My Love Story With India (Part 4)
THE MILLENIUM CITY
Behold Gurgaon the Millennium
City! And aptly so.
Gurgaon is the definition of all
things technology and sophistication – the Silicon Valley of India; the centre
for international multinational companies like Google, Accenture, Bestech
Cyperpark, high-rise buildings and lots of greenery. Beautiful high-rise apartments
and buildings whether for private, office or public use adorn the city of
Gurgaon.
This is the home to the beautiful
magical world of KOD, Kingdom of Dreams. The first time
I stepped inside KOD, I was mesmerized. I loved the
emotions it evoked, the longing it cried for and I was beside myself with
mirth. The design, the craftsmanship, architecture, and activities in KOD shows a lot of thought
was given to making it just that: A MAGICAL WORLD.
The magic illusion of Kingdom of
dreams where only nighttime is the only reality with an illusionary beautiful
blue sky dotted with permanent glittering stars often leaves you wondering why
it’s not day time yet. Ha!
If you want a feel of India
theatre like Broadway, KOD is where you want to
experience that. I was actually blown away by Tejas, a young man who knew his
art of illusion. Sitting on the platform as he played sweet cunning tricks on
my mind (even though I told myself time and again that I won’t be fooled), I
ended up utterly enjoying myself, and so did the little girl Amita and her
mother along with three other guys who were thoroughly as spell bound as I was.
As you drive further south, the
city’s architecture is a throwback to styles of the 60s and 80s (India brick
designs) interspersed with more modern sophisticated glass and marble
buildings.
Ongoing construction of high rise
buildings are a constant feature – like the city is burning and itching to
re-assert itself and reach the sky in response to the dazzling brilliance of
the sun’s rays towards it– like a grass stretching itself towards the sun.
The air around is a thin fog, just
above the tall buildings: a collection of dust particles constantly whipped
into the atmosphere, car fumes, smoke from burning bushes and activities from
mechanized farming, bush clearing and activities related to construction of
bridges for flyovers are also ongoing.
Both sides of the highway is
littered with small and medium scale businesses providing daily and regular
services in transport accessories for cars, tricycles, supermarket stores,
appliances, petrol station, trucks and heavy duty vehicles with sand and stone pyramids
packed on the shoulders of the roads, waiting for their next instructions or
next port of call.
As we drive on highway 8 towards
the airport, you begin to head south of India towards Jaipur.
All kinds of Vehicular contraptions
can be seen all over India, especially in the industrial zones. Quarries for
breaking stones, gravels etc., into finer bits and granular chunks produce a
lot of dusty air. You find bikers covering their noses.
Scattered private buildings with
beautifully decorated walls roll past as we gain speed on the highway; hills
after hills similar to what you find in Okene and Lokoja in Nigeria on your way
to Abuja dominate the stretch of land. Trees, shrubs, hills, high tension
wires, thatch houses, tall buildings still under construction, dilapidated
structures of all kinds, old and new buildings can be found within the same
radius.
Every Stateline I crossed, I get a
ping on my phone alerting me to read my sms – a network announcing “Welcome to
India” from Airtel India or “Namaste” from AR-AIROAM. For example, when I got
to Rajasthan I got a “Namaste” greeting but when I landed in Delhi I got a
“Welcome to India” from AirtelNG.
For every patch of empty brown grassland
you pass, you pass an equal amount of land bearing the weight of colourful
architectural designs. Trees commonly cover the front of houses as though
shielding it from the direct rays of the sun when it faces that direction as
you drive past. No wonder some of their house retain their colour and beauty.
Further away from the city, sales
of beautiful colourful items, sculptures, carvings, etc., are prominently
displayed on both sides of the highway. As we drive further out of the main of
city Gurgaon, trucks, tankers, trailers become a common fixture building up into
a series of traffic lines. Road diversion signs are commonplace, exacerbating the
traffic flow. The 911 trucks equivalent in Nigeria stretch as far as the eyes
can see: long school buses, small cars, trucks, trailers, high-end vehicles
tail each other bumper-to-bumper. The trucks are painted in bright beautiful
colours, sometimes adorned with rich Hindu words in red, orange, white or pink.
Where words are lacking, bright paintings of well decorated and richly adorned
India women carrying baskets on their heads is also depicted on the body of
these trucks. It leaves you with a heady feeling.
As we inch closer to the mouth of
the diversion, I find that the resulting traffic was due to a tragic road
accident caused by a truck driver who ran over a bike rider, chopping off his
head. A large crowd of people have gathered; their faces betray an array of
emotions: anger, sadness; many including myself bewildered at how this could
have happened. The dead man (who seemed young-looking from the sneakers he
wore, white shirt, colourful wrist bands), was covered with another white short
over his non-existent head. I hope he gets a decent burial and the accident
thoroughly investigated to determine the cause and met out justice as
applicable.
As soon as we were cleared to
move, our driver inched further on and enter the place called Dharuhera, a local
town after Gurgaon, which unexpectedly open its doors into more high-rise
buildings. Our guide tells us that the Japanese and Korean companies have made
this town their manufacturing abode, their companies spotted along the roads.
Gradually we leave the houses and
people behind and drive through a stretch of desert land. Finally we reach
another town, Neemrana, another town on the desert road. This place is a
Japanese zone, we are told. The area feels like Bauchi/Azare of Nigeria: sunny,
hilly environment, sparse greenery, scotched earth, livestock grazing and
sun-dried hays litter the length of it as we travel on Highway 8 which seems to
be a long continuous stretch of well-made road sneaking through all these
country sides. Old, peeled-off painted Industrial buildings litter the stretch
of land and open spaces.
Marble factories can be found. The
business of re-cycling of papers, nylons and plastics seems to be a constant
activity going on here. Another common feature is buildings broken down halfway
(perhaps they will be rebuilt? Or is this the pattern…).
Neemrana is a long stretch of arid
land notable for animal rearing and livestock grazing, industrial plants: home
of Michelin Tyre Manufacturing company.
We pass so many other country
towns similar to Neemrana until finally we reach Rajasthan – The land of HOT
SPICES! Let Part 5 take you there. Click the link below.
Attribution for pix 1 and 2: Tripadvisor.com; Pranavbhasin.com
