What makes a person like a city or dislike one? Many a time I have used in my conversations with people, the term ‘character’ for a city. This thought comes from listening to the ‘Dilli’ song from ‘Delhi Heights’. It is a pretty cool song and I thought it was a nice collage of Delhi.

Anyway, going on to the character thing. In every discussion, there have been enough defenders for each of the large cities.. the Delhi ones swear by Delhi…of course, the Mumbai-kar loyalists are the loudest and definitely Chennai has its bunch of lovers……a friend from Chandigarh claims nothing like her city…

But the thing about Bangalore…its a strange one…folks staying in other cities view Bangalore as this cool and fun place to be, which it is…but the number of detractors today that Bangalore has inside amazes me (for whatever reason) . Today most of the folks from Delhi or Chennai staying here dont like Bangalore…..given a chance, they would quickly shift out…

To me, its not so much about the traffic and infrastructure etc…its more about what can you associate with the city, what I call the character. Character is the essence or ethos of the city that needs to be felt. For me, when I travel or visit any city, if I can get a sense of that, then I consider my visit satisfying.

At some point, people have stopped making an effort to like Bangalore or understand the possible character of the city. When I started living here in Bangalore, it still had the ’small-town’ nature, very laid back and it was just a clean beautiful city. Now I think Bangalore is in a confused awkward adolescence stage. Shes no longer a small kid nor is she an adult yet equipped to handle the growing up…yet the city is still an all-inclusive city which has accepted all into her folds (despite the politicians)

Like any city, there are the problems. But it’s not all bad…
Well, maybe a Rabbi song for Bangalore is what is needed to prod folks into making an attempt to like the city …

New York is a great place, a city full of energy and a city that never sleeps..but when I am travelling back tomorrow to India, I feel good..

I feel so ready to travel back…I am usually the kind of person who likes visiting new places and try and understand the ‘character’ of the city.

New York should have been perfect. Dont know if it is due to the amount of work or the team I was working with…am sure glad India is calling…

I guess there are times when you want to be the adventurous one in the world exploring new corners and there are other times when you want to get back into the comfort zone that you are used to….

What a person is, I suppose dependent on how comfortable and what proportion of the time he/she likes to tread into the unknown…

The one good thing about this trip was the number of old friends I caught up with. I realized I knew so many people here - school, college, ex-colleagues, IIMB and some of them I had lost touch over the last 3-4 years and some of them I have not talked to in about 10 years…But its good to know that there are so many people who you can just pick off where we left off from…

Makes me think, I should definitely try living in Mumbai…

To think that a few months back, I was in the city where the FIFA world Cup was played out yday makes me nostalgic for Munich. Though I lived there only for a year, it was a great time indeed.

hmm..would have been a great time to be over there now….with all the crazy football fans over there….

One of the pictures that was exhibited at one of the gardens in Paris. I thought the expression on the face of this girl was remarkable. 

I think the Germans are one of the most honest and straight forward people I have ever met. Couple of days ago, a colleagues wife had lost her purse in one of the shopping malls with nearly 200 euros in it. The fact was that there was no form of identification in it. The only paper was a video library card.

Believe it or not, this person who found the purse actually took the pain to go to the video store to obtain the address so that he could go and post it to them. For my friends luck, this person recognized them when they went by his store and finally managed to give back the purse to him.

I dont think there are very many chances of this happening in India. Even if we are honest, we just wouldnt take the pains of finding the owner. This country amazes me for its values. It’s quite sad that they are not able to adapt to the new fluid environment in the world as much as they would have liked to.

Louvre Collage
Originally uploaded by bibinsr.

Views from the Louvre.

Again an amazing museum. By no stretch of imagination am I a connoiseur of art. But Louvre manages to amaze you with the variety of paintings and scultptures. However, I did think that the Mona Lisa was one of the most hyped stories in the world. There were so many paintings which were probably more beautiful than the Mona Lisa and so it seemed strange that people only want to see the Mona Lisa. The room where the Mona Lisa was hung was so crowded while the rest of the museum had so less people. Quite a marketing success!!

Paris City Collage
Originally uploaded by bibinsr.

As a last minute effort to remove an entry from my wishlist, I managed to make a weekend trip to Paris - one of the truly great cities of the world.

Definitely a city with ‘character’.

When I came back from the trip, one of my friends asked me whether I liked Rome or Paris. To me, both of these were so very different and amazing in their own ways. Rome is all about history whereas Paris offers everything - history, style, class. Rome takes you to an era back. Being an ICSE student, I had to learn Julius Caesar during schooling and it left a deep impression on me (thanks to my english teacher). So when I saw the Roman Forum, I could sense the greatness of the city.

In Paris, you get the feeling that you are in one of the great cities of the world. The Eiffel Tower is again one of the places where you feel that this monument lives up to the reputation. The 3 days that I was over there went by so quickly. I would love to go back to Paris and spend a less hurried vacation and soak in the Parisian ambience.

Madrid - Bullfight ring view. Seems to me a sadistic pastime where an animal is being challenged by so many men prompted by 10000 or more people 

Barcelona - A city where you find everything - beaches, history, entertainment. A beautiful city 

Toledo - A small but beautiful town on the outskirts of Madrid where the famous Don Quixote was supposed to have lived with its beautiful old streets