Sitting in my office gazing
through the window, overseeing the approaching road to the SDB 3 I always
wonder what the process was for me, to choose Mangalore as location after
training at Hyderabad. Whenever I have tried to find the answer I have failed
to exact one, out of my own self. Seemingly because there was nothing logical
in it but a reality that big cities suck (apologies for not using a more
civilized word) big time.
Having stayed in big cities like
New Delhi and Pune, and having observed others like Bangalore, Chennai and
Mumbai, there was little doubt in my mind that the quality of life in Mangalore
or for that matter, the Tier II cities is much better. This contention is
driven by absolute logic. No conjectures here! I have identified certain
yardsticks to back up my argument.
First yardstick I would like to
introduce is the pace of traffic. Minimum distance covered in one minute at 9
am sharp on MG Road (peak time and supposedly to be the most crowed road). And
the result is 439 m/ min. Just kidding!! But seriously in Mangalore am yet to
see a traffic jam. There are some crowded intersections in the city though but
the traffic movement is absolutely smooth. You compare this with any of our big
cities. If you have to commute from point A to point B you shall have to plan
at a war footing. You may even have to perhaps keep some buffer time and even
then, you may reach the destination late, completely frustrated and drained due
to the heavy traffic and pollution to top it all. Every morning when I drive to
office in my bike (just 5 kms from Nethra), I touch the parking lot in 10 minutes
flat. I always wish if this journey would take a bit longer so that I could
enjoy the cool breeze hitting my face, for a little longer… Perhaps to mitigate
the abrupt ends to my drives I should plan to relocate to some place a little
more further from our campus. But wait a second. What about the petrol cost? So
let me not do this mistake until the fuel prices stabilize a bit more…
My
second yardstick is diurnal temperature (a meteorological
term that relates to the variation in temperature
that occurs from the highs of the day to the cool of nights).
For Mangalore, the average of the mean max. and
min. is 13.2 degree Celsius (33.20C-20.00C). And for New
Delhi this was 31.4 (390C -7.60C). More than double is
the difference in diurnal temperature between these two cities. Sorry for
bothering with the loads of data. But the fact is Mangalore is pleasant and
much more suited for human life. Look at
the advantages of this. You are not required to buy any woolen clothes or either
buy, coolers and air conditioners that inflate electricity bills. You are
insulated against this financial drag all because Mangalore sits at a more life
sustaining latitude and longitude on the globe. What a global privilege!! So
what are the other downstream benefits? You are in the lap of nature. You have
your base in The Western Ghats-one of World’s bio-diverse heritage sites. And
needless to say you have a rich variety of flora and fauna around you. The
breath taking view that one can enjoy if you are of the habit of sitting on the
benches overlooking the sea side (below our FC) is phenomenal. Perhaps many of
you have sea facing cubicles and mind you that’s not a small thing. It is
perhaps the rarest of the rare privileges which Infosys has provided you
unknowingly and even did not care to factor it in your CTC (shush shush…). Jokes
apart, I believe that in totality the wear and tear on life in Mangalore is
definitely the least as compared to our ever burgeoning metros.
I
have other yardsticks too to support my claim. But guess will talk about them some
other time. In the meanwhile enjoy your stay in Mangalore to the hilt!!