While in Bangalore I was cursing myself for not having enough cash saved over in order for me to do some shopping. With me still paying off the cost of the laptop (on which I am typing) money is on short supply and hence spending is also less. But you can’t visit Bangalore without atleast window shopping!
On the second day that we were there, my colleagues and I decided to go out to Brigade road in the evening and look for bargain buys. So after the training we came back to the guesthouse and rested for a bit. By 7:45 we walked a bit and the took an auto towards MG Road. I must say that I was highly disappointed that this once behemoth of an attraction for both tourists as well as citizens alike has fallen on bad times. Blames the flyovers that are being constructed and hence the area is a little too dingy and dirty, blames the fact that Bangalore has prospered so much in the last 10 years that each of the big suburbs have developed at a frighteningly fast pace and are now self sufficient and doing lots of business on their own. Still it was a shame to see so much rubbish piled on some corners. There were more stray dogs than people on the big road! And quite a few rats.
We made our way to Brigade road and went to a few stores. While my colleagues shopped around for clothes, I snuck into an open cafe and ordered a lime ice tea. They both bought a watch each from the vendors and I bought a wallet – cheap but very nice look and make. We then went to have a pint of beer in Soul Cafe, a really cool but dark looking place where they have lots of people smoking hookahs. And the place has a strict no photo policy!
Some more walking around later, it was dinner time and we went to KFC and ordered our food. That’s my plate that you see in the pic over here. That’s 2 piece chicken, fried rice, french fries, a coke and gravy. Ketchup too. The fries sucked and I didn’t even bother opening up the small gravy cup. The chicken was good and the rice ok. KFC in Brigade has fallen on bad times – you can make out with the fading colours, chipped plates and overall look of not doing enough business in the once fine establishment. I dunno how the other branches in the city are doing; the one in Cochin is raking in the big bucks like crazy!
By the time dinner was done, it was almost 11pm and we were tired. We walked down to the auto stand and the first joker said that it would be Rs.160 to take us to our guesthouse. Fuck you asshole! We walked a minute down the road and got another auto driver who said Rs.50 and we said ok. Auto drivers give Bangalore a bad name but unless you own a vehicle, you are dependent on the auto rickshaws.