Morning Walk Vignettes

The shifting of airport to Devanahalli has freed the approach roads to the HAL Airport from eternal traffic snarls and honkings, and it now resembles one of those sleepy boulevards that Bangalore was once famous for. However, it somehow has not caught the fancy of morning walkers in the area. Probably the stigma of those horrific traffic jams still remains.

I once chanced to come upon this stretch and decided to abandon other trails. The road at the Institute of Aerospace Medicine end and the other one which has the Blue Dart office present a chalk and cheese contrast. The former is well maintained while the latter is unkempt with garbage strewn on the footpath and taxis and lorries parked on both ends. There are even some makeshift eateries and their wafting sambhar smell often aggravates my hunger pangs.

As for the walkers, barring few guys most seem to be the strolling types and are more engrossed with their cell phone, iPods or in conversation with the walking partner.

In most instances it is the husband and wife team and I guess burning calories is the last thing in their minds when they put on the walking shoes. Probably they were following some doctor’s advice with much reluctance. There is one bespectacled guy, mostly in blue t-shirt, who comes solo and seems to be doing what may best be described as a Tai Chi version of jogging.  

There is another guy – a six foot plus, who probably is in the police force or the army. He does some real brisk walking and I must confess I am no match to his pace. A couple of times I did try to catch up with him but his lanky strides were too much for me.

There is one middle aged couple who are quite regular; the man is tall and gaunt with pepper and salt hair, with more of latter. They are serious walkers and do it quite briskly. They seem to be a friendly lot and often nod at me and I nod back out of politeness, all the while wondering who the Dickens they are.

I do come across some women walking their dogs. A middle aged woman with a Dachshund seems to be a regular and sometimes I do see a young woman with a Golden Retriever. The women with Dash often tosses biscuits to stray dogs and even pats them. Probably this is her way of buying peace to prevent her diminutive Dash from becoming their mince meat.

The road is lined with trees and some of them do provide a visual treat when they flower.  The road and the footpath often gets ‘carpeted’ by leaves and flowers, but they don’t remain so for long as the civic workers diligently sweep them away.

Among civic workers I often come across a husband and wife team with their toddler son in tow. Often they take turns to keep an eye on him as they move on with the job of clearing leaves and other wastes.

The trees are abuzz with various birds, mainly crows, and squirrels. One day I happened to come across a squirrel tail on the road, wondering how it got cut asunder. For this gentle looking animal it must have been really painful.

At the erstwhile car park of the airport compound what struck my attention was a Contessa car. I have been seeing it parked ever for too long. Most probably the owner just abandoned the vehicle for a sleeker and less fuel guzzling sedan. He may not have found a buyer or even the scrap guys refused to take it. This rusting jalopy stands in contrast to more contemporary cars parked there.

This luxury offering from the Hindustan Motors’ stable was quite a rage in the late 80s and early 90s, when it had a competition-free ride. Now sighting a Contessa on the road is as rare as sighting a sparrow in our cities.

However, quite recently, to my surprise, I saw the car had disappeared from the parking lot. Often wonder what happened - probably it caught the fancy of some scrap dealer or maybe, at the risk of sounding too optimistic, the owner thought it is worth a makeover.

Apart from the rains, the only spoiler to my morning walks is the 'VIP movement'. Though the aam janta has to trudge all the way to Devanahalli to catch a flight, the netas still use this airport to fly to Delhi. On these days the road at the Institute of Aerospace Medicine end gets cordoned off and police men land up in droves. These stoppages become all the more frequent when there is some political uncertainty in the state and these VIP trips to and from Delhi become all the more frequent.

Also Read: Random Jottings