Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Chennai Days

Hi friends,

This post is about my life at Chennai - the place where I have spent nearly 2 years of my career.

First an intro bout Chennai: For many people hailing from northern parts of India, Chennai(Madras) is still synonymous with South India! Chennai is a great cultural city full of beautiful ancient temples and churches and beaches(which are not so beautiful). It is a shopping hub for clothes, gold and many other things... And of course its famous for its coffee and idli-sambar. Enough said.

I remember my first day...

Myself and another friend reached Chennai Central early morning and headed for a Hotel in T.Nagar. The auto driver got us there in 10 minutes and charged 150 bucks! We could not argue because of the language problem.

The next thing we noticed was the humidity. We were sweating so bad at 7 in the morning! Its not the heat but the humidity that kills you. Little did I know then, that I would be spending 2 summers in Chennai, and in afternoon shift!

In two days, we shifted to Besant Nagar. This place was closer to home. We had an independent room and roomies from Bangalore plus the area itself is cleaner than rest of the city.To me, having a room close to the beach(about 50 meters) was like, really great!! We had a gala time in Besant nagar - nice beach, good food and decent babes.

Our first trip was to Pondicherry. Pondy is just 3 hours away from Chennai and you can see the beach along the drive. We went to the beach and enjoyed the evening. Morning we visited Aurobindo Ashram and returned to Chennai at night. That was a memorable trip.
Later we visited other places - Tirupati, Mantralayam, Mahabalipuram...


Work was smooth without any problems(I was getting my salary on time :)
I spent so many weekends travelling to Bangalore that I lost count. I guess I am partly responsible for the profits Indian Railways has made in last 2 years. :)


As time passed we felt bored with the place. Even though life was not bad in Chennai, it was not great either. Once boredom creeps in, man gets restless. It happened to me too.

All of us from Bangalore were close group of friends. One by one, our friends went back to Bangalore. We were beginning to feel the heat now...
We humans are strange creatures. When 10 of us get apples, we eat our share happily. But if 9 of us get apples and 1 gets a mango, every body wants to eat that mango.

As our roomies left one behind the other, we had to leave Besant Nagar and shift to another place.
The new place was stinking so bad and it had bedbugs so I couldn't sleep. I was awake all night and moved to a new place at dawn break. This time I was moving in with a different set of friends.

By now, I had completed more than a year and a half in Chennai and was pretty frustrated. I made up my mind that I have to take transfer back to Bangalore.
Then started my quest for transfer. Numerous requests and talks and meetings failed to convince the managers. It was no easy task...

And all this did affect our room atmosphere too because we were all sailing in the same boat. We were not relaxed as usual- no cards, no pulling each other's legs much and no fun.

But I guess life had a lesson to teach us - that of patience. So we held on and waited for time to come. When that happened, the things just fell into place themselves as if they had been waiting for the right time.

Now I am back to Bangalore and totally having fun + home food.


Looking back, I am greatful to God that he gave me an opportunity to work in Chennai. I can recount numerous stories I will rewind throughout my life. Here is one crazy story:

People over there are crazy about Tamil movies. They consider superstar Rajinikanth to be God. I
have seen posters of Rajini standing next to God and blessing newly married couples!
I came across one such person who narrated this to me - at a time when there were very few channels on T.V, one of Rajini's movies was up for release. It created lot of hype but there were no promos on T.V. So this guy along with his friends went to a theatre and bought tickets of other movies just to watch the trailer of Rajini's movie during the interval! And he did it for all four shows that same day from morning to night!!

On a closing note, I would like to list down all the things I liked about Chennai and the things
I would like to see happen.

Things I liked -
*beach
*transport system - local train and wide roads
*preserving our Indian culture and traditions
*hard working people

Things I would like to see happen -
*more locals speaking in Hindi and other languages
*Installing meters for autorikshaws
*last but not the least improving the drainage system


P.S: Everything I mentioned above is purely my personal opinion and I don't intend to hurt
anybody's sentiment.

First One...

Hi Friends,

This is my first blog ever! And it has arised out of a need to express myself. Need for freedom...
And what better platform than this?
So here I am. Trying to share my thoughts with the world.

Keep reading and don't forget to give your valuable feedback.

Regards,
Swaroop.