Visit to CHICAGO, the ' world's alpha city'

We were wondering whether we would be able to make a visit to Chicago which has been classified as an alpha world city as the period of our stay was nearing to a close. Our children staying in the United States leave no stone unturned with their enthusiasm and energy to show us more places and make our hearts content with joy and fulfillment.

We left by car on 4th October 2007 for Chicago, the 3rd largest city in US and the largest in the State of Illinois. Chicago is one of the ten most influential cities in the world (30 Lakh population) and we reached the wonder city within four and half hours from Michigan and were in time for lunch to join our host.


Chicago,as you may be aware, is a portage city between the Great Lakes and Mississippi river watershed and is a busy transportation hub in US. The history of Chicago is very much tied to that of Michigan lake.

Our host took us in the evening to 'swamy narayanan temple'. The temple has a mamooth architectural outlook, occupies a vast land space, gives a look of a five Star building. Puja and Mangalahathi, we saw. We took leave of our host for some time to visit another.

We had a dinner invitation from my wife's colleague's daughter and the couple are working in Chicago hospital. We spent more than 2 hours enquiring the welfare of our common friends and places to see in the city. When we returned to our host's place, it was nearing 11p.m and the secession continued till midnight with them

The next day we went to Sri Venkateswara Temple in Aurora County. The temple is well maintained and they conduct religious functions with an agenda. They had drawn up a big programme for Navarathri with Pujas, Chandi homam, etc. The priests are from South India. The deity looks exactly same as Venkataramana in Tirupathi. The place is at an elevation and Ganesa, Subhramaya, Laksmi, Andal, Anjaneya, Siva, Parvathy are the Idols we worshiped inside the 'praharam'.



We had a lunch programe with another Bangalore friend and drove straight there.
"On The Border" is a famous Mexican Restaurant in Chicago and we were entertained with a tasty and sumptuous pure vegetarian menu.


We then moved on to see the celebrated 'down-town' of Chicago. We went round the The Millennium Park and walked down the busy streets and arrived at the 'Bean'. The Bean reflects on all its facets the sky line of Chicago, an amazing sight to look at the tall structures of the windy city IN ONE BASKET OF THE 'BEAN".

We joined the shore line on an exciting journey touring the Chicago river and the architectural land marks which include East bank Club, Sears Tower (1454 feet high with 103 floor Sky Deck), Boeing, John Hancock Observatory, The Trump, Navy Pier, Shedd Aquarium, Chicago University, Chicago Tribune, old Post office buldg., etc. The ferry ride was for almost 2hours and it was fun filled and sensational especially with a scenic Michigan Lake on the backdrop
We visited Hancock building and went up the 95-96 floors in 65 seconds and looked at the breath taking view of Indiana, Wisconsin and Michigan, gazing a stretch of several miles. Twilight was falling then, and the view of thousand and more lights was sparkling and twinkled like the beauty of stars. We went to the signature room in the Hancock Tower for refreshments and snacks at a premium.

We drove from Hancock Tower to another friend's place who had invited us to stay with them for the night and also participate in their child's first birth day party, the next day. We, four, took active part and almost played host in a supporting role and the birth day party turned out to be a big success. The food was ordered from 'Star of India' and the guests had a go at it.

Our engagement on the final day was a visit to the Asian Street, a shopping center which is mix of Commercial street, Bangalore and Mount Road, Chennai. We did some shopping buying costume jewellery's, almond, bad am, etc. Lunched at Mysore Woodlands
We took the next day's morning flight from O hare-Chicago Airport to Denver to our daughter's place.

Our daughter and son along with their better-halves had made our stay wonderful. The grand children kept us busy and the thought of returning to the place of origin makes things difficult for us as well as to the children. We can feel happy with the saying "All is well that ends well