Mysore.

I was in Mysore the whole of last week. Of course I had no time for sight seeing but saw enough to wish I lived there. First two days I went around the city, something kept coming up at the back of my head wasn't able to put my finger one it...then it struck me - there is not a single high rise building in that city!!! There is open sky everywhere. Not like the piece of sky I can see from my terrace but much wider and bluer. There are still so many trees that you can see the moon shining through them at night. In the evening when you are not blaring your TV off to kill boredom you can hear classical music coming from the Kalyana Mantapa nextdoor - live.

The mornings are clearer and the evenings are pleasant and there are lakes around which you can walk and see the most gorgeous painted storks busy building nests on the island. The city still has space for the not so young and hep ones. It still has the old world charm that made it the pensioner's paradise which made me regret I was not earning any pension soon enough.

But I also saw old buildings razed down and big names in construction advertising there. There are signs screaming that soon the sky will shrink and the storks will fly away. I do hope I am proved wrong or that it doesn't happen as soon as it seems.