If you've been in India a while, the capital of Karnataka will probably feel like a long, soothing break from the endless commotion. The first city in India to get electricity, Bangalore continues, in many ways, to blaze the trail in terms of the country's quest for a modern identity. Once known as the Garden City (and less encouragingly as Pensioner's Paradise), the country's most pristine city evolved significantly when the high-tech revolution hit and it suddenly found itself at the center of the nation's massive computer hardware and software industries. Its cosmopolitan spirit fueled as much by its luminous pub and cafe culture as by the influx of international businesspeople, India's high-tech hub has a high-energy buzz, yet it's tangibly calmer and cleaner than most other places in the country, with far and away the best climate of any Indian city -- no doubt the reason the majority of upwardly mobile Indians rank it the number-one city in which to live.