Bangalore Blues

 In June 2011 I happened to visit Bengaluru n Kerala. This trip was unplanned as I was in Delhi for my paper attestation work n realized that I had to visit Bengaluru for the same. Bengaluru has changed a lot - with Metro work going on at prime locations, it's very difficult to locate a place. Long traffic jams r another added nuisance. The airport is also too far from the city.
I stayed at Hotel Shelton Grand for a fortnight. The hotel was not as grand as it's name though. Curzon Court Hotel on brigade road is a common destination for travellers. Y did I stay at Church street at Brigade road - because it's in the central part of Bengaluru, full of college crowd, which reminded me of my college days there.
In 1 evening a crowd of African youngsters stormed the hotel. Someone misleadingly tried forcefully opening my room's door in the middle of the night n a drunk African girl asked for the location of the Washroom. All because the hotel had a disco theca on it's top floor (which I didn't dare to enter). The place was buzzing with young scary girls in the evenings.
My daily itinerary was to visit Ruby Tuesday, just opposite my hotel for dinner. The Chicken winglets there r superb. I couldn't understand y they don't allow smoking inside their outlet. Another nearby pub Amoeba also is good [previously it was NASA]. A budget Andhra restaurant Bheema on Church street serves authentic Andhra cuisine over banana leaves. Mcdonalds, KFC, Softys, Baskin n others were the other places I visited regularly on the Brigade road.
The Mota Arcade n Fifth Avenue malls have changed quite a lot in 8 yrs but not Neelgiris, Fahreinheit (a roadside clothes shop), Higginbotham's bookstore etc.
As the mighty intelligent readers know that I always land up at the wrong place most of the time, similarly on this trip I thought of visiting a Hyderabad House outlet (famous Hyderabadi biryani restaurant chain) only to find that it was a fake restaurant.
My Richie Rich batchmate Raghu was generous enough to take me for dinner at Indiranagar club, along with my senior college friend Prashant. My other freinds Nandini n Hema couldn't join. A true club culture was on display at that club, with smoking - non smoking - drinking zones. The club was jam packed even on a regular weeknight.
I took timeout to visit my ex dental college at Wilson Gardens [BIDS], where i was there for abt 1 yr. I also visited my favourite restaurant in that area - SPR wines n ordered Fish Bangda [old common Meckeral fish menu].
As my degree attestation work was taking a lot of time, i visited my friend Manoj at Palakkad in Kerala. The overnight bus journey was cool, it had sleeper berths too. Palakkad [like other parts of Kerala] was green with rich flaura n fauna. After forcing Manoj to dismiss many of his clinic patients during OPD hrs we visited the Madhava Raja club for an exciting lunch, where we had mouth watering beef chilli and in the night visited Fort Palace hotel for a solemn Keralite dinner. Manoj had just been awarded the most outstanding Dentist by Kerala IDA branch n rightly so !
I returned to Bangalore after two days n after collecting my documents came back to Raipur.
As an afterthought --- Kerala is 1 of the finest places for people to live a retired life ...