners were a drain on the city coffers and dispensed with them.  After rotting away for a couple of decades, planners returned with a vengeance. By this time however, Bangalore had become an IT hub. And so street names went decimal. So we now have several 100 Feet, 80 Feet and 60 Feet Roads. Damn the fact that most of the feet on the road are those of pedestrians who lack a sidewalk. When I went over the weekend with a tape measure, I found that Indira Nagar 100 Feet Road should actually be called 52.7 Fe

I am, like a true neta, breaking my promise of a story on our trip to the tailors. I thought a story about the recent near-demise of the UPA government would be better. But the media went wall-to-wall with it. And then it happened! Yes, the blasts. Don’t you agree that a story on my version of the serial bomb blasts here makes a better read? Mumbai, Madrid, New York, London and now Bangalore! Informed sources tell me that you've gotta get bombed to get into the big league. And we finally made it on Friday. The same source tells me that till recently, an average Joe from overseas (btw, I learned that the desi variety is called the average Jai) got off his flight from Benguluru International Airport and either made his way to Electronic City for meetings with the tech biggies or took a long cab ride to Mysore to see Mysore Palace and the Vishwesaraiya Dam. The bombings however have changed it all. Rumor goes that an enterprising tour operator now offers a tour called “A Blast into

The monitor in front of me spat out the time. "12:15 AM". A thousand thoughts whirred in my head as the jet tipped its wing to the left, then banked right, before swooping down to drop its wheels on the hard tarmac below. As the plane rapidly decelerated, the stewardess began the announcement she must have made a thousand times before. I paid no attention to the drone of her voice. I was lost in thought. Life had come a full circle in eighteen years. We were back where we began. India is home once again. Except that this time, it is Bangalore. A city none of us had ever lived in. And a place where we did not speak the local language. Bangalore has been a regular stop for me for several years. But a city responds to you a whole lot differently when you start living there. Thirty minutes into becoming a returning resident, I was reminded to dispel those romantic notions of living in India that I had childishly entertained. No sooner I entered our nice rented apartment, I emptie