New Delhi felt quite a bit different than Mumbai though I think that it mostly stems from the hotel not being in the center of a shantytown. The Trident Hilton Gurgaon is a pretty incredible place. There are huge reflection pools both at the entrance and in the courtyard that the windows of the rooms face. The reflection pools are set up so that around the edge the water flows down a two-foot incline to give a smooth waterfall effect. In the center of the pool at the entrance a few flames burn at night which are reflected in the pool to give a beautiful effect.
doors at the entrance are so massive that the doorman opens one and allows the momentum of it to keep swinging open and slowly begin to close while he walks to the other door to open it for you as well. The reflection pool in the central courtyard, which is a huge reflection pool and has no 'yard', starts at the ground level for the rooms then flows down towards the swimming pool in the center. This will be much clearer once I figure out a good way to get my pictures up.
Gurgaon is a town to the southwest of Delhi. It appears to be a fast-growing industrial area with lots of call centers, development centers and malls. Everywhere you look there are new buildings going There have been lots of articles about the huge numbers of malls being built all over the country. We were in the DLF City Center mall. Although it is more crowded than the malls in the US or most of those in Israel many of the usual suspects are present. Pizza Hut, Ruby Tuesday, Subway, American Tourister, Benetton and of course Tommy Hilfiger. Now I was quite surprised to see Tommy Hilfiger considering that to my knowledge the designer had made some remarks about his clothing having been designed for upper class white people. Looking into it deeper he either never said it or refuted it very well. Of course there were plenty of shops selling cellphones, electronics, saris and other local clothing and yards of cloth.
We decided to eat in an Indian restaurant that one of our colleagues had suggested from her previous trip. We ordered some garlic naan (a flat bread), some jasmine rice, two mains, an appetizer and drinks. The whole bill came to abour Rs 640 or about USD $14. In comparison at the hotel, albeit a Hilton, breakfast for one is about the same amount. Dinner quite a bit more.
Interestingly the malls have stands selling sweet corn. It comes in cups and you can order it with different flavourings. Didn't get a chance to try it out this time but will at some time in the future. We did stop at McDonalds for an ice cream. No beef on the menu and some interesting curries in edible rectangular bread bowls.
Posted by David at April 8, 2005 06:11 PM | TrackBack