A friend of mine recently mentioned that I was a tad self obsessed. It was one of those "can’t win" conversations where she said something about herself and then I made a corresponding statement about myself only to get a “There you go, talking about yourself again… how self obsessed can you get?!” (or words to that effect). Then she said “I liked your blog, you write quite well” to which I modestly replied  “Really?, Which piece did you read?”  (because y'know, I have two blogs) and got an “Oof! I don’t remember! Just accept the compliment will you... God, you really like to fish!” (again, words to that effect). As this blog doesn’t get too many compliments so I accepted every good word gratefully. ( Note: I have been informed that as of this morning, I have readers as far away as Gurgaon… I think readership increased ever since I put in more pictures of myself).

This conversation was taking place while I was at Shimla. Not on vacation, just a day trip while we were working on an assignment in Baddi (the part of Himachal that now looks a lot like Ankleshwar). While my colleague was having a conversation in Gujarati with his wife, I was speaking to my friend in Bengali who pointed out (again) that I spoke Bengali like a Calcutta based Gujarati. Faulty network signals do result in weird accents.

Shimla was beautiful. There were some subtle changes since my last visit (late 2003). The drive to Shimla from Chandigarh/ Panchkula had always been pleasant, but the shops all along the Solan-Shimla stretch took me by surprise. While a lot of people I know continue to criticize Shimla for its apparent “commercialization” I like to see a small city (formerly Hill Station) that has a shopping mall, high end coffee shops, a smart multi-cuisine restaurant serving good Mexican food, a multiplex in development , Tantra T-shirts, organized Pay & Park facilities and lest we forget… plenty of ATMs and shops accepting credit cards. (That was a major setback during my Arunachal trip… and the only reason why I didn’t buy the Chinese Rambo hunting knife). Enough about me now, here's some of the stuff Shimla has to offer. Visit the Photos section for more.