Bangalore: The Next Chapter

A Happy New Year to all!

Destiny once again takes control of my life, bringing me to Bangalore for six months in order for me to complete an internship (also known as Practice School 2 at BITS) after which I shall finally (!!!) be a Computer Science engineer (hopefully!)

My first impressions of Bangalore...
A nice city overall, reminds me of Mumbai to a great extent, sans the efficient transport system, the language and the discrimination.

Transport System: All my friends in Bangalore shall hopefully agree with me on this one. There are only two forms of public transport available (against 3 in Mumbai) public buses, and autorickshaws. The buses are unorganized, have no fixed schedule as far as I can tell and come in far too many categories. They seem to be kinda regular, but searching for a route map for all the city buses is a futile effort. I finally found a booklet on the route maps at BDA complex, bought it, and opened it to see no buses that ply my area!!! The autorickshaws are often a highly irritating mode of transport, the drivers almost always overcharging and never going by the meter. I think they should just make a bonfire of all their autorickshaw meters next Holi...

Language: The principal language spoken here is Kannada (no surprises there!) Not too many locals speak Hindi or English here. This raises the question... What were our constitution makers thinking when they made India a secular state? And why wasn't there a single language which everyone would understand and speak, no matter which part of India they came from?

Discrimination: I can't help feeling being discriminated here at Bangalore. Maybe its my mind playing tricks on me, maybe its real. I thought I would just pen it down anyway. A few observations; I think people here refuse to speak Hindi/English even though they understand it (Hope this is not the case!) and I see bus conductors always asking me for change and handing the local next to me the correct denomination in coins without a single complaint. Also, they tend to defer the task of handing me the change until I actually have to explicitly ask him for it because my bus stop is getting close. And I get the money with grumbling in the local language bundled for free!

Apart from these few minor objections, Bangalore is a perfectly nice place to live, good places to hang out, great shopping malls and coffee shops at practically every corner.

Only looking forward to my first stipend!!!

Later...