Notes on the Geography of Peninsular India: Chennai/Madras 6: New ChennaiIndia's changing fast, if not fast enough for all. Here are some pictures on the "half-full" side, followed by a few on the "half-empty." Make default image size larger ![]() The convention is that you can tell how a country is doing just be looking at its airports. Here's Chennai's, pretty much up to international standards. ![]() But with an Indian twist. Call it a legacy of the caste system fused with British colonial hierarchies. ![]() Out on the street, we pass something that a visitor from the 1980s would have thought impossible. "It will never be," he said, but he was wrong. ![]() The full monty. ![]() A dealership straight out of the global catalog. Farewell to the coconut-powered Ambassador, cut down at the last to its chassis, loaded with cotton, and pulled by a bullock. ![]() Remember autarky? Self-sufficiency? Trade barriers that kept the global players at bay? ![]() The new India needs new offices. ![]() They rise like squash flowers from a compost heap. ![]() Nobody ever said they had to comport with European taste. ![]() If you can't read English, this space isn't for you. ![]() "London shuttle's landed, sir." ![]() It's Easter Sunday, 2016. What's the attraction? ![]() Answer: Marina Beach. ![]() Modesty prevails. ![]() Meanwhile, the old city continues crumbling into the dust. ![]() Eventually it's demolished or restored. Here's a case of restoration: The Daily Mail Building in about 1990. ![]() Ten years later, the newspaper had moved out and the building had been cleaned up. ![]() People meanwhile occupy every vacant inch. Here's a line of huts on the grounds of St. Andrews. Come around to the front. ![]() Laundry, as colorful as it gets. ![]() No room for a hut? Stack it on a proper building, in this case on the city's outskirts, past the airport. ![]() The outcome? Optimist and pessimist alike must wait and see. |
* Argentina * Australia * Austria * Bangladesh * Belgium * Botswana * Brazil * Burma / Myanmar * Cambodia (Angkor) * Canada (B.C.) * China * The Czech Republic * Egypt * Fiji * France * Germany * Ghana * Greece * Hungary * India: Themes * Northern India * Peninsular India * Indonesia * Israel * Italy * Japan * Jerusalem * Jordan * Kenya * Laos * Kosovo * Malawi * Malaysia * Mauritius * Mexico * Morocco * Mozambique * Namibia * The Netherlands * New Zealand * Nigeria * Norway * Oman * Pakistan * The Philippines * Poland * Portugal * Senegal * Singapore * South Africa * South Korea * Spain * Sri Lanka * Sudan * Syria (Aleppo) * Tanzania * Thailand * Trinidad * Turkey (Istanbul) * Uganda * The U.A.E. (Dubai) * The United Kingdom * The Eastern United States * The Western United States * Oklahoma * Uzbekistan * Vietnam * The West Bank * Yemen * Zambia * Zimbabwe *