Yeah right...I only mean with the city wide black out. April 19, Sunday evening will go down in history as the hottest April 19th ever... 41 degrees, was 5 above normal- reported one daily, 13 above- reported another. And just when Kolkatans were snuggling into their comfy air conditioned 24 degree living rooms to watch a bit of IPL on TV, BOOM... yeah, literally, BOOM went the lights, fans, AC-s, TV-s all over the city... and well, the street lights and traffic signals and hospitals and metro railway and airports... you name it.
Pic from The Telegraph of Park Street during the black out.
Of course, Kolkata Knight Riders lost their inaugaral match. But thank god no one was watching TV to see our Hero (seen here in action yesterday) make 1 run. Take his captaincy away, and the Expert Boria Mazumder, (who was my senior in Presidency btw, who knew one day I would be quoting him), knows something about the stinking (pun not intended) atmosphere of the
dressing room in lovely South Africa.Anyway, unable to stay in the house we decided to take to the streets in my comfy ac car, it has a music system also, godbless. Seems like every one had the same bright idea. We were bored sick of South City Mall, that being 5 minutes drive from home, so we decided to make a picnic of it and drove all the way to Mani Square. And God, was that a bad idea. Their parking is not well equipped to hadle a sudden surge of cars, it was mayhem right at the entrance. Inside, the mall kept plunging into darkness every fifteen minutes, which lasted 5 seconds in the shopping area but in the over crowded food court, we were at one time sitting in near pitch darkness for 15 minutes or more.
The food court itself was in the throes of the worst kind of chaos. No one knew the meaning of a queue. Once you manage your coupon, its a mad rush of loudest-shout-first-serve. Or longest-arm-first-serve. Im just five feet two, my arms arent that long, but hell, my voice is pretty darn loud, is what I found out yesterday!!!
One word of caution for people carrying babies or toddlers. Unlike South City, this mall is not todddler friendly. The drops are not totally covered. There is half a foot gap between floor edge an the glass railing, any tiny foot could get stuck there. If you are parking on the upper floors and you want to take a pram through the fourth floor entrance, then its a hassle with a largish step over which you have to carry your baby's pram by hand.
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