Expo '2010; ...Part 1

Hi! Sorry for the length but then not every day is like today(The 8th Jan). Got up @ 7. Made some frantic calls to Abhijeet & Tarun. At 7:30, it was finally decided that I was meeting Abhi... at Signature Tower 8 am sharp. Completed my morning engagements in 15 min, as if I had to catch a spaceship (delay of trains & flights is hackneyed nowadays). Took an auto & reached Signature @ 7:55 sharp, 5 min before the stipulated time. The dense cloud of fog had reduced the visibility to few cms. At that moment, I could challenge a BMW, a Merc or even a F1 for a race & was sure of winning, considering the snail-like speed of traffic. It made me think highly of my sporting skills. With the dew falling on my head & the icy breeze piercing my bones I could not help but curse myself for being over punctual today. Generally it’s the opposite; others cursing me for following the Indian Standard Time. I could have attended to my morning engagements at leisure. Finally at 8:27, a silver Esteem stopped near me, two different hands were waving. One was Abhijeet, my colleague & the other, Mr. U.K.Bhat, our HoD. Abhi was fully prepared for the day. His camera from Hongkong & his uniquely shaped beard were evidence enough. One cannot help but admire Mr. Bhat for his sense of humour. He has the potential to tickle you down to the last breathe with his words of wisdom. After wasting a few minutes finding our way at the circuitous roundabouts near CP, at last we reached our destination at 10 am. Parking is a big issue on days like these. 2 km long line with some cars parked on the road, traffic jam was inevitable. We collected our Business passes from Gate 1 & moved towards the Gate 2 entrance. 3 rows with 60 to 70 people in each row, I thanked God that we possessed B-passes & would escape the general treatment. This was one visible advantage of being in the automotive sector. But hello! I was soon brought into the real world by Praval, our marketing executive who informed that everyone in those 3 rows possessed the B-passes. The splendour of possessing a B-pass soon disappeared. It seemed as if every salaried person irrespective of his profession & sector could have that piece of paper whose importance had suddenly plummeted. All 3 of us followed suit & finally.... Voila! We were inside Pragati Maidan witnessing the "10th Auto Expo '2010"... the biggest money churning biennial event for the organizers which encompass SIAM, CII & ACMA.

We headed straight to H9 (Hall No. 9) where we had our stall in the Diesel Planet Section. As we entered H9, the big scaffold at the left caught my attention. It was GM's new Chevrolet Beat on the show. Other models of GM were the recently launched hybrid car Volt, a blue coloured Cruze, Spark electric & the sports car Chevrolet Camaro which has been made famous by the recent Hollywood movie series ‘Transformers’. It was but obvious... the costlier the car, the hotter the model next to it. The models clearly enjoyed being the CoA (Center of Attraction) leaving behind the cars. After all they were the real crowd pullers. I wondered what if we just have cars & no models at Expo 2012. M sure, the footfalls would decrease by > 50%. I know you would argue on the higher side. The models in the expo were the leisure by-product of God. Next Section to GM was Renault. The biggest crowd puller at Renault was the Renault F1 car. Apart from F1 there was the zero-emission electric car - Twizy ZE concept & Fluence to name a few. Finally after crossing the GM & Renault arena, I reached the Diesel Planet Section. Was glad to see the iCAT logo on the stall & the icing on the cake were our own Male models. They knew they had the toughest competition but kudos to them, their spirits were high...