They say that India is a land of extremes and contradictions… and my first day here was certainly marked by both. I awoke at 8:30 to Michael Jackson’s “Bad” being blared alongside some guy on a PA system talking about how everyone should SMS (use their cell phone to text message) their friends and have them come down for the event. I looked out my balcony windows and saw a mess of tents and cars – a genuine Indian car show/auction/swap meet.
I found Vivek (another Google engineer from Mountain View) downstairs, and he drew me a map of the main roads near us so that I could explore. I also met Akash (a new engineer hired in Bangalore), and he and I were going to walk down Mahatma Gandhi (MG) road to look at the shops, but I instead got a call from Lalit inviting me to lunch with a potential candidate we’re looking at to help with business development deals here in India. Lalit said to meet him at the Leela, and the name rang a bell from the recommendation another engineer had given me; he said that I had to eat weekend brunch there at least once. The car arrived for me, and we headed there.
When we arrived at the gate, we turned off the main road as we would have any other random street… except this one had a guy in full uniform making airplane-style directions. We rounded another bend to yet another guy and soon parked at the front. Let me tell you… this place is incredible. I’ve been inside a lot of nice hotels, but this by far beat them all. The opulence is stupefying – and rates go for around $350 US per night (this, in a country where the GDP/capita is only $462)! I’ll post pictures when I’m next there.
After a fantastic lunch (accompanied by around 5 attendants just for our table, I headed with Lalit to the office here and picked up my cell phone and went on a quick tour. We’ve got enough space for probably 100 people, and it’s very nicely finished. See more pics here: http://jdmc.smugmug.com/Travel/61451
After returning home to the guesthouse, I set out for MG road and wandered up and down one of the main shopping areas – again, crazy amounts of people and shops – lots of Western/European brands have started setting up shop (Reebok, La Coste, etc.) Lots of young people just hanging out. More to come on this.
I found Vivek (another Google engineer from Mountain View) downstairs, and he drew me a map of the main roads near us so that I could explore. I also met Akash (a new engineer hired in Bangalore), and he and I were going to walk down Mahatma Gandhi (MG) road to look at the shops, but I instead got a call from Lalit inviting me to lunch with a potential candidate we’re looking at to help with business development deals here in India. Lalit said to meet him at the Leela, and the name rang a bell from the recommendation another engineer had given me; he said that I had to eat weekend brunch there at least once. The car arrived for me, and we headed there.
When we arrived at the gate, we turned off the main road as we would have any other random street… except this one had a guy in full uniform making airplane-style directions. We rounded another bend to yet another guy and soon parked at the front. Let me tell you… this place is incredible. I’ve been inside a lot of nice hotels, but this by far beat them all. The opulence is stupefying – and rates go for around $350 US per night (this, in a country where the GDP/capita is only $462)! I’ll post pictures when I’m next there.
After a fantastic lunch (accompanied by around 5 attendants just for our table, I headed with Lalit to the office here and picked up my cell phone and went on a quick tour. We’ve got enough space for probably 100 people, and it’s very nicely finished. See more pics here: http://jdmc.smugmug.com/Travel/61451
After returning home to the guesthouse, I set out for MG road and wandered up and down one of the main shopping areas – again, crazy amounts of people and shops – lots of Western/European brands have started setting up shop (Reebok, La Coste, etc.) Lots of young people just hanging out. More to come on this.
posted by jdmc at 2:37 AM
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