The Trip to Ahmedabad and Kolkata

Hi all, its been a while. Let me post a short and sweet note about my trip to Ahmedabad and Kolkata last week. Thought of writing a travelogue but then decided against it.

I'm back after a fruitful and enjoyable trip to Ahmedabad. This was a company sponsored trip. We attended a training on the Operation & Maintenance of Centac Compressors by Ingersoll Rand. The training was fruitful and so was the visit. Enjoyed Ahmedabad. The place is sure looking good. It has the widest roads among the metros and so no traffic jams unlike the other metros. Heard from a local that the place was nasty pre 2002. So Modi's magic at work, i guess. The Ahmedabad - Gandhinagar Highway is amongst the best in the country. Gandhinagar is such a beautiful city. Places to visit include the Akshardham temple, various malls and Patang Restaurant. Akshardham is easily one of the most beautiful and well maintained temples in the country. Words fail me to describe Patang Restaurant. Google it and you will know why. Too good. Having said thus, there is a lot of scope for improvement too. One blaring negative is that the public transport system is not as good as was said. Another big negative is that you cannot find a single name board either in the buses or in the streets written in English or Hindi. Everything is in Gujarati. People complained about the same in Tamil Nadu, which in my opinion was better as you can find English written in so many places. I wonder what those people would have to say if they visited Ahmedabad. Unless you can read Gujarati, its very difficult to know your way around there alone.

While returning, our transit was through Kolkata. All the good views that i had about Kolkata from my previous visit there vanished in a flash. Kolkata, during the monsoons, is among the places to avoid. So much water logging on almost every road and such poor drainage system. No matter how much ever a vibrant city it can be, if the basic infrastructure is so poor, it can't be helped. Hope it gets better for it was one of those cities i genuinely liked during my first visit.

All said and done, it was a memorable trip :-)