Cashless Carnival

The pictures are posted in the order in which I navigated through the entire show on the 14th of January. I focussed only on cars and stayed away from the ones that are already there in our showrooms.

[Click on the first picture of the series and use the Next and the Previous links to move forward and backward]

Mercedes and Audi Pavillion

I was surprised not to see BMW in the German stall and felt they had not made it to the Auto Expo this year. But a few stalls later, I spotted the angel eyes.

FIAT and TATA Pavillion

For me, this was the best part of the show. In my opinion, both TATA’s and FIAT put up a fabulous show and 2008 belongs to them.

The German contingent - Part 2

Volkswagen

They had all their models out there from the Beetle to the Touareg, but there was just no space in the stall to venture around.

Skoda

I was hoping to see the Fabia RS, but it wasn’t out there.

BMW

It was such a pleasure to see the angel eyes.

DC Design

With his stunning Ambierod..

Hyundai

The ones who’d put up the lousiest show. I missed getting the picture of the shoddy alloy wheel on the Accent displayed in the stall, else you’d have instantly realised what I am talking about. Nevertheless, here’s the Hyundai series:

Honda

Let me know what you think about the new Accord.

Chevrolet

The usuals..looked like a GM showroom to me. The only surprises were the Captiva, a few concepts and the Hummer H3. I could not get the picture of the Hummer H3 since there were people all over it.

I just fail to understand why GM is not advertising or showcasing the Magnum SRV at all. The Optra Magnum did a decent job of denting the Ocatvia sales and the SRV can also sell numbers, but not many know that the Magnum engine has gotten on to the SRV as well.

M & M

The last, but my no means the least..

Maruti

I did not get to any of the bikes pavillion, but as I was just passing by the Yamaha’s I noticed this gorgeous sweetheart standing right near the gate and she was in such an excellent condition. It had been ages since I had seen such a stunning one.

Some hooligan had draped this poor chump with the “Jai Karnataka” flags. I would have loved to relieve this chap off the burden, but did not want to run the risk of landing in the hospital for a dozen injections on my tummy.

Picture taken at Sultanpalya, Bangalore. Canon 400D

This week I was glad to see a few Brahma Kamalas bloom in my garden. These flowers are considerered very special since they bloom only once a year and last only for a few hours. The flowers begin to bloom from the corners of the plant’s big leaves and not from the stem. They start blooming only after sunset around 7 PM, bloom fully around 10 - 11 PM, stay for one hour and then start withering.

This picture was taken around 10:35 PM using a Canon 400 D, f/6.3, 1 sec, Manual - Bulb.

On my way back from Coorg to Bangalore last weekend, I noticed these plastic containers queued next to a borewell in a village. Don’t the colours of these vessels and their arrangement awaken patriotism in the hearts?

When I look around from the top floor of my office, I see 12 commercial construction projects coming up and this is all within a kilometre’s radius (may be lesser) from my office.

According to DTZ, which is a leading global real estate consulting firm, Bangalore’s commercial space absorption rate is next only to London and Tokyo. Over the last two years, the absorption rate has ranged between 2.5 million sq.ft to 3.4 million sq.ft.

Will the dying infrastructure of Bangalore be able to support this kind of growth? It’s high time the government did something to spruce up the infrastructure scenario. I just hope the sun never sets on this huge real estate boom which Bangalore is going through.

Picture taken from the top floor of my office @ Whitefield using a Sony Cybershot @ around 6 PM.