City Centre Shopping

On our anniversary Penri and I went out for the day. We started off at Santhome Cathedral. It is one of only three churches in the world where a saint was purported to have been buried (St Thomas or Doubting Thomas). It is a lovely cathedral and there is a museum at the back with relics and information about St Thomas. Very interesting and well worth visiting. From the Cathedral we went to Spencer’s Plaza (shopping mall) and then on to the Park Hotel for a meal. It was a lovely day!

Speaking of shopping, my mum and I took a trip to the City Centre Shopping Mall - the one I have heard so much about but hadn’t managed to get to. This trip is a perfect example of what I was saying before about rick drivers. We agreed before we got into the rick on 80 rupees; in fact we didn’t even negotiate with the driver – he said 80 and we said ok. He took us there down all these back roads and we had no idea where we were going – he was a bit of a crazy driver, weaving in and out between the traffic. When we got there he said ‘Very far, madam, 150 rupees’. We couldn’t believe his cheek – he obviously knew exactly where he was going and he is the one who set the price!! It was obviously a fair price though as coming back we paid the other rick driver 80 rupees. Arriving at City Centre, from the outside it didn’t look very promising. The building didn’t seem to be complete and there didn’t seem to be anyone around. I kept saying to my mum ‘Are you sure we’re in the right place?’ We walked around the corner and saw the main entrance and quite a few people. So, off we went. The shops, although there were only two good ones, were massive and spanning over three floors! We spent a couple of hours in ‘Lifestyle’ and had a very strong cappuccino in the café there, which we got free with the cookies we had bought in the shop. The shop had everything from clothes to toys to household items. From there we went to ‘Landmark’ (the other big shop), which had the best bookshop I have seen in Chennai. It was on par with Waterstones and had such an amazing selection that we spent over an hour in just the book section. Other things they had were a good selection of CDs and DVDs and a stationery section. In total we were shopping around City Centre for five hours!! I’d definitely go there again.