From: Donald Duckworth <[email protected]> Subject: Fw: Oh Where Have You Gone My Old Bangalore This poem sums up why I will never return to what was The Garden City of India, also known as Pensioner's Paradise, where my grandfather's lovely home has 3 blocks of flats on the site. Don *OH! WHERE HAVE YOU GONE MY OLD BANGALORE?* *By Aubrey Millet* Oh! where have you gone My old Bangalore ? The old charming Bungalow with red bougainvillea Framed by trees with yellow forsythia The city of lakes with an abundance of shade And tree-fringed boulevards like South Parade. The cheerful smile of the Convent nuns Would light up your day like a thousand suns The blushing purple of Jacaranda Did greet the eye from every verandah Oh! where have you gone My old Bangalore ? Breakfast at Koshy¹s after Sunday morning Mass And off to the jam-session to woo the lass Blazered school boys on their weekly walks And giggling school girls in their frilly frocks Oh! where have you gone My old Bangalore? Gone are the days of Languorous denizens Replaced by hordes of Nerdy netizens Gorgeous gardens with the greenest of grass Buildings ravaged by time and fate Now built-up facades of steel and glass Of the MNC¹s and the Conglomerate Oh! where have you gone my old Bangalore ? Thronging crowds at monstrous malls Clogged gutters and traffic that crawls Undisciplined vehicles driven pell-mell Transforming the city into a living hell Chaos of the Metro and Mono Rails Chopped up trees and current that fails Flooded streets and fallen poles Encroached pavements and huge pot-holes Racuous music from blaring mikes The cacophony of drag-racing bikes Packs of stray dogs barking in the night Foraging in the garbage of urban blight Cement ghettos of high-rise apartments Rampant corruption in government departments Scurrying neighbours, uncourteous and faceless A monument to man¹s thisworldlyness Oh! where have you gone my old Bangalore ? Frazer Town is now Pulikeshinagar And Palace Orchards is Sadashivnagar Ulsoor Lake is now called Hallasuru And even Bangalore is now Bengaluru . __._,_.___ . __,_._,___