Preceding the floods that drowned Mumbai, the favorite topic of discussion for me is the inane urban planning of this city. The politicians and the people have robbed this wonderful city of dreams of its beauty. Since I have been to Hong Kong (and Avinash happens to stay there) I can vouch for the fact that I haven’t seen a city as beautiful. The most towering influence as soon as you land in Hong Kong (HK) is the Chap Lap Kok International Airport and the superb Airport Express trains. It’s like getting off one plane and moving into another. Then comes the 3 private companies who run the excellent bus services and the 2 rail transport companies (KCR and MTR) running the overground as well as the underground rail services. The waterfront is also used for transportation from one island to the main land and so on. Every person carries a smart card which acts like a ticket on any transportation that you take. Simply said, Mumbai needs such services desperately and I am afraid that it’s already too late to even start thinking about it. We have the money and the expertise and the men who can do this job efficiently. All we need are some politicians with foresight and willpower.
Next comes the sports and India again lost miserably to Sri Lanka in the finals. At 205/3 it should have won the match but the boys put their heads down when it really matterd the most. It would be harsh to judge Greg Chappell on one match but this author already abused him a number of times :-)
A report by World Bank called ‘Doing Business in 2005’ which says that it takes 89 days in India to start a business while it takes just 41 days to start one in China. Everyone would be surprised to know that in Pakistan, it takes as little as 24 days to do the same and 5 days in the US. Without saying much, the bureacracy is solely responsible for this disaster. But for closing a business, it takes just 10 days in India while China does it in 2.4 days.
Starting tomorrow I go on a 4 day longgg leave from office. The eMarketing team has performed excellently well to deserve this extra day. So I have borrowed the latest Unreal Tournment 2003 and Soldier of Fortune – Double Helix games from a colleague to play all day long :-D
Last but not the least, I leave you with a wonderful quote by John Buchanan, the Ozzie Cricket Coach who has written in his article “You must lose to be able to win.” India has hope :-)
