New Delhi, The Wild West

I'm fresh from another work-related trip to New Delhi (actually Gurgaon, about 20 minutes outside the city). While There are many things that drive me nuts about traveling there (complete dependency on drivers and being stuck in either the office or the corporate apartment come to mind). However the wacky, loosey-goosey, need 25 guys to stand around and check your office pass quality of the place never fails to delight. Neither does the utter 'boomtown' of it all. They are in the middle of building a huge metro to extend into Gurgoan from Delhi, and the speed in which office buildings are erected boggles the mind. The buildings literally spring out of the dirt - Microsoft, Ericsson, Canon, Deutsche Bank and always seem to pop-up within a matter of weeks or months. The best part is the morning run across the road from the corporate apartment - 'Belvedere Towers' (I have to start compliling the names of all the corporate apartments I've had the good fortune to stay in) to the office. This is the equivalent -I'm not exagerating- of crossing a freeway, except on this freeway there are cars, tractors, bicyle rickshaws, auto-rickshaws, cows, motorcycles, those crazy colorful 'Goods Carrier' trucks, and whatever anyone else can manage to get running on the road, all following some sort of honking code I have yet to crack (basically honk continually for what seems to be no reason at all). I always feel grateful when I make it accross this road and I know there is some fitting 'why did the chicken cross the road' joke inherent in the situation, but I haven't worked it out in my mind yet. The strangest sensation is finally making it across alive, walking by (again, not kidding) a snake charmer, then making it up the small dirt hill into the office building. Once up there one could be in San Francisco, Frankfurt or New York. The ground level of the building is complete with the chains we all know and love, Costa Coffee, Papa Johns Pizza, Subway and McDonalds. Once inside it's floor after floor of office space just like anywhere else. The only way to tell you're in Delhi is by looking out the window to see all the insanity: the crazy traffic, buildings and apartment high-rise construction sites in every direction, all amidst the dust and the cows. Once inside, it's business as usual - lots of meetings, conference calls and all that good stuff that's part of workin' for the man.