My efforts to get a house in Hyderabad

So after 5 years of staying in rented places in Hyderabad, I decided I should have a place I can call my own. Keeping in mind all the good times I had at my grandparents place during my childhood, I longed to have a similar house. A house with lot of open space in the backyard and in front of the house.

So with that thought in mind, I began searching for plots around Hyderabad, mainly around Madhapur area, where my office is located. After a long search, where every place I saw was about 20km from my office, I thought that my dream will remain just that after all. Luckily, one of my friends recommended a place called Bandlaguda, which comes to 17 km from my office. I was exhilarated and paid a token amount for the land.

The cost per sq yard of the land was 10k. It is an open plot. Now the problem was that I didn't have enough money to pay for the plot completely. Not a problem, I thought. I will easily get loan for that. With this, I started going to banks for loan. First up, was LIC housing finance. And they gave me the first shock. They said they will give me loan on the SRO (Sub Registrar Office) rate which is another word for government rate. To know why I was shocked, just consider this point. The cost of the land per sq yard in the market is 10k, where as the SRO rate was just 3.5k. So considering this, I was getting far less loan than I expected to. So this kind of lessened my excitement for the plot. I told this to the agent who was kind of helping me buy the land. He said it should be possible for me to get the loan from other banks too. So I went to another bank, ICICI. They said they won't fund for areas outside the main city. But this area was outside.. so no loan. same with HDFC, Axis bank and so many others. One of my friends friend works in IDBI bank. So I went to that bank and enquired. They said I will get good amount of loan. That amount will be enough for me to purchase the land. Awesome I thought. But when I went with the documents to them, they said they will fund only if I have HMDA approval for the plot. To get approval for a plot, first the layout has to be regularized and approved. But my layout was not, so no question of getting approval. By this time, I was losing hope fast that I will be able to buy it. In a final effort, I contacted DHFL, who give loans exclusively in panchayat regions on market rates. They said they can process my loan, but the amount was less and I will have a shortfall during construction.

So I had to forget my dream home..... 

My First Flight Experience

After approximately 3 years of waiting, I finally got the chance to fly. Though I wouldn't say that this is the best time to fly as I married recently but I decided to utilize the chance that I got.

I came to the RGIA, Hyderabad by 5 PM when my flight was scheduled to leave at 8.15 PM. I painfully bid farewell to my parents and my wife... the time seemed so long the waiting from 5 to 7:20 PM when I was allowed to board the flight.

I came to board the flight. It was an airbus 320 and I was amazed that such a big thing would fly. Then I went to my seat. Luckily I got a window seat. I made last minute calls to my wife and parents and told that I am starting soon. Soon it was 8:15 and then they made an announcement to switch off our mobiles. I was waiting in anticipation for the flight to take off. They showed the flight safety instructions on the TV infront of our seats. And finally it was ready for take off. The statistics were visible to me in the display before me. We started our journey. The plane was going round and increased its speed from 0 to 6 kmph to 27 kmph and then came the announcement we will take off. Suddenly the plane increased its speed from 27 to 100, 500, 1000 kmpl and we were taking off. I was so amazed and mesmerized by the view beside me that I forgot to observe how the speed was increasing. The city looked like a gold shop with all the glittering lights. It looked very very colorful and I thought paying that money was paisa vasool for just that view. When we were going high, I got more of the view of the city from above and it was lovely, I think no body can imagine how it looks. You have to see it to know how beautiful it looks. After sometime, I felt a pain in my right ear, and I thought something was wrong with my ear. I tried to adjust it. I tried to open the ears by opening eyes wide but the pain didn't reduce. I felt the pain only in my right ear so I thought it was a problem with my ear and I was terrified if it would increase or anything all the time hoping that it would be right. And after some time with the pain only I started observing which direction we were heading.. we were heading in the direction of Pune with the speed of 2700 kmph at the height of 6000 feet. Then we were allowed to remove the seat belts. Some of the people in the flight were watching movies but what ever buttons I pressed I was only able to see the statistics on the screen before me. So I pressed a button to summon an air-hostess and asked her about that. She asked me to press a video button beside my seat and I was able to see the videos. They had old hindi channel, new hindi channel, English channel and NGC. I opted to see the movie 'AA Dekhe Zara' which was thrilling. Then the brought some dinner. I had that dinner. By this time, my ear ache also subsided. Then I decided that this might happen during takeoff and started enjoying the movie which was very interesting. And in some time, we got an announcement from the captain that we will be landing in Mumbai airport in few mins.

Again the scene was super... We felt as if we were touching the buildings. And slowly we reached the Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai. I took my hand luggage and went for the security check and again waited for the next flight. In the meantime, it was 12 and I was wished a very happy birthday by my  wife and few friends. I also bought a Readers Digest and settled to read when we are asked to board the flight. I was really taken aback on seeing the Jumbo Jet Boeing 777. It looked like a train with people everywhere. I got a middle seat in the flight and I felt congested in the flight. The seat was not comfortable. I cursed our company for looking for Rs.6500 and disallowing me to take a better flight from Lufthansa. But again I thanked them that I atleast got an opportunity and settled to spend the time just hoping that atleast in the next flight I will get a window seat. I watched a romantic movie called '500 days of summer'. And after that I felt sleepy and slept after having a sandwich. Then I woke up the next morning and soon we had breakfast and half an hour after breakfast we landed at Frankfurt International Airport. It was snowing around and it was all white around. From Mumbai landing to the airport we were taken in an airport bus. So I expected that in Frankfurt also this would happen, but we directly went inside the airport. And as I thought, it was like a train and we had to wait for about an hour to go through the security checks. There were very few counters for security checks and about 400 people got out of our flight AI 127 and finally my turn came for security check. They checked my luggage and asked me to stay aside. I was confused on what was happening. They asked me if there was any liquid in the bag. I said I had a spray. They asked me to open it. I opened it. It was a 153 ml Charlie Revlon perfume. He told me that they allow only 50ml in the flight and hence he just dropped it into the dust bin. I felt bad but I couldn't do anything else. Cursing him and Indian security authorities, I left to board the flight. If they had told that to me in Hyderabad I would have given it to someone, now I had to throw it away.

So I got in again into another Jumbo Jet AI 191. But this time it was more comfortable as I was in the first seat in a cabin, which gave more leg room and another thing which made me happy was that I got the window seat :). The seat beside me was empty but there was German girl beside me. 

I was happy that I got a chance to see the take off. And true to my wishes the takeoff was a wonderful experience. I saw us going up slowly. But as it was not night, the lights effect was not there but I could see the landscape turning white below me as it was snowing lightly. We reached near the clouds and It was amazing to see down. But what took my breath away was that we went above the clouds and I could now see the horizon of the earth... I think its a breathtaking sight. The going up is a very good experience. Everything is blue, the flight took a right turn making me face the sky upto 70% which looked wonderful. Though I missed taking pictures in the HYD-MUM journey of the lighted city, I took out my phone and clicked a few photos which are here.

From My World

From

Click on the image for bigger view.

After flying for sometime, I watched the 'Shambho Shiva Shambo' movie for sometime and made some small talk with the German girl who was going on a holiday to the US. I asked her what which places she liked in Germany. She said that she doesn't like Germany much and she liked big cities and she is looking forward to her stay in New York. She also said that she didn't require a visa. They just have to fill a form online and they can come to US. That is the difference between our country and developed countries. And soon we were announced that we have to fill a US immigration form and landed and Newark International airport. Here the immigration and security check were easy. There were many many counters in the airport and hence our immigration was completed in 10 mins and baggage collection took sometime. I got my luggage and he asked me if there is any eatable. I told there are pickles. He stopped me and asked me to go to another counter. I was afraid that these will also meet the same fate as my Revlon perfume. But they just scanned my luggage and I was allowed to take it.

I should have been tired by the journey but I was very much excited by it. I just came and called the person I knew here. A black cab driver helped me in using the coin box. I got some loose change from the starbucks cafe in the airport. I called the cab driver in whose home I was going to stay and he asked me to stay in the airport for 15 mins. I decided to check starbucks so I took a 2 dollar coffee which was not so great as any amount of sugar was not sufficient to make the coffee sweet. After some time I came out of the airport. It was chilling. Thats when I understood how cold it is. Soon the cab driver came and I went to his room. I called home and intimated my safe journey and set out to explore New Jersey.

This is the photo of my apartment...

From Drop Box

From

And this is outside my office.....

From

I will share some experiences of my stay in the coming posts.

Book Review: Hyderabad - Narendra Luther

Image via Wikipedia

With the issue of Telangana boiling in Andhra Pradesh, I just chanced upon a book called Hyderabad, a biography of Hyderabad written by Narendra Luther.

It is an account of Hyderabad from its beginnings till now. It starts with the building of Golconda fort till the debacle of the IT chief minister of the state ChandraBabu naidu.

I learnt a lot of interesting things about Hyderabad from that book.

> Md. Quli was the person who built Hyderabad. There was just a small settlement at the banks of river Musi before that. He built it exactly where he saw and married Bhagmati, his lover.

> There were two dynasties who ruled Hyderabad. The Qutb-Shahi and the Asaf-Jahi dynasty.

> Quli's city was one of the best in the world. There were lot of garden's in and around the city. All the Baghs in Hyderabad were all gardens from his time.

> Most of the modern development in Hyderabad happened in the prime ministership of Salar Jung.

> Hyderabad was a very beautiful city even till independence. It was after independence that city expanded rapidly.

You can read some of the poetry written by the Nawabs of the time. It was a breeze to read through the book and its like a whirlwind view of that society. But I was saddened to see the the last Nizam actually didn't do much and was sidelined by the Razakars and how the last Nizam was very stingy that he offered biscuits himself that to one by one and put in them in the locker!!!

Not a must read, but you can pick it up if you want to know about Hyderabad or particularly interested about history of Golconda, Charminar.

For the telangana issue, seeing by the history, the chief ministers who ruled A.P have violated the provisions of Gentlemen agreement and hence it makes a strong case for a separate Telangana.

Good Telugu Website www.nalamothu.net

Today I was searching for reviews of radio channels in hyderabad. I found an article in a blog which was written by a doctor. Clicking my way through this site I found a complete website in telugu with all the links like a portal. The link for review of radio stations is
http://telugu-talk.blogspot.com/2006/12/fm-radio-stations-in-hyderabad-review.html

It also had links to various blogs and websites. I was really very happy that a telugu person has a commendable web presence serving all the other telugu people. Whats more is that he even offers free services to other people.

Free Services: Search engine optimization and Adsense placement. Guidance on System and software problems. Advice on Medical and Health issues.

These are the lines directly taken from the site. visit the site at www.nalamothu.net
There are various links and the link for currently running contests on the net was interesting. visit it and enjoy..