Since it has been for over a year of living in Chennai, I want to share my top choices of quality food in Chennai.

1. Saravana Bhavan: Still the best in South Indian food. The quality is awesome, the restaurants are clean and rates are very reasonable. Ideal place to take out of town folks who want to try out South Indian fare.
2. Mmmafia: One of the newer places in Chennai where the food is authentic and tastes italian without tasting like Italian food made with Indian spices. Arguably the best Italian food in Chennai.
3. Main land China: Best choice for Indian Chinese food in Chennai. Their chocolate is worth dying for.
4. Ente Keralam: A gem of a hotel tucked away in a residential area in Poes Garden. Authentic Kerala food.
5. Muragan’s idli shop: Quick service once you find a table to sit on, good food and low prices. Take a walk on Besant Nagar beach and head over here for some good quality food!
6. Dhaba Express: An indoor outdoor restaurant. Good quality, clean and lots of food.
7. Dakshin: The only one on my list that is expensive, but made it because of the ambience and good food. Try some Indian wine along with tasty south Indian food and live music.
8. The Great Kabab Factory: A one of a kind experience where you can watch food cooked in front of you. Go when you are hungry as the number of items on the thali is extensive and unlimited. Dont try seconds till you have tried all the food once.
9. Copper Chimney: Authentic North Indian food. Very good service. Location is not convenient as it is close to a flyover, but valet parking is available.
10. Banjarong:  One of the good Thai food joints in Chennai.

Other places I have tried and high on the list are Kefi @ Taj Mount Road, Creme Center @ Chamiers Road, Asiana Hotel @ OMR and Azulia @ GRT Grand.

In the last few month, we had bombings in Bangalore, Gujarat, Delhi, Assam to name a few. Each time the politicians mouth the same crap and everthing is forgotten in a few days except by the families of the people who are directly affected. When is this carnage going to stop? When with the government truly take steps to protect its citizens? I have listened to enough people dancing around the subject of terrorism in India to be sick in my stomach.

• We need a national policy to go after the terrorists by sharing information across various organizations that are involved in fighting terrorism.
• We need to take on the terrorists and follow them into their rat holes and destroy them. If US can attack Afghanistan after the world trade center bombin, then certainly India can target terrorists in their own countries.
• Stop illegal flow of money into the country and cut off funding for terrorist.
• We need to go after terrorists no matter what religion or creed they belong to.
• The policy of fighting terrorism worked in Punjab – take lessons from there and apply it elsewhere.
• Let us kick out the politicians who do not have a plan to stop these attacks.

This is an attack on India, freedom, democracy and values that we all cherish.

I was in the US when 9/11 happened. There were changes that many people did not like, but there has been no more terror attacks in the US. Let this attack on Mumbai be a wake up call and the last time any event like this happens in India.

There is flooding across many parts of the city. Most schools have been closed since Wednesday. Many companies were closed on Friday.

I took a drive around Kotturpuram, Adayar and Taramani on Friday morning and took some pictures. Even a small rain in Chennai causes flooding and this one has been a disaster.

Flooding in Chennai

Flooding in Chennai

Flooding in Chennai

To give some context, my route to work is to drive across Kotturpuram bridge and then take OMR to Sholinganallur. Over the last few months, medians were added both to the Kotturpuram road and OMR using totally different approaches. Keep in mind both these roads have significant traffic during rush hours.

Kotturpuram road: The effort started by dropping off 6 ft x 3 ft x 6in blocks on the road side. After these were around for several weeks, the middle of the road was dug up and these blocks dropped in. This process took a couple of months on a stretch of road that was no more than a couple of kilometers. Then these blocks were painted (another few weeks). Holes were drilled on top, and metal rods inserted, welded and painted to form small cages for the plants. This took another two months during which we had laborours sitting on the road and cleaning, welding and painting at peak rush hours.

OMR was a different matter altogether. Concrete was mixed on the road side, poured into moulds to create a concrete median. Then it went through a phase where sharp iron rods were protruding from the block which made it downright dangerous for motorcylcle riders. Then the blocks were cleaned and hand painted. The process for doing this took a few months, though once they perfected the art of creating blocks in the middle of traffic, the process went by pretty quickly.

Does anyone consider the delay these on the road constructions cost? Does anyone care or account for that in the estimates. Does anyone care of the danger the construction crew faces as the work on the road, paint etc in the middle of traffic.

Hello, has anyone heard of pre-fab concrete blocks that can be just carted over at night and dropped in??

We saw more tombs, palaces and forts than on any other trip. My pet peeve after seeing all these is the lack of information at all these monuments. There are so many tombs, carvings, pictures and drawings and so much history behind all these places. Why cant the ASI keep these places clean, remove the graffiti and have detailed information? Maybe they do not want to put these tour guides out of business? I would have gladly paid more money just to keep these guides away.

The day we landed in Delhi where we saw Kutabh Minar, Lotus Temple, Homayun Tomb, Rashtrapathi Bhavan, Parliment House and India Gate. We got a guide in Kutabh Minar insisted that the monument was built by a Hindu king and represents a clock. We were left wondering if he has a different story for each visitor.

The second day started with a visit to Indira Gandhi Memorial. As I went through the house, i was caught in two minds on what the family has given for India and how they treat India as their personal property and rule it by heredity. The recent controversy about Margaret Alva and her getting kicked out of the Congress was very timely.

The second stop was at Akshardham Temple on the banks of Yamuna river. This temple, probably the largest temple in the world, is worth the visit and doing justice to it will take a full day at the minimum. The temple also shows that India can be clean, organized and crowd can be controlled!

From Akshardham we went to Raj Ghat followed by Birla Mandir. We drove over to the Bengali Market area, ate some good chaat. We made the mistake of entering Raj Ghat through the VIP entrance where there is no shoe stand. Result: my sandals were stolen while I was inside for about all of 5 minutes. A very helpful and I guess useless security offered my his sandals. They ended up being my sightseeing sandals for the rest of the trip and I left them behind at Delhi at the end of the trip.

From Delhi we went to Vrindavan, Mathura and Gokul for a day and saw the Krishna Janmabhoomi, ISKCON temple, Madhuvan and several other temples there. The highlights (or the lowlights) are narrow dirty streets, unruly monkeys, beggers, and aggressive guides. If this is the holi land, why can’t it be kept cleaner and friendlier to the masses of devotess who visit every day?

We then went to Agra for a day to see Taj Mahal, Agra Fort, Sikandara. The movie Jodha Akbar must have done more to increase awareness of Akbar and the Mughals than everything else. I had one teenage daughter who kept the tour guide on his toes with questions. Sikhandra was again an example of a beautiful structure but poor documentation.

We stayed at the Clark Shiraz at Agra. This is one of the older hotels in Agra and shows it age. The visit to Tah Mahal has been described by many people who do a much better job than I can. All I can say is that this is one of those monuments where you will not be disappointed whatever your expectations are. We did a tour of a marble factory and bought a marble Taj and plate. Rule of thumb – try for a 50% discount at a minimum. A must do at Agra – stop by at a Panchhmi sweet shop and buy Petha.

The water and food at Delhi, Vridavan and Agra took a toll on us and we had 2 sick kids. Clarks has a visiting doctor who has great bed side manners and handful of medicines to give out. After a good nights rest, we started for Jaipur and saw Fatehpur Sikhri on the way. A good idea of building a new city and starting a new religion – too bad there were not too many rulers like him with an open mind. There was supposedly an underground path from Fatehpur to Agra – is that just a legend?

Rajasthan has more forts and palaces than probably any place in India, so we stayed with the highlights – City Palace, Hawa Mahal, Amer Fort. We also got time to do a lot of shopping at Jaipur.

We came back to Delhi and spent a day there and saw Red Fort and the Railway Museum. I always had a fascination for train and train journeys in India. These usually result in long and interesting conversation with total strangers. The engineer in me was also looking forward to all the trains, but this trip was a major disappointment. There is so much history in this museum, but so little maintenance. All the historic engines were out in the open and gathering dust. There is absolutely no information and history about anything inside.

After 7 days, it was time to head back to Chennai. Many a time you feel that a popular tourist destination is overrated, but this is one of the trips where every highlight was indeed a highlight.

There were 4 of us in the group – my mother, Sarada (my sister) and Murthy (brother-in-law). Some simple rules for Nepal – all prices are negotiable, make sure you carry a lot of small currency to tip people and be aware that most jewelry are fake.

We reached Kathmandu on September 15th and stayed at the Yak & Yeti hotel. This is a really nice hotel with a casino and disco for entertainment. There are also walking trail, tennis courts and swimming pools for the fitness conscious people. This is also very close to the Durbar Marg, one of the better shopping areas in Kathmandu.

That evening we visited Pasupathinath temple, the holiest of temples in Nepal. The number of people who approach you to do a puja or sell you something is just amazing. We arranged the trip through Samrat Travels and got a guide who was showing us around. Later on we found that the guide worked in one of the shops and the idea was to get us into the shop.

We visited the Boudha Stupa in Kathamadu. Highlights are the prayer flags, people who are prostrating repeatedly all around the temple. Another temple of interest in the Budda Neelakantan where the main idol is Vishnu lying down in the middle of the pond.

Security when flying in Nepal is practically non-existant. We were issued a boarding pass which did not have our names or flight details, no one checked our ID at any of the airports. The only check is from the final security officer who asked us very politely if we carried knifes or any dangerous things. Somehow I do not think he gets a lot of positive responses.

Plane to Pokhara

The next day (16th) it was off to Pokhara on a small plane that seats around 25 people. Flying in Nepal is an early morning affair as the weather conditions make it fairly difficult to travel later in the day. Make sure your travel agent books the first flight in the morning.

View of Annapurana ranges

At Pokhara, we stayed in a hotel on an island – Fish Tail. The view of the Annapurna ranges is absolutely stunning from the hotel. The only way to get to the hotel is on a boat. If the group is larger than 4, you travel on a floating pier which is pulled by the boatman. Very cute.

Pokhara is one of the larger cities in Nepal and tourism seems to be the main industry. There are several interesting places to visit – Seti Gorge, Devis Falls, Bindya Vasini Temple and the Gupteshwar Guha. You can travel along the Guha and get below the Devis Falls, but the cave was closed because of water after the rains. If you think the Devis Falls is named after some god, think again. It is named after some couple who decided to take a dip on the swift falls with bad consequences.

We left for Jomsom on 17th on the second flight from Pokhara. This flight is not for the faint of heart as the plane never seems to climb above the mountain ranges and hits a lot of air pockets. I thought I could reach out and touch the mountain in many places as the pilot seemed to take pleasure in giving a joy ride to the passengers.

Nepalese children on way to school

Fields near Kaghbani

Amma, the easy rider

Mukthinath temple

Jomsom is a little village with one street that is not paved. The airport is towards the end of the road and the other end leads towards Mukthinath. We thought we had our own jeep to take us to the temple, but we soon found out that the jeep will leave only when there are 14 passengers – 8 in the back, 4 in the middle seat and 2 in the bucket seat in the front. A long argument with the jeep owner did not get us any where. But luckily a couple of Polish students decided that they will take the jeep instead of walking. We were packed into the back seat but with the roads (or should I say rocks) being so bumpy, not having space to be thrown around can be a blessing is disguise.

A quick dip at the pond at Mukthinath

Easy way to get to Mukthinath

The easy way to get to Mukthinath is by a helicopter from Pokhara as you can avoid the vagaries of the the weather. Once you at Mukthinath, you can go on a motorbike to the entrance of the temple and avoid a walk.

Fruits and vegetables sold on roads

It seems to rain every night in Jomsom, but skies are clear and beautiful. The term patience takes a whole new meaning in Jomson as no one is in a hurry. We were taking the second flight out of town at 7:15am and trying to hurry up. Our hosts at the Majesty Hotel were calm and in no hurry to get us breakfast. Jomsom wakes up when the first flight gets into town.

Palace on the lake in Pokhara

We spent the 18th night back in the Fish Tail hotel. We rented a boat and went around the lake. There is a temple in the middle of the lake. You also get to see the kings palace which is now locked away with no one staying there.

We drove from Pokhara to Kathmandu on the 19th and stopped at Manakamana temple. It used to take 4 hours to hike to the temple a few years ago, but now you can reach there in about 15 minutes in a gondola. We found a small area with a lot of red paint like substance on the ground. Initially it looked like kumkum, but very soon we realized that the color was a lot more macabre – animal sacrifice is still very common in Nepal. Watch the video only if you are not faint of heart.

We got back to Kathmandu, did some more shopping, stayed the 19th and 20th nights at the Yak and Yeti hotel. There were some minor rioting in Kathmandu and police everywhere. We ran into streets that were blocked with burning tires and crowds marching and shutting down shops. Luckily we made it past all this made it to the airport.

Riot police on the KTM roads

At the airport, we realized that we have to pay Rs 780 as airport usage fee per passenger. This is not something your travel agent or airlines tells you when you buy the ticket. Also, Indian currency over Rs 100 is illegal. We were searched by the security officer and when he discovered a wad of Rs 500 in Murthy’s pocket, he thought he hit a jackpot. He asked Murthy to go into a side room with him but since I had cleared my security check, Murthy handed over the money to me without the guard seeing it. After the second search when did not find the money, the guard was very upset and wanted to take some of the pounds Murthy had. After some arguments, Murthy was allowed to proceed. Our troubles were far from over. I bought a gold plated Buddha statue for about Rs 10000 and made the mistake of keeping that in my hand baggage. This was spotted in the next security check and the officer refused to let me take the statue out of the country without a archiological certificate. After discussions where I came from, my passport details, job details he was about to come to the money part. Luckily one of the senior officers came along and waved me forward. At least there were some honest folks out there. Sarada had a similar issue but we finally managed to get out of Nepal.

So what did I think of Nepal? Most of Kathmandu was very disappointing as I had a picture of a quaint country. The Himalayas was stunning and the people are very friendly and polite. There seems to be a genuine liking for Indians. It is cheaper than India and the service is great. If I make it to Nepal, I will skip Kathmandu and head off to the mountains.

Now the topic is really misleading – it is neither a marathon (21 kms or 7km) nor did I really run as it was impossible to do more than just walk because of the crowd. I heard about 70,000 people registered but there could have been easily over 100,000 folks out there participating, volunteering, cheering or just hanging out to have fun.

About 300 people from my company signed up for the 7km run that was supposed to start at 7:30am. I got there around 7pm and the place is organized chaos and I am being kind with my words. I managed to find about 30 of my co-workers and got our company signs and participated with a lot of fun.

There were not enough directions to direct people to parking, start of race or information. The police was visbile in large numbers and very polite, but totally ignorant. There were no volunteers to be seen or any help booth.

We were supposed to run the 7km race but ended up going part the finish sign and continuing on the 21 km race as there was nothing to indicate what needs to be done. Eventually just stopped walking and took the bus back home when my group was tired out

It is easy to criticise, so I want to offer my suggestions on what needs to be done for next year.

• Put information about how to take public transportation to get to the start of race.
• Have large signs indicating where to park, where the race starts
• Make sure all the volunteers are easily identifiable.
• Have information booths at various locations.
• Signs to indicate where the race starts and ends.

But the event was a lot of fun. There was loud music, film stars and politicians on the stage, lots of encouragement by the bystanders.

I would love to hear from someone else who participated in the event.

BTW, We will be back next year.

Why do they have TV’s inside a restaurant? On any given day I ate there, most folks are just glued to the TV with minimal conversation at the table. Especially when the IPL cricket tournament was going on, they should have just shut down the restaurant and made it into a take out joint.

See other reviews about Mainland China at Netsamooha http://www.netsamooha.com/city_chennai~id_1599~title_Main+Land+China~6~0.htm

Timings in the evening are very simple – there are two slots for which they take reservations (7:30pm and 9:30pm). You can choose between vegetarian and non-veg. The waiter gives an entertaining commentary of what he is serving and which sauce to use. Items are served one at a time.

You can have unlimited servings of each item or choose to go back to any that was served earlier. Make sure you save some space for the desserts. Frozen kulfi is served in earthern pot.

You can see additional review about this restaurant at Netsamooha web site http://www.netsamooha.com/city_chennai~id_13068~title_GREAT+KABAB+FACTORY-2C+THE~6~0.htm