The Bengaluru express

February 28th 2011, Teh Babz enters Bengaluru for the first time as an employee at Honeywell.
He said his goodbyes in Chennai to his mother and sister and embarked on a mission for 4 long months, of which he is still being troubled by today.

The hardest part about living in such a place is accommodation, and i found out in a rather ugly but very apt way that life is not always a breeze.
Teh babz got the number of a broker from his good ol mate Richa, and went to see a few PG’s ( paying guest houses ) where you could pay and stay on monthly rents. I had already been warned about the state of these places and had no real idea till I saw them first hand. Dark and dingy rooms, poorly lit, red walls and a heaviness of the air that could only be compared to the inside of a coffin buried 6 feet under. After politely saying that i would call back later, i went on to the next PG and the next and the next but to no avail. Finally i decided to call the broker, his name was Shiva and sounded very decent on the phone and thus i decided to check the place out.
We met outside a shop the following day and he took me to the PG, the road turns left and right and left again, finally at a dead end the huge apartment like building lay.

The building in itself was very nice and the rooms were spacious and well lit, i was told that my room would take a few days to get ready and was requested to share a room for 2 days. I agreed instantly out of fear of losing the apartment to somebody else. I managed to make it through those days well and good and got my own room, and thats when the troubles began.

This room was on the ground floor and from outside looked funny, i went inside and it was like the room i had seen earlier and i was happy enough. I settled down and thought that this was the ideal place. Later that day i had met a few friends for dinner and returned home at around 11pm. I locked the door and slipped into a deep slumber. At around 1 am, i woke up because i needed to use the washroom and started trudging towards when i noticed a fan was running in the hall, perplexed to say the least i went to switch it off and to my surprise i found 4 people sleeping on the floor ! I had locked the door shut and here at 1am i have 4 people randomly sleeping in my house, what if they had broken in ? What if i made a sound ? Would they harm me, i saw no option but to run into my room and lock the door. Immediately i did that, the power went out and it became unbearably hot, so i decided to open my window because so help me god i wasn’t opening the door. As i opened the window and let a fresh breeze in, i peered across to the other side where there were 2 people, 2 people staring straight at my room with as little as a smile, i freaked out ! What was this place, i did the only honorable and brave thing i could think of, i sat knees in arms on the floor praying that the electricity and daylight would come soon ! Eventually the power did come back, but i did not sleep, not till i saw daylight and gathered the courage to open that door. And yes, through all of this, i forgot to use the toilet.

I think that was the ultimate deciding factor in me leaving the room in the morning,  I slowly opened the door and to my shock, there was nobody, there was no sign that anybody had even been there. This i must admit totally messed with my head and i knew i had to get out of there. I went to the caretaker and asked him about it,  by the way people.. communication barriers are a bitch, this guy could only speak the local language and it was like talking to a goat.. his mouth was moving but all i heard was disjointed grumbles. Finally the building owner arrived and i asked him, and his response was to die for ! He said rather with an air of nonchalance ” Oh, yes.. i let them in, they are construction workers from nearby and wanted a place to sleep for the night, and by the way.. you should consider latching your door as well instead of just locking”, after i gave him my wtf face i got round to asking why the hell they were there, and again in his oh so annoying tone; ” oh, i thought you would be okay with it, they are very nice people.. don’t worry.. “. Son of a biscuit I had heard all i needed to hear, without further time wastage i packed my bags and …. well i stayed there 1 more night because i had no where to go, but still.. i think i made my point.

I finally made it out alive and got my deposit back after some rather pointless arguing and talking to the caretaker again, we kinda shared a bond at the end of it, but thats history. As for me, I left and now starting a new phase in Bengaluru, whats gonna happen in the next few months,  guess we’ll just have to find out laters

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