The morning walk stories – Lucknow

Mom and I have been going for our morning walks around the hotel in Lucknow and have come across interesting things everyday. For starters, there are no rules for drivers, vehicles come in all directions. While that is the case in almost every city in India, its heightened here. The roads are wide, atleast in the Gomti Nagar area but vehicles come in from every side and every which way at full speed. Scary.

The walls supporting the new flyovers are all painted with street art which is very welcome. It looks beautiful.

The Akhilesh and Mayawati governments seem to have been on a building spree. Mayawati has built huge monuments for her mentor Kanshi Ram and the Dalit cause. Akhilesh has built these large structures for the “Farmer’s market” etc now lying unused or sparingly used.

This massive complex has a hostel and an auditorium besides a sprawling market place, but just a few shops are in use. Its almost deserted. There are these vegetable carts that were parked inside looking like they have been sparingly used if at all. Hope this large complex is used soon rather than being wasted.

There is a huge mall called Cinepolis with all the well known stores as part of it. The reason I am posting this picture is, because there are these massive drains or sewers, almost like a canal that run all over the place which have been left open !!! Their stench is unbearable and I cannot understand why they aren’t covered.

These open drains are all over the place, rarely covered. I am also worried about someone falling into these drains when it rains.

There are roadside barbers giving a haircut or a shave to men early in the morning and then the food stalls sell hot puris with aloo curry (potato). We do see several walkers and cyclists and there is a quaint little tea shop that has a cow tied right next to it. I guess you can get fresh milk and tea from that shop but I haven’t checked. The sugarcane juice vendors start a little later, but we have managed to drink sugarcane juice on a few occasions.

We like Lucknow, but for the traffic. If the drains can be closed off and the traffic can be streamlined a bit, this is a fun city to live in.

We skipped our walk today. Yesterday as we went to Naimasharanya and Malihabad the searing heat took a toll, with all of us having a headache and just being really tired. Looking forward to our walk tomorrow morning.