Hot Madras Cafe

Today is last day of the year...2014. It is time to take review of passing year and plan for new one. When I was child, for me new year was just a party, when all members of our joint family use to sit and eat together and enjoy programs on TV. Those were very much enjoyable, memorable days. But now, whole family is dispersed at various places around the globe. In recent years, like many others, I have started to take review and make new resolutions on 31st December.  Some years are remarkable in our life which we don't forget. Some years are general when we just live routine life. For me this year was special, different.  In 2014, I joined the new job, new role, at new location. I dared to break my comfort zone, disturb my settled life, and take new challenge. It was not easy decision for me. But I am very thankful to my wife for her constant support. I visited many new places this year. I learned from and made friendship with, many new people.  I crossed India...

Actually I returned from Paris ten days ago. I wanted to write this post just after returning but couldn't find time. Life is too busy now a days. In last two months I visited many places in Paris, seen many new things, meet new people from France and outside France. I got chance to see a different culture, different place on this earth, a different lifestyle, different and very fascinating nature and weather. I am very glad that I got this opportunity. I observed people in Paris, their behavior in society, their respect and faith in law and system. I saw their patience while working, while in traffic or while in public transport. This is something I think all Indians need to learn urgently. Whenever I was outside in Paris, in my mind, at background, a continuous comparison was running between Indian way of doing things and French way. I was thinking how to bring or do the same things in India, but after two months and coming back, I feel that we have to solve our problems on...

Now, its been one and half month that I am away from my family. This is fourth month in all, that I am away from my family in this year. One year before, if someone would have said this to me, I probably would not have believed. But we can never know what life has put in our plate for us in future. In the same way if someone would have told me that I will be cooking everyday for muself, and that too good (at-least I think )...I wouldn't have believed. But its true. I am cooking for myself everyday. Am I cooking good or not so good.. well I don't know. But, I have survived my food for last one and half month, so it should be good if not best. So, do I like to cooking ? Yes certainly. Why? Because, it is a place where I can do experiment. Its a place where I can show my creativity. Now a days I am cooking for myself in the morning and in the  night. I am sure there are many men who are cooking everyday.  Everyday, I plan new dish or same dish with new and...

Disneyland Paris...its a dream land. I visited it recently. I am writing it here to provide some guidelines about the visit. First of all, it is to be noted that, tickets needs to be purchased well in time. In Europe, for any ticket, like bus, flight, train or any other, it is better to be sooner. It will always be cheap. One good news is that tickets are available with validity of even one year. Hence it will be possible to attend anytime in one year according to our convenience Except for some days. On its official website you can also check for offers if any. If going in group there could be better offers. Remember that, there are two parts of Disneyland.  1. Disneyland Park and 2. Walt Disney Studios. Separate tickets are needed for each. It is better to get both the tickets at the same time. Its cheaper. Also, tickets are present to cover both the parks in one day or in two days. If you are going on weekend better to cover it in two different days. I feel it i...

Paris is famous for its museum, for Eiffel tower, as a city of romance but also it is famous for its best ever public transport service. City is divided in various zones. There are four ways of transportation, bus, metro, tram and RER (it is a railway). But the best part is they are well connected with each other. For regular travelers it is possible to buy just one Navigo card. It is the pass or card, by using which it is possible to travel by any of the above means in any zone of the city. So good thing is, it is literally possible to travel at any part of the city without carrying a single cent for complete one month.  Based on zones and the tracks of metro, tram etc. city maps are available. These maps are elaborate and self-explanatory. Once understood how to read, then it is possible to roam at any part of city without opening mouth. Tram or metro are running at every 3 to 5 minutes. So waiting is minimal. Inside the metro, or tram or RER, all stations on that root ...

Today it is Sunday, October 26, 2014 while I am writing this post. Today, at 3.00 O’ clock in the morning all clocks are shifted 1 hour behind here in France . So, at 3 all digital clocks, all computer clocks, all mobile clocks automatically starts displaying 2.00 AM.   All mechanical clocks need to be taken back 1 hour manually. It is special day here in Paris or maybe at many parts of Europe. May be it is common for Europeans, but for Indian like me it is new funny event.  When I woke up today morning my digital clock and Mechanical clock shows one hour difference. :)   In India there is only one time zone. And time is same all the year. But, in Paris, it changes twice year. In March on last Sunday, they will restore all the clocks by 1 hour. It is done here for daylight saving. I think it is good idea and necessary step, because during this time of year, there is dark outside until 8.00AM.   But, all daily routine work starts early morning...

This was my second weekend in Paris. Now, I am settled in Paris, I know the routes, I know how to search routes for any location. I am ok with food and weather. Language is not problem. People try their best to speak in English. At the same time I am trying my best to know more and more French words. My senior here company suggested some locations to see for week end. I decided to follow him. He suggested many places near Eiffel Tower. On Saturday, I started my tour with visit to a very famous place i.e Assembly Nationale. The moment I saw this building and some statues in front of build all I could say "Wow". Frankly speaking I need all kind of good adjectives to describe Paris. Its so beautiful everywhere. Does anybody know meaning of word Paris, is it Beautiful? Assembly Nationale is Gorgeous building. It is in front of Siene river. From, the bank of Siene, if looked around, in any direction, its simply beautiful view. Siene was flowing silently, and l...

6-October -2014 to 10-October-2014 I have arrived in Paris for some office work. My office timings in Paris are exactly same as that of my time in Chennai. It almost takes 45 minutes to 60 minutes to reach office. It depends what travel mode I choose. There are two roues to reach office. In first root I have to take a tram and Bus thereafter. This bus directly goes to office. This is the best route in the morning. There is another route, in which I need to take, Tram - RER -Bus. It takes some more time to reach office. In last week, five days I have explored all the routes and now I am aware of plus and minus of each root. While returning I observe the homes in country side of Paris. Homes are very very beautiful. They are very neat and made in typical European style. Each window has flowers and it looks beautiful. They are very well maintained. Watching these homes while going to office and returning from office is my favorite part. As far as food is concerned, in ...

No I am not closing this blog..I am moving to Paris for my office work. I created this blog to write my experience about life in Chennai. Now, I think I will continue to write in this same blog (it may be misnomer to blog name..) about my life in Paris too. Its a matter of short time. After all its about sharing experiences of life. We all keep traveling all the time. Actually speaking life itself is journey. But, I don't want to make this a travel blog so I will create a travel blog where I will share my traveling experience, isn't it a good idea? So...Chennai, I will return after short break :)

05-Oct-2014 This was Sunday. Day started with the good news. I woke up and called the reception and inquired about the luggage and to my surprise it had arrived on earlier night 2.30AM. I must appreciate airline for their efforts to bring the luggage back. They kept their promise. Good job Emirates. Now after arrival of my luggage I was suddenly ready for all the possible situations that I may face. Earlier evening I purchased 'Navigo' card, so I was all set to roam anywhere in the Paris at anytime without any problem. Paris has got best traveling/commuting network. I will write separately about it. It deserve separate post. So on Sunday morning I went to La Chappel area in Paris. It is the area where many Indians, Sri Lankans live and have the shops. When I went to this area I felt like I am roaming on any Indian road. There are many Indian shops, hotels, cloths and jewellery shops. One of my experienced friend showed a good Indian grocery shop where I was a...

Date 04-October-2014 Today I traveled from India to Paris via Dubai.   It was first time I was traveling to any foreign soil. It was day full of events. First I started my journey from my home in Chennai. I was not feeling well, having some back pain and some cough. I was unsure how I will travel to such a long distance and for next 17 hours without trouble.   But with faith in god I started from home to airport by taxi. Once I was at airport, I was feeling bit better.   May be it was because of the chaos around or crowd.   My flight time was 4’ O clock in the morning.   I started checked in process, security check and immigration process. It took less than one hour. So before 2 ‘O clock I was waiting for flight. Flight arrived little late by 15 minutes. I was not aware that time that these 15 min delay is going to cause headache. I boarded a huge plane. It was Boeing 777. First halt was Dubai. It was 4 hours journey. During this journey I spent time t...

I am living in Chennai for about six months now and I was thinking what are the good thing I like about Chennai. Few things quickly popped in my mind. I am mentioning them here.  I. People are sincere about their work I will call Chennaikars to people of Chennai, who are living in Chennai irrespective of their age, gender, native place, language etc. I feel Chennaikars are much sincere about their work. It doesn’t matter what work they do. May it be engineers, doctors, any other workers. It can be observed easily when we go to any shop, tea stall, hotel etc. Just to give example, I happened to go to two different doctors few months back.  At the first doctor's place we paid consultation fees, after consultation doctor found that there is nothing wrong. So he asked reception to return money. This was new experience to me. At other time, at other doctor’s place, when doctor found patient is not cured by his medicine, he gave free consultation and medicines next t...

As I said in my last blog, Chennai is little different than other cities in India. I have traveled all over India from North to South and East to West, and can say that small tea stalls ( Chai tapari ) are very common at all the places. But Chennai is exception to this. Here, I found equal number of coffee shops. Best part is coffee tastes very good and that too at very affordable rates. Before coming to Chennai coffee was an occasional beverage to me, but now I cannot imagine my day start without cup of that heavenly, tasty and sweet sip of coffee. This is also the reason, I decided to name this blog as hot madras cafe, devoted to my experience in Chennai. Coffee is the part of tradition in south India. In all the four Dravidian states (Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala & Tamil Nadu). In south India coffee dates back to 17 th century when one of the sufi saint brought coffee beans from middle east to Karnataka where he settled. Later it became famous under British rule ...

Whenever we go to new place we see something unseen before. Every city has some popular trends. In Chennai I observed many things which are less common in Pune or Maharashtra. I am not writing to judge which is better way. Two things that are at the top of my mind now are mini markets or bazaars and coffee shops. I will write about coffee at some other time. It deserves a separate post. So…shopping is now inseparable part of our life. This is consumers’ economy thanks to treaty signed by earlier government back in 1991. In last seven years, my shopping experience in Pune may it be day today needs, groceries, clothes, shoes, electronic equipment or any special shopping; it mostly revolved around the Malls or Big markets. When not shopping, it is place for spending time in the evening. In today’s fast life it gave pleasure to spend time among people with friends or even alone. It is the place where you get to know about new brands, new products, and new technologies. On many week...

At this moment while I am writing this post, its power outage in Chennai. I stay at one of the mainline area.  But even then power outage from 45 minutes to 120 minutes is common every day. In Chennai, a day and specially night without power is like spending time in boiler.  And it is condition of one of the metro city of India.  So can you guess about the small town and thousands of villages! It is real horrible situation out there.  In Maharashtra, there are many villages where power cut from 6 AM to 11 PM Haa! This is the time span when anybody would require electricity normally.  In today’s world electricity is synonym for life. But, as usual Indians have this bad habit to adapt to even bad and wrong things. Watch Swades movie. Today, all states are producing at least 1000 MW power less than required. And hence load shedding is the everyday word. There is no power for on an average for Four hours every day all over India. So obvious question is what...