Chennai - A Pendulum Swinging Between Tradition & Modern

Chennai

A Pendulum Swinging Between 

Tradition & Modern

This is yet another CBC inspired post. CBC is the acronym of The Chennai Bloggers Club. CBC is the most happening facebook group of Chennai Bloggers. For me personally, this is the group which showed me the right path and transformed me as a blogger. In CBC, we blog, we discuss, we motivate and last but not least, we also initiate the social causes both on-line & off-line.

This post is part of the blog tag titled, The CBC Tablog - 3, About 20 bloggers from Chennai are participating in this blog tag where we will write about our favourite city Chennai and how it stands as a testament to the blend of the traditional and the modern. 

So here's my post for the CBC tablog - 3 titled, ‘Chennai - A Pendulum Swinging between Tradition & Modern’. Our previous Blogtag was titled as “One Aspect I Want to Change in Chennai”. You can read that post by clicking here.

Thanks to Susan Deborah for this wonderful initiative and also to the intro about me in your post. You need no introduction. An inspiring blogger and a wonderful human. As always, I am a fan of your writing and your post in this topic is just too good. I would want the readers to have a look at her post “Chennai - A concoction of the traditional and the modern” by clicking here.

Chennai is more than just a city for me and I am proud to be a Chennai’ite. Amongst many things, I love Chennai for its heritage and the history it carries. Chennai is a hub of people belongs to varied culture but still loved by everyone. One of the oldest city, Chennai, has its own values and customs by retaining the traditions and also by adapting itself to the modernity. It is not easy to strike a balance between the Tradition and Modern. I tried to compare and write about the blend of Modern & Tradition by way of our day to day activities and summarizing it below:

• For most of the Chennai’tes, the day starts with a soulful Suprapatham sung by M.S.Subbulakshmi and the day continues by listening to some jazz and rock music while they drive. 
• Chennai still sees the people wearing Dhoti on one side and also the people wearing Jeans on the other. 
• While the postman is busy delivering the posts, the statistics reveals that Chennai has 1.2 Million facebook users. It shows that the direct mail exchanges has been on the raise, both the ways – Digitally and Physically as well.
• While a set of people enjoying the hassle free shopping  in the Kuralagam, few others are freezing their time out in a fully air conditioned Phoenix Mall for shopping.
• While few people visiting the Egmore Museum as a part of their holiday plans, few others spending their quality time with their family at Queensland. 
• A dad will be enjoying the Y.Gee Mahendran’s drama in Music Academy at the same time where his son will be enjoying  some rock music in Hard Rock café.
• Dad will be eagerly grabbing the Hindu paper from the paperboy early in the morning, and sharing some interesting and breaking news with his son but his son replying like I gotta know about this news last night itself through an app on my phone.
• The Gen X of Chennai starts the day with a cup of strong filter kaapi from mom and ends by meeting the friends for a cuppa cappuccino at starbucks. 
• As a resident of a Triplicane, I shouldn’t miss out on food :) Foodies have their breakfast of Sambar Idly from the Ratna Café and will have lunch with the colleagues in The Pasta Bar Veneto.
• The Chennai’tes have the luxury of enjoying the open air ride in the traditional cycle rickshaw and at the same time, they can have the posh ride in a BMW through Uber Radio  taxi.
• We have the Kalakshetra at one end of Chennai and also have the John Britto’s dance academy on the other end. 
• While the business houses adapted to the e world of marketing, we still have the traditional roadside posters and banners  as a medium of promotion.
• Not to forget the traditional cycling, Chennai sees a lots of cycle riders alongside the Vespas and Harleys. Good news for those who loves cycling is that the Corporation of Chennai is planning to initiate a unique Bicycle-Sharing programme this year, similar to the ones in London & Paris. 
• Chennai observes the Tradional Madras Day on 22nd August every year but we never hesitate to celebrate the Joy of Giving week as well.
• Even in the sports front, Chennai accommodates both the traditional and modern sports. Be it Kabaddi or F1 racing, the participation and support from the Chennai’ites is enormous.
• From Sivananda Yoga to Maverick fitness, the chennai’tes have bunch of options for their physical fitness.

Conclusion: 

To conclude,Chennai, the city which just celebrated its 375th Birthday, is still young and energetic.  The way it retaining its tradition by adapting itself to the modernity is what makes the city a special for those who visiting Chennai.  It is worth mentioning the quote by Bishwanath Ghosh, the Author of Tamarind City – 

“Chennai is the  city whose head is ruled by technology and heart by tradition. The marriage of the two Ts makes it unique”

Thanks for reading. I am very much happy and proud to pass the baton to Kaushik Govindaswamy who blogs at http://kaushikgovind.wordpress.com/. He is a Multi talented person and a versatile blogger. He writes about almost all the genre. “A Picture speaks which the words can’t”, His snaps makes this sentence true. A wonderful photographer. Passionate 3D artist. His posts doesn’t contain much words but conveys the message strongly. Eagerly looking forward to his post. 

Do drop in your suggestions and feedback to innovativedeepak87@gmail.com . Meet you all in the next post very soon.

- Deepak Raghuraman (www.facebook.com/nammaareablog)