4-Post Friday: Post 3/4: Trip No. 8- Another Trip to Bengaluru

It was only in April that I was in Bengaluru and last week again I made another trip. In April it was an official trip and I was there for only a day. Last week’s trip was a personal one (to attend my brother-in-law’s marriage) of three days. During April I visited the bookstores on MG Road and that was all. Last week I went almost all over the town. Of course, I went to MG Road also.

We left on Tuesday evening by train and after an uneventful journey reached Bengaluru sometime around half past seven in the morning. We were put up at a hotel in Rajajinagar which wasn’t very far from the railway station. Later I came to know that the place is also called Shivanahalli but whatever it was called it was a pretty nice place. In fact, the whole of Bengaluru (or whatever I saw) was pretty nice, so very much unlike Hyderabad. I did not see a single Mega-pothole on any road that I passed. I was sort of dumbfounded and disappointed that I couldn’t come across even a teeny-weeny pothole. Oh yes, the road was bad somewhere under a bridge but that was all.

On the first day some kind of function was scheduled in the afternoon followed by the reception in the evening. After breakfast we landed at the venue only to learn that it was a function mostly to do with ladies. We had time until three to participate in the final part of the function where we guys had to be around. So I decided I’d make better use of the hours that lay ahead. It is surprising how in a place other than the home town it is quite easy to convince the spouse regarding some things. It was a matter of minutes to get the go ahead to our plans to visit MG Road and check out the bookstores. Hours later we returned with lots of books ( see in accompanying post) in hand. The rest of the day was full with lot of activity and it was pretty late in the night when we returned to the hotel.

The next day was the actual marriage and since many of the invitees had made it to the reception the previous evening there wasn’t much of a crowd for the marriage. Like all traditional Indian ceremonies this too took a pretty long time. I wished I had brought along one of the books I had picked up at MG Road the day before. After lunch there were some more winding up ceremonies and then it was all over by four. I went out to book tickets for ‘Bangalore Rounds’ and was disappointed to learn there were only two seats available. Luckily, I was told I might be able to find seats if we managed to reach the starting point by half past eight the next morning.

The next day we were lucky. We got the seats in the sight seeing bus. Though MG Road was included in the tour unfortunately, that day, it was excluded due to the flower show at Lal Bagh where we were supposed to spend more time. Anyway, it was six by the time we got to the hotel. Next was a visit to my friend, Amarnad who I met in Chennai in 2000 I guess when I went there to attend a training course. We stayed together in the same room for about ten days which was long enough to spark a long term friendship. I wanted to meet him because he had sent me a box of cream that he makes at home from out of rare herbs that quickly heals any wounds.

Afterwards we got to Yeshwantpur where we caught the Sampark Kranti Express at ten in the night and reached Kacheguda in the morning. I was glad to be back home after almost a week of travelling to Dehradun and Bengaluru, one place in the North of the country and another in the South of the country.