Gurgaon: A City of Contradictions

The first thing you notice about Gurgaon is that it does not look like it is trying to impress you. It just does.

One minute, you are stuck behind an auto on a dusty road. The next, you are staring up at glass towers that look like they belong in Singapore. And only a few kilometres away, someone at a small tapri will be selling chai surrounded by people from diverse backgrounds. Old uncles would be sipping piping hot chai while gossiping about current affairs, all while a corporate employee in a perfectly ironed shirt is rushing past with a laptop bag and a coffee in one hand and attending a call from another.

Welcome to Gurgaon.

Or, as the government would like us to call it, Gurugram.

But honestly, ask anyone who lives here what they call it, and chances are they will still say “Gurgaon.”

Gurgaon is a city of extremes. One Google search will tell you that it is a major financial, industrial, and technology hub located in North India. But what it won’t tell you is that it took just a few decades to transform from a relatively small town to what it is today. Its skyline is packed with offices, luxury apartments, malls and business districts, with DLF Cyber City located in the heart of the place.

But the number of buildings is not the impressive part.

You fall in love with the city at the crack of dawn, looking at the purple-pink skies. Then at 9 a.m., when the roads are packed with people heading to work. You feel the city fever when it comes alive at 7 p.m., when corporate hustlers become cafe goers, and Cyber Hub starts filling up with groups of friends deciding where to eat. And then you come across a completely different Gurgaon at 2 a.m., because this is a city that seems to have forgotten that it is supposed to sleep at one point.

There are different layers to this city. And as you peel through the layers, you’ll find out that each one is as thrilling as the last.

There is a strange feeling in watching Gurgaon transition from day to night. During the day, everything feels like a race, with all the meetings, traffic, deadlines, deliveries, calls. But as the sun goes down, the city seems to change its personality. Office buildings light up, restaurants get louder, and suddenly everyone seems to have somewhere to be.

Perhaps that is the beauty of Gurgaon. No matter how long you have lived here, there is always another layer waiting to be discovered .

-Garima