STATE OF ART - NEW PROPOSED CHENNAI AIRPORT DESIGN

There has been lot of construction going in and around Chennai to tackle heavy traffic which is well know to all. Also there were lots of discussion and controversies floated around the politic scene to decide on expansion of the Chennai International Airport.

Finally, they decided on moving to Sriperumbudur, suburb town near Chennai. Its currently the hub of car industry in South, can also be called as South India's Detriot where Hyundai and Ford company has headquartered.

These are the proposed pictures of Sriperumbudur-Chennai international
Airport. If it is completed it will be the No.1 in South Asia and the proposed Express Highways in Chennai. Whether this plan is approved and put for execution or not. One thing for sure, its going to be money cow for politicians for another 10-15 years to come. I know it is always the case in many things in our country.

If this new international airport plan falls thru, it will surely change the Future of Air travel in South for the years to come. Do you think ?!

Check out the pics..

Higher Level Design

Chennai Super Highway

Courtesy: Ravichandran, friend who is excited and shared this design.

INDIA TRIP - ONLY MONEY MATTERS, BIG MONEY!!!

Like every other desi, I did carry back loads of memory (without the need to check-in the flight) when I came back from my recent India trip. Obviously most of 'em about very happy and joyous moments but it also includes some interesting and strong, frustrating scenes which still remains untainted and fresh in my mind.

Those anguish instances when comes back at me, makes me to feel wary of the situation and pushes me to reach a bold conclusion that value for Rupee is diminishing faster than ever and at same time attraction towards has increased many times in recent years. To tell the plain blank truth(as per me), NO VALUE FOR INDIVIDUAL anymore in India unless you are big politician. Only MONEY MATTERS, especially BIG MONEY.

Everybody, talks in C's. Do you know what I mean?! C means CRORES like M - Millions are big figures. Like few years back, 10 Lakh Rupee is a big money to invest in anything but now its nothing and compared to Rs.10,000. There is no value for thousands anymore.

Why go that far?! There is nothing you can buy for a one rupee except a Clinic Plus Shampoo nowadays. One rupee which bought a couple of tea or an ice bar or good number of candies few years ago is no longer valid. There is no value for one Rupee not even with the beggars. They too expect more atleast Rs.5 or Rs.10.

Inflation and cost of living has gone up many fold in my opinion. Being a outsider visiting india after couple of years, its huge change. It might not seem a big deal for people who been witnessing this day in and out but its a surprise rather shock for us.

I have seen in many places, people are getting riped of in whatever way they can. There is no better choice than paying the extra bucks. Take the Metro bus service in chennai. They introduced different bus services like M service, Superfast, non-stop which charges many folds than usual fare but still take the same amount of time to reach your destination. There is no choice for commuter than taking these services. Few years back, you can buy a ticket of Rs.5-8 to travel to my place to Chennai Broadway(30kms) which now costs atleast Rs.15-18 and more in the special buses.

In other public places, the charges have be jacked up many fold. In order to go to a reasonable North Indian type restaurant for a dinner for two, you atleast need a Rs.500 note in your pocket otherwise you better look out for the usual idli and dosa hotel. Movie tickets are now minimum Rs.50-75 in reasonably good theatre. Its actually more than hundred rupees per head in multiplex theatres. Man, lots of things changed in 2 years.

Its even gotten worse in the temples and tourist places. When you go to big famous temples like Palani, you get riped of in the name of faster service. I was a direct victim of it. We wanted to go to Palani Hill Temp while we returning from Kodai(hill station). We didn't have enough time so we decided to take the expensive line to catch the ride in Rope/Cable car, which would cost us Rs.50/person compared to normal Rs.10 hoping to reach the counter faster. But it took the same amount of time compared to the Rs.10 line. Nothing special about it the extra cost. Totally unreasonable to ripe off taking the situation as the advantage.

Another situation which took me to the heights of ripe off that I have experienced in this trip. We had plan to go Kodaikonal for 3 days from Chennai as our escape from heat waves. We booked thru a chennai club to have rooms in the big, famous Hill Country Resort 4 months ahead of our trip. We got the letter from the club saying that we will have a big delux room when we get there. When we went, a shocking news is waiting for us. They told us, they never got the reservations from the club and can't allot any room for us. We were stranded in the street and nowhere to go.

We were so ridiculed and frustrated to hear about it. We immediately called the contact person of the club and asked about it, he doesn't care. He said, we tried our best and we got to know that we couldn't get the rooms 2 days ago and sorry to inform you at the last min. Because its the peak season, they didn't have reservation for the clubs. Myself and my father-in law went ballistic.

What are you telling us? We planned 3-4months ago and sent you all formal paper work and payment and now you are telling us its not reserved. He just stayed silent and told that he will make other arrangements. He decided to ripe us off which was evident in his answers. He then gave us a local agent who has a contract with him. This agent guy tries to put us in a media core hotel and planned to take the big money we paid for the resort. What a cheap mentality people? We got to know their plan and decided to not go with that agent guy.

We were so tired after long travel and just want to get a good place at this situation. We tried to find rooms using a different agent on road and finally able to get a reasonable place paying from our pocket. We wasted one day to get the accommodation with the 11month baby in hand and couldn't enjoy the rest of vacation well because of the hassle.

Later we came to know that its normal tactics from this club. They do these type of things all the time and we are there victims this time. As soon we got back to chennai, my in-law had a tense talk with the club folks and in one stage plan to give a compliant report in the newspaper and backed out. Nevertheless, he is trying to the get money back. Whatever it may be, the vacation spoiled is spoiled and nothing can bring it back.

I hired a magician for my Son's Birthday party. He quoted a fixed charge of Rs.1000 for a hour(lowest charge I can find) over the phone but when he got to the party. He tried on me to get more money taking the advantage that we don't have choice. But I strongly said if you want more, you have to do it. He just agreed and did the show.

People just wanna find situation to take advantage to us rip off. I had come across many more instances like this one in this trip. After being a victim and witness of few, I realized that time have changed and nowadays people don't care for others. They just care only for money and they go to any extent to ripe off others money in anyway possible. All they think about is Money and nothing matters to them. I doubt the situation will ever change rather getting worse every day. You be the judge...

CHENNAI CITY - Is it losing friendliness with an Attitude change?!

With my eyes still burning and begging to take a nap due to jet lag and date/night change, I couldn't control my fingers to stop lingering at the keyboard. They just wanted to start back up on my blogging with loads of interesting things still fresh enough in my mind from my recent trip to Chennai - India. The month long vacation to home land will never be enough with too much stuff to do in a short duration. It just vanished like a second, leaving some memorable and unforgettable moments.

Busy highway traffic than ever with all types of vehicles, new model cars from all over the world struggling to float thru local streets, construction all over the city making a city traffic a nightmare during peak hours, pizza and burger corners all around the town, increased number of call taxies and autos adding to the chaos, new malls and multiplex movie theatres for fun, busy shopping complexes and TNagar streets with more heads than ever with loads of stuff in their hand during the weekdays.

It might be an usual sight for the chennai residents but its new for visitors like me. Before I like to write all about good and memorable moments, I am more tempted to blog on some of the interesting but frustrating instances which I experienced in this visit to chennai that hit me right on lifting my eyebrows high enough. Does all these changes made an attitude shift/change in people mind?!

Being a witness to this evolving change on and off in this city, I would say "YES" to that boldly. Its losing its friendliness with a big attitude change of "DON'T CARE ABOUT OTHERS". Some might not agree with me but thats the true fact. Let me sketch out few instances which I faced during this trip.

I was at the big shopping complex POTHYS which stands at the center of TNagar(chennai) between Pondy Bazaar and Pangal Park. Its one of the busiest shopping complex at all seasons. I was shopping some trousers and shirts with my wife who is also shopping for her. In that shopping complex, every floor has its own cash counter and you have pay it each counter separately if you are buying different items in each floor.

First of all, there is no Queue for the cash counter. You have to wait in magic line at the cashier desk to pay in each floor to get your stuffs. I was next to that cashier desk to pay my bill waiting for the guy ahead of me to finish up. Cashier is busy counting to make sure he got the right amount for the bills and didn't care to see the next person in line. But I was hoping to be serviced next since I am the only one standing.

In a blink of a second, couple of other people got in the magic line in front of me cutting me thru by stretching their hands with their payment long enough to the cashier to crab his attention. I didn't say anything and still waited patiently, hoping that the cashier will get my payment after finishing up with the guy.

After finishing up with guy ahead of me, cashier took the payment from the hand which stood next to his eyes from the other person who cut me thru the magic line. It totally blew me off right there since I was the one waiting in that line long enough to be serviced. I immediately took it on with the cashier shouting to express my stand.

He tries to defend himself saying he can't see who is next because he is busy counting the money. I told him that there is no proper process to pay the payment. There should be a queue system or cashier should be smart enough to notice the next person in the magic line. I would mainly blame the people who just cut me thru without any courtesy to see that there are already others waiting in line to pay. After asking about it, cashier immediately took my payment and serviced me.

There are couple of things which wasn't right. First of all, there is no "Q" system or any process to make the payment easier. This is always the case in most of the shopping complexes. There is no proper payment counters or queue system in anything. The complex owners has to be blamed for it. Secondly and most importantly people need to have courtesy to see who is on line and try to let them pay first and wait for their turn instead of acting in urgency all the time. I did find the suggestion box to write my suggestions hoping they will read and implement it. After all, they advertise themselves has Perfect Service Shopping complex.

Here is the another one which happens in all the small streets in this big city. After some bizarre million cars getting exported and produced every day in our country, you see them in great numbers all over the city nowadays. But the city streets were built to handle only bikes and carts not this big cars. They get flooded and choked up with traffic all the time. Car drivers just try every way to maneuver around the city streets without worrying about others.

With less street space, only one car can go at time in most of the city streets. One time, we were going to my relative place in my in-laws new Ford car and hit on this small street which has only enough space for a car. There is already auto rickshaw parked at the end of the street blocking the way to get out to make it worse. We were waiting for the auto rickshaw to clear off the street faster so we can get out.

While we were waiting, the car which came behind us just wouldn't care and over took us trying to get out. He was not able to move being the auto rickshaw is still blocking the way. Why can't he just wait for it to clear and for us move and he can proceed?! There is no patience, every body wants to move fast in a urgency and its always me and me first.

It again blew me off. We are waiting and this guy just cut me thru making it worse. So I immediately came out of the car and asked the same question to the driver. He didn't car and some how maneuvered himself to get out of it. After the auto rickshaw got cleared, we were able to get out and move on.

I was so disgusted to see these things just because people don't have courtesy or friendliness to care for others. Its all about the them and that's the shift in the attitude. Nobody cares about what others things and nobody likes to ask about it. They just accept and go with it.

These are just few instances of many which I faced during my visit last month which totally changed my mindset about this evolving city and my own city. It is losing its shine on friendliness with change in people attitude...

Veyil Agni Veyil - CHENNAI HOT HOT SUMMER

After 3 weeks of busy roaming around the city in HOT HOT AGNI VEYIL(SUMMER) to complete some personal commitments, I finally able to find time and good internet connection to shoot out this blog after a short break.

I actually dreamed of a fun vacation but it turned to be a HOT one. Chennai HOT HOT days peaked to the max of 110-112F last week really which spoiled my fun dreams. What a atrocious summer?! Its totally unacceptable from the SUN buddy to broil us with his hot sun rays and test our limits.

Its not just me who came from America is complaining about it. It came from the chennai people and they themselves couldn't tolerate this Agni hot days inspite of having air conditions in the cars and shopping complexes.

I am from Houston(USA) and I have seen Hot summers but this one is entirely different. I always used to come to chennai in winter season but this time because of personal reasons I had to visit in summer. I thought I can manage being native chennaiwala few years ago. But I was failed. This hot summer taught me a lesson to not to come again in this season.

Madras nalla madrasdanda samy!!! I had to travel almost everyday to different parts of the city to visit my relatives in the car with A/c switched on. I still felt the beat of the heat from the top of the car making my head to spin. Even when I stayed at home, I kept sweating with the fan running on top of me in the high speed. The heat waves and hot breeze just keep hitting the body all around to make a worse experience.

I can't imagine how bad it will be for people in villages and other places living without a fan or a/c facility. Their live would have been horrible during these summer days.

I was able found shelter for 3 days in KodaiKanal(Hill station) taking a break from this hot days. But the break made it real worse when I got back to chennai. I felt the sun torcher more and more and couldn't withstand the heat waves.

The cold water and soft drinks straight from the refridgerator like Fanta, Maaza(my favorite) couldn't stop to the thrist but they all tried its best to give a bit of relief to take me to a splash ride.

Its slowly getting better for the past couple days but I have only a week to spare in this hot summer. I leave next friday back to Houston to make myself ready to take the heat from the other side of the world. I guess its all in the game of life!!!