8.24.2006

Taking Dr. Mallya literally

Background :
Biocon Ltd chairman and MD Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw interviewed UB Group chairman Vijay Mallya on the ills of Bangalore and the possible solutions for The Times of India and this particular part has relevance to what I want to say :

KM : How would you tackle traffic congestion in Bangalore?

VM : Bangalore needs to demarcate its Central Business District and use tolls, congestion fees and software to regulate traffic in the CBD. Cities like London and Singapore have successfully managed traffic congestion through these methods and I don’t see why we can’t do the same. Autorickshaws need to be confined to suburbs and banned from the CBD. We need to introduce car pool lanes on Hosur Road and Whitefield Road to ease traffic density. Bangkok has transformed itself from a mega-traffic-jam city to a free-flowing traffic city through a network of tollpaying elevated roads. We need to borrow from successful ideas and not try to reinvent the wheel. We need to implement the Metro and the Mono Rail projects at breakneck speed. Schools need to manage traffic in a more responsible way. We need more multistoreyed car parks. We need underpasses and overpasses to regulate pedestrian traffic and we need to prevent stray cows and dogs from impeding traffic as well!

CM : He hotly refused to burden the citizens with more taxes.

My take:
Day before yesterday our office shuttle driver decided to take a short cut through a layout in Whitefield to avoid all the traffic logjam on the now internationally (in)famous Marathalli bridge. So, there we were sailing "smoothly" through all the pot holed roads, which is the fact of life for most inner roads of Bangalore layouts. Suddenly we saw a group of guys jumping around on the road in the distance. We did not understand till we came up to them that the war dance that they were performing was to ensure that any approaching vehicle stops before it hits them. Ok so we dint have a choice but to stop, what with two over-enthu guys gleefully blocking the narrow road. The other two guys approached the driver and demanded Rs. 10. Our man was confused. Then one of the guys was kind enough to explain that it was (....now listen to this....) the "toll" for using that road! Many vehicles (cars, tempo travellers and the ilk) plying through erstwhile quiet neighbourhoods near IT hubs have become a menace for the people living there. The narrow roads are not tarred and with every passing vehicle a fresh drift of dust is ushered into every house. One cannot forget the noise pollution which the first-geared vehicles produce. Sometimes there are traffic jams even on these "short-cut" roads. Understandably the frustration of the populace mounts.

We got away that day without paying the ten rupees either because the guys were sheepish about their task or the driver was too much of a match for their wit.

Bangalore's citizens, even if its only jobless opportunist youths, are taking it into their hands to implement what Vijay Mallya suggested and what the CM would not! Is it the correct path? I dont know. I am not here to judge. Nevertheless, kudos to their guts and entrepreneurship!

Long Live Bangalorean Enterprise :)

8.21.2006

These are a few of my favourite things


My current passion : ACCESSORIES!

Hoops, danglers, bracelets, brooches, bags et al....I love buying these and I love wearing/using them even more! My folks tell me I spend way too much on them but ab kya karen control hi nahin hota ;)

Bijou-Brigitte- For glittery, bling bling, colourful and sheer varrrriety this is a must go. This chain is not in India though. I love their gift wrap li'l bags the most!

Sia Art Jewellery
- Its an Indian chain. Amazing ethnic stuff you get here! But it all depends on how much you are ready to shell out. The lesser the money the plasticky the look gets.

Jute Cottage - Jute jute jute jute wonderful jute! Its in Bangalore.

Ballyfabs - The Jute Shop - I know there is one in Spencer Plaza in Chennai but not sure if they have opened one in Bangalore. Delightful shop! Designer stuff I tell ya..

Any of you reading this post is welcome to take this forward and blog about the shops you keep going back to, the shops that you buy most of your accessories from!

8.18.2006

When Bruise Lee was in my next seat

Continuing with the in-flight experience...

When I am totally awashed with tiredness and long to rest, I always get a seat which is next to a fat person who is occupying half my seat or I get a "middle" seat and then my space gets encroached upon by two people or I have to cope with a bawling kid beside me or a sprightly kid behind me forever kicking my seat. When people sit beside me on a flight they like to assume that I am actually half my size or so I think, otherwise how can you explain the phenomenon of "elbow space". I never ever get to rest my elbow on my seat's hand rest - someone else has got there before me.
(I have a theory about how to solve the elbow space problem without losing out on the number of people you could stuff into economy class. Will tell you as soon as I can make sound a little less crazy).

The experience I am going to narrate now is a greatly different from what I have blabbered on above.
I got onto this flight. I was in a very happy state because, even though I hadnt managed to get a window seat even with my best am-a-good-little-girl smile, I had procured an aisle seat. Sitting on the aisle requires a lot of precision. Precision on where exactly you could place your legs without tripping anyone walking by and still make use of the luxury of stretching them out. Oh! you dont know how rapidly the air hostesses and stewards move about. I have personally seen a steward emerging from the first class section to economy, tripping on an aisle passenger's foot and landing on his nose half way across the deck. If I let myself ramble on, I can write reams of irrelevant stuff can't I?!!
So, I got to my seat and it was a three seater. There was a girl already at the window seat and nobody in the middle seat. I waited with bated breath to see if somebody would come to occupy the seat but very soon the plane's doors were closed. I turned towards the window-seat girl and gave her a triumphant smile. She dint understand the reason but she returned it. I explained to her very shortly with actions. I kicked off my shoes, lifted the seat handle and occupied half of the middle seat. I almost felt royal! The other girl was quick to grasp the meaning of this extra comfort and followed suit. We sailed peacefully through the air till I started to slumber. I dont know for how long I had slept when I woken with a huge thud on my head. In my sleep I thought the plane was crashing! I flared open my eyes and found myself looking straight into the window-seat girl's eyes. She was as bewildered as I was. What I found even more shocking was how I found her poised. She held the back of my seat with one hand and the seat in front with the other, her legs in the air. I was totally confused by now as to what was going on. All I could understand was that the thump on my head was beginning to pain a lot so I rubbed it. The girl sheepishly told me sorry and ran off in the direction of the rest room. As I became more awake I realised what had happened.
I was in deep sleep, so deep that my mouth was totally open. The other girl wanted to desperately use the rest room. She felt saddened at the prospect of waking me up from my meditative state so she thought why not try to get past without disturbing me.She recollected all that she had imbibed from the crouching tiger kinda movies. She hoisted herself in the air and would have landed safely on the other side of me, had she not misjudged the size of my head. Somewhere in the process her hand hit my head squarely on top and left me with a huge sore bump! Weirdness can only happen to me really! I mean, I get one and a half seats, and still I have to contend with those. Maybe I should just get back to remaining awake on flights.
Also, I want to thank the Lord for making me thick headed enough to suffer only a pain. But with my current track record in remembering things I would never know even if I lost some memory anyway!

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