Delhi Hotel Experience

I heard of an unpleasant occurrence during my overnight stay in Delhi that I feel I must talk about. There are a number of reasons why I did not want to discuss this issue online and they are:

1) The issue is founded only on the word of two people and I do not have any evidence, beyond circumstantial evidence, to back it up.
2) Equally importantly, I do not want the people who told me of this to suffer any adverse consequences which might affect their livelihoods.

Therefore, all places and persons in this account shall remain unnamed.

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I had about an 11 hour overnight halt in Delhi on my trip to Bangalore and rather than try to spend the night uncomfortably at the Domestic Airport, I decided it would be better if I got a hotel room for the night and tried to get some sleep (even a few hours' worth). I found a cheap hotel in a Tibetan area of town and booked my reservation through an online travel website from the U.S.

I also arranged for a taxi pick-up service from the airport and as promised, the taxi driver was waiting at the airport for me when I landed. On the way to the hotel as I chatted with the taxi driver, he seemed surprised that I was staying at this particular hotel. When I asked why, he said that generally the hotel owners do not give out rooms to Indians! Shocked, I asked why a hotel, in India, would not give rooms to Indians. He said he did not know, but said that if an Indian were to inquire about a room, they would be told that there were no vacancies even if rooms were available! When I asked what business sense it made, the taxi driver replied that even he has not been able to figure it out up until now.

At the hotel, as I checked-in, the lobbyist wrote down my details, as per Government of India regulations. As he looked at my passport, he asked me what my visa number was (to fill in the portion of his hotel-book that asked for the visa number). When I asked why I, an Indian citizen, would need a visa number, he said OK and continued noting down details. It seemed to me as if the man had never seen an Indian passport before. A quick look at the guest-book also revealed only Tibetan and Western names.

I didn't get much sleep that night (it was 31 degrees at 11 p.m. when I landed in Delhi with about 85% humidity making it feel 9 degrees hotter (I am not joking!)) and was at the lobby the following morning at 7 a.m. and asked them to call me a taxi to return to the airport. I had a different taxi driver in the morning than I did the night before. On the way to the airport, as I chatted with him, he too remarked surprise at the fact that I, an Indian, was staying in this particular hotel. He asked me how I managed to get the room and when I told him I reserved it online, he nodded and said that made sense.

Let me state that I remain an ardent supporter of the Tibetan cause, especially following continued Chinese transgressions in Tibet. That doesn't excuse the actions of Tibetans within India however. The fact that a hotel in India would discriminate against Indians is beyond unacceptable; it's criminal. Tibetans are, after all, guests in this country. Tibetan refugees from China have the option of taking Indian citizenship, but the vast majority of them have declined to do so, following the Dalai Lama's advice that taking the citizenship of other countries would dilute their numbers and consequently, their claim for an independent Tibet.

Instead, they have availed themselves of Indian policies which have provided them papers to live and work anywhere in the Indian Union. They are automatically granted refugee status and these papers upon setting foot on Indian soil and there is no annual cap for the number of refugees India will provide shelter for. India is also the home of the Dalai Lama for the past 49 years and his Tibetan Government-in-Exile. More than 100,000 Tibetan refugees make India their home, more than any other nation in the world (twice the number in Nepal and more than 10 times the number in the United States).

In light of this generosity and support that the Indian people and the Indian government (irrespective of which political party is in power) have provided the Tibetan people, what I heard of the happenings in Delhi is disconcerting, to say the least. It's unfortunate that my opinion of the management of this hotel has tarred my views of the overall Tibetan community in India, the vast majority of whom I am sure will not support such discriminatory policies.

Trip to India

Instead of making one giant block of text, I'll separate my travel experience into various categories:

Jet Airways

I flew by Jet Airways, advertised as "India's Finest International Airline", from New York JFK to New Delhi via Brussels. I had heard good stuff from others, but I was nonetheless impressed. I flew on brand new Boeing 777s and the crew was friendly and prompt.

The best feature was having video-on-demand. There was a large selection of movies, which I watched during the Brussels-New Delhi leg as I tried to stay awake (I try to time my sleep on aircraft so as to adjust to the destination time and avoid jet lag). In the course of the 7 hour flight, I watched Rambo IV, The Golden Compass, and a chick flick whose name I do not remember. Rambo IV was awesome (which Rambo or Rocky movie is not?), The Golden Compass was OK (certainly not the Lord of the Rings which they compared to), and the chick flick was, well, a chick flick!

Now that I've sufficiently proven my masculinity, let me move on. Food on the flights was good and it certainly was a matter of pride to see the many non-Indians flying on the JFK-Brussels sector audibly marvel at the quality of the airline. Unlike the perennially awful state-owned Air India, Jet Airways is a sign of India's arrival on the international stage.

New Delhi

It had been a good 15-and-a-half years since I had last stepped foot in the nation's capital. While I had read about the changes that had happened, I am very impressed by the absolutely wonderful state of the infrastructure in the city, infrastructure that makes Bangalore (supposed "Silicon Valley of India") look like a village. Don't believe me, check out the photos.

An intersection near the hotel I stayed in a Tibetan area of Delhi. In Bangalore, this road would be a large arterial road and a point of pride for the city's residents. In Delhi, I noticed quite a few roads of this size.

A water cooler by the roadside. The government in Delhi has placed these kinds of coolers all over the city so that citizens who cannot afford to buy bottled water always have refrigerated water available, a very useful service in a city where summer temperatures can soar to 45 degrees.

We drove through a couple of green spaces, such as this park, en route from the hotel in the northeast of Delhi to the airport in the southwest of Delhi.

One of the more chaotic intersections we encountered proving that Delhi is still, after all, a part of India.

Another road in Delhi, where there was a green median separating us from oncoming traffic.


And as a not-so-concealed easter egg, here's a photo with cows, once again proving that Delhi is a part of India.


If our government tells us that they have to remove all the circles in Bangalore because there is too much traffic for them, how come Delhi still gets to keep its circles?


Ongoing construction on the Delhi Metro's line to the airport.


Entrance ramp to the national highway that heads down past the airport to Gurgaon. I think in Bangalore, our highways themselves are about as large as this.


National Highway 8 within New Delhi. Count the number of lanes on this side of the median.



Perhaps the one area that Bangalore fares better than New Delhi. Our Vayu Vajra and Suvarna buses are far better than the buses that the Delhi Transport Corporation plies to the airport, but then the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation is one of the more modern bus systems in India.


Delhi will also soon be deploying air conditioned buses to complement these non-AC buses to the airport. More importantly, Delhi will have a Metro connection to the airport by 2010.


The beginning of the flyover near the airport.


The exit towards the domestic airport.


Getting ready to take the exit. I wonder how many years we are from such roads in Bangalore. We have flyovers but not of these size.

Construction at Delhi airport; I wonder if that is the new terminal.

Bangalore International Airport ("Seeme-yenne canu airport")

I am sure that after reading my previous blog posts blasting the airport, you're all curious as to what my opinion of the airport is after traveling through it. Well, the airport looks fantastic and feels truly world class. But scratch the surface and deficiencies immediately appear. Let the photos below do the explaining.

The Good: As you can see, the airport looks very nice as seen from the plane.

The Good: The all glass facade facing the planes looks modern and international.

The Good: The glass gates also look very nice.

The Good: The inside of the terminal also looks very modern.


The Good: En route to the baggage claim area. The corridor looks clean and modern.

The Good: The baggage claim area.

The Good: They seem to be slightly confused about the name of the city (as is everyone else). The logo to the left and right of the sign states "Bengaluru International Airport" but it proclaims "Welcome to Bangalore".

The Good: The check-in area of the airport.


The Bad: The outside of the airport looks nice, but all visitors have to wait out here. I wonder why they are not let inside the airport. Maybe it's a Government of India regulation ...


The Bad: That's it. That's not one terminal of the airport. That is the airport. After 15 years, we have eight piffling gates at our service and from the number of stairs that can be seen here, many people will still be forced to climb and descend staircases, even in a brand, spanking new airport!


The Bad: I mentioned eight bridges, right? Here are two narrow-body airports parked next to each other and you can see the wingtips are almost touching. This means that two wide-body aircraft (such as Boeing 777, Boeing 747, Airbus A340, etc) cannot be parked next to each other. In times of heavy international flight presence, this reduces the number of effective gates to five! Seeme-yenne canu airport indeed.

We still are forced to go to the airport at odd hours of the morning to catch flights since there is not enough capacity and Albert Brunner's plans do not include a second runway for another 12 years, despite the aircraft being over-capacity in its first year.

Finally, there is the issue of there not being any coffee vending machines for the staff. Albert Brunner says that they can buy coffee from the stores at Rs. 50 a cup like anybody else. He says that vending machines will reduce the international quality of the airport. I wonder if he's paying the staff international wages. I am sure they would love to be paid at the U.S. minimum wage of $7.50 (Rs. 320) per hour, in which case they will gladly avail themselves of "international standard" coffee at the international-standard shops!

Albert Brunner cannot live under the delusion that the airport should be completely international while providing his workers third world wages. For a person in the U.S. making minimum wage, a $5 cup of coffee is about 40 minutes' work. For a person in India making Rs. 5,000 a month (a relatively large amount), a Rs. 50 coffee is about 2.5 hours of work. Do the math!

Seduction by California

Philadelphia, at 1:45 p.m. EDT, 0n 06/08/2008:


Davis, at 01:45 p.m. PDT, on 06/08/2008:


For the uninitiated, compare the 52% humidity in Philly (which makes it feel 5 degrees hotter than it actually is) with the 14% humidity in Davis (which makes me quite comfortable as I sit in my non-air-conditioned room with the ceiling fan on.

It's funny, back in December when I visited Philly, I missed big city life and I was telling people here in January (a cold, rainy month in northern California) of how the difference in weather is not enough to keep me back from heading back east after I finish my Ph.D.

After spending one spring in California though, my views may have changed. I love the fact of being able to wake up six months out of the year (April through September) and knowing that there is a 99% chance it will be an absolutely out and out gorgeous day and that there will not be a single cloud in the sky. I look up and I see an ocean of light blue in all directions.

I seem to have fallen in love with California! How did that happen?

A Tale of Two Airports

No, I have never read the Charles Dickens classic "A Tale of Two Cities" but that obviously has not prevented me from adopting its title for this blog post. Now that we've gotten that out of the way, we can talk about this article.

The article notes that:

"It has been eight years since the location of the new airport has been known; in all that time the state government of Karnataka state -- of which Bangalore is the capital -- didn't bother to build an expressway.

The net result is this: A software engineer working in Electronic City on Bangalore's outskirts may end up spending three hours on the road to catch a one-hour flight to another destination within India.

That, more than anything else, is why frequent fliers of Bangalore are feeling cheated with an airport they have eagerly awaited for so many years."

Yes, the lack of a proper expressway is a significant grumbling point for many Bangaloreans, but Albert Brunner and his thieving business partners would be sorely mistaken if they think that's the only thing that ails the airport. After promising Bangalore the sky (or at least an airport modeled on that of Zurich, Switzerland), these con-artists have done a number on Bangalore that's truly impressive. To con India, well known for producing illustrious con-artists, so thoroughly is no small feat by any yardstick.

The airport in its first year will be operating at 12.5 million passengers, 1.5 million more than its official capacity of 11 million. In its first year!!! What does Mr. Brunner have to say?

"The existing runway can handle 20 million passengers a year, he says, compared with the 12.5 million expected in the first year of operations."

The existing runway can handle 20 million passengers a year only if one continues the uniquely Indian practice of operating an airport 24 hours a day! The reason we have a new, larger airport is because we didn't want to have to show up at the airport for flights departing at 2:05 a.m. as we did at the old airport because it was too small to handle all the traffic in daylight hours.

Let's look at Mr. Brunner's home airport, the Zurich Airport, which Bangalore's new airport was supposed to be modeled on. In 2007, Zurich Airport handled 20.7 million passengers. By Mr. Brunner's assessment, it should have one runway, right, with expansion work being undertaken on a second runway? Wrong!!! Zurich Airport has three runways, which is the requisite amount for an airport of that size.

What about some other airports? Sacramento International Airport handles about 11 million passengers and has two runways, as Bangalore should have had. In neighboring China, Chongqing International Airport, for example, handled 10.35 million passengers in 2007. Though possessing one runway, after crossing the figure of 10 million passengers, the airport is about commence on a second and third runway to handle the increased air traffic.

In Bangalore, a second runway is not even planned for the immediate future and Albert Brunner seems perfectly happy to allow Bangaloreans to continue going to the airport at odd hours of the night to catch their flights and pay exorbitant "user-development fees" in the process. Hence, the litigation in the courts to keep the old airport open.

Siemens and the other private companies contend that the government agreed to give them a monopoly on an airport in the Bangalore area. Yes, that's true and the government should have given them a monopoly if they had provided a quality product. Instead, they have provided Bangalore a shoddy, third-class product that is under capacity. Clearly, the situation has changed and the courts should decree the original contract null and void and resume operations at the old airport in the public interest, which should be paramount in any democracy. Maybe some good old fashioned, capitalist competition is what is needed to get Brunner and his ilk to get to it and provide the airport that Bangaloreans deserve!

P.S. Did I mention the airport was a shoddy, third-class product? Click to read, this is a different article!