"Glory lies in the attempt to reach one's goal and not in reaching it. " ~ Mahatma Gandhi

Caught amidst the rigid roots of a Dravidian cultural orthodoxy and the tantalising tentacles of modernisation, stands the Gateway to South India - Chennai. From St. Thomas Mount, where the great apostle was martyred, to the Parry's Corner that, a couple of centuries ago, housed the second largest Judicial Court in the world, stretches the fourth largest metropolis of India that holds surprises at every turn.

The remnants of the erstwhile British George Town still look down upon you from it's serene heights, aloft the red-brick mansions, near the port area. And if you take the road that leads you from Parry's Corner to Marina Beach you will find, sheltered in the Anna Samadhi, the last remains of that giant of a man, who, in modern times, is responsible for reviving the lost pride of the Tamil heritage.

Right from the moment you alight at the Chennai Central railway station you notice something everywhere in the air...it's a tremendous linguistic pride, to the extent of being an inertia. The coolie will come up to you, and depending what you look like - talk in Hindi or Tamil. Having found that you are Hindi-speaking, he will, very politely, offer his help to carry your luggage. You, being a light traveller, refuse and then ask him, in Hindi, where the main gate is. He will suddenly, behave as if someone just attacked his linguistic independence. He will shake his hands all over his body, dance around for a while and before you think you have got the right quantam-mechanical equation to pin down his momentum and position, he will depart, leaving you feeling stupid all over. He has shown you that he does not understand Hindi. In fact, this attribute of the people is most wonderful, and is of tremendous academic interest. Unless they want something from you or want to exercise their skills in Hindi, they will not talk to you in Hindi. English they might speak, but Hindi, an emphatic no!

If you are still a college bachelor, you would certainly get carried away with the urge to fling a camera on your back and catch the first train to Marina. But hey! Don't get surprised if you do not get a seat in the four o' clock train --- Chennai rises before most bachelors sleep.

By the time "The Resurrection" has lulled you to sleep the people are up and are prancing around their daily chores. And on the way back from the "Aavin" milk-booths the elderly never fail to say "hello" to the poor old cockerel who prepares to begin the day with his cock-a-doodle-doo.

Your toes will be crushed and your nose will be sore from smelling armpits. At every other turn, you will be thrown on to a pile of humanity and at every alternate turn the pile of humanity will be thrown back at you. And even if you are not on the bus you cannot fail to notice it racing across Mount Road with more human beings hanging out of it, clinging to its rusted doors, than sardines in a can. It looks like a postman's bag with letters hanging out precariously, sure to fall at the next turn the postman takes on his century-old bicycle. But surprise again...they keep clinging!

The bus is tilted to the left at a drastic angle and you, immediately, marvel at its stupendous capacity and giant strength. And then you become philosophical about life and its many pains, like the Buddha.

The young Chennai reveres the old Chennai like no other place I have set foot in. I have never seen a youth sitting within visibility of the elderly, be it a prime time train or the overloaded-beyond-capacity bus. It's certainly not like Delhi where New Delhi simply cannot tolerate the old one of Chandni Chowk.

Cross the Gemini fly-over towards Parry's and take the first turn right. Take another left and you will see the Sathyam Cinema Complex that plays English and Hindi stuff. There are three theatres and all are equally populated with "ticket-blackmarketers" in the first week of the movie.

There is no other place in Chennai where I have been cheated on more occasions. Keep going towards Parry's on Mount Road and just where the road from Triplicane meets it, on your right stands the Devi Complex - a huge five storeyed cinema complex that carries all flavours...Hindi, Tamil, English and another Tamil... four theatres in all.

The art of poster-making has reached its zenith here and I once mistook men standing on woodworks, painting a poster, for real. Sometimes, these posters hide the view of a side street and you know of it when a car screeches to a halt six inches from your mortal configuration.

Mount Road is the highway of Chennai and also the commercial plaza. It will take you from one end of the city to the other, both geographically and culturally. From Guindy, the lung of the city with its deer and snake parks where the conglomerate of ancient villages became part of the city, to Parry's Corner, where the English set up their first Indian establishment and tussled with the French for this marine gateway to the land of abundance, history and chemistry of the people rub shoulders.

And then, there is the unifying influence of modernisation which paints the nights of Mount Road, or Anna Salai, with innumerable sodium and neon lights and springs giant five-star hotels, departmental stores and consulates at unsuspecting corners. Multinationals have rediscovered the wealth of Indian consumers and on the by-streets, music and dance acadamies enchant their audiences with spellbinding Carnatic Vocal or Bharatnatyam performances by celebrities.

In these auditoria, Chennai breathes music and dance and tries to forget the salt air from its creeks between Adyar and the Bay of Bengal.

At the regular bus-stop you will find an old, wrinkled woman trying to get into a halt-and-speed bus and the young salesman, wearing a tie in the enervating heat and humidity, helping her climb the foot-rest by extending his hand. This is what Chennai is: the old, orthodox and piously religious intermingling with the strong, competitive and determined. Despite all the culture-shocks it held for me, and all those coolies and auto-rickshaw fellows who cheated me during my initial months... this sentimental mixture is what I have since fallen for.