And Chetan Bhagat definitely isn’t one! Well, what did you think? I am going to whine about my life story too? Naaah! There is time for that.
“Two States” – as his new book-cover cries out – is about his struggle to marry the girl he loves. If you remember well, his character is the same person from Five Point Someone – Krish (the loser who falls in love with the professor’s daughter).
In the newest release, the loser turns over a new leaf. He becomes an IIMA graduate, with one of the highest packages in his batch with Citibank, and has a sky-high dream of quitting his job to become a writer.
Chetan Bhagat has been famous for his witty and simple way of delivering his thoughts, a kind of manifestation of how a common man thinks. The success can be measured in terms of the number of directors jumping at his stories (true, no genuine concepts with our Bollywood nowadays)!
But who am I kidding, even though there is no great literature or whatsoever, I have actually ended up reading all four of his books! It can be slapstick humour, or a snail-paced monotonous biography, his stories does pick up pace at the later stages. Though “One night at the call center” was complete bogus, I did enjoy the rest of his books.
Enough of analyzing Bhagat, now back to the book at hand. “Two States” is about the girl from Chennai and the Punjabi munda from Delhi. The initial chapters are snail-paced, as I said. The writing style similar to his other books, at one point of time I was wondering why the hell I actually picked up this book. The culture difference is quite stark, with the garrulous, property-laden North-Indians and the hyper-educated, “The Hindu”-loving South-Indians (for the dumbstruck ones, no it’s the newspaper The Hindu, which it appears from reading the book, is the staple breakfast in Chennai!).
But as I entered his Final Act (which says – Delhi & Chennai & Delhi & Chennai), I actually had bouts of tears and giggles! You can call me over-engrossed or over-indulged with books; I do tend to empathize with characters. And with Bhagat, it is like a conversation with the next door guy, who is venting out to his close friend. Anyways, the book begins with sweet / half-matured / peer-pressured / impulsive / over-spoilt love, which inculcates into a long-drawn struggle of different cultures, misunderstandings, too much of effort and patience to pacify all parties, leading to a short-stint of break-up before things fall back into place.
I was really flabbergasted with one thing – if the book is actually a reality-narrator then it is quite over-whelming to know that Bhagat’s Dad is the way he has portrayed. Maybe that is the first question I will ask him if I ever get to interact with him (high-hopes there!). Whoever has read Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan’s “You Are Here” will know how blatant and frank one can get in her blog / book. Bhagat’s style is similar and he has definitely marketed himself well, IIM graduate after all!
One more thing kind of struck a chord, his decisiveness and aim since early on in life to become a writer. A goal that was so adamant that he knew he had to save some money before he could sit down to write full-time. Does give some hope to folks like me… Snort!
A much awaited and wondrous voyage to the Scotland of India – two days seemed so less.
I am talking about Coorg guys and after a long time, words fail me! Even as I write this travelogue, I am apprehensive that I won’t be able to do justice to the small town nestled in the hills.
For a change, we had made extensive planning of the places we would like to visit and on which days, where to stay (which we inevitably ignore every time), when to start exactly, and when to return – all courtesy my cousin. We were a group of five hence booking a Qualis seemed to turn out cheaper than taking a bus. At a decent rate of 6.5 bucks per km, we were quite happy with the deal.
After a lot of debates, we finally left at 4.30 am on Saturday morning (22nd Aug) with plans to reach the home-stay by 10 am. After reaching Madhekeri, we realized that our abode is another 30+ km towards Talacauvery (I’ll come back to these places again). With the hilly road conditions, it was almost 11 am when we reached Mount Grass – our home-stay – and received a very warm welcome and a hot breakfast by our hostess.
Even before site-seeing, the thing that really excited us was Coorgi food. It is a non-vegetarian’s paradise, and you need to be a complete foodie and a glutton to visit Coorg. Our hostess prepared a breakfast of dosa, a sumptuous lunch of fish and mutton, there was snacks in between and for dinner (hold your breath) pork and chicken!!! Of course the guys hogged to their hearts’ content, I went to bed without dinner after the heavy snacks.
One can comfortably stay and relax in Coorg for a week. An amazing backdrop of mountains with clouds creating a misty hat, the harvest green in front of your eyes, and the constant spring weather with mild drizzles, all you need is a book and your loved one with you. Trust me, you will just not feel like returning. We have already vowed to make a longer trip soon!
For a hastened site-seeing three days is optimal. To list down a few places – Talakavery, Dubare, Abby Falls, Raja’s Seat, Madhikeri Fort, Golden Temple, Nagarahole National Park, and Bhagamandala (Sangam).
I’ll explain each locale in the follow-up of this article. Till then relish the idea of enormous meals, lazy life amongst hills, reaching out to the clouds, a book, mild music in the background, and croaking of frogs and insects’ buzz at nightfall – heavenly combo!
A little delay in the follow up to our Coorg trip, but hope you can refresh your memory from the 1st part of the article. Yummy food, wonderful mountainside and cozy town, that’s all I can harp on again and again. So before you get totally pissed, let me take you to the details of the site-seeing that I mentioned last time.
As I said, we were staying in a home-stay which was just 15 km from Talakavery, it was the first place we visited the day we arrived in Coorg. It is the place where Cauvery River originates and every October on a particular day, water gurgles out of a hole in the ground.
Our hostess / aunty asked us to be there around 4 pm so that we can experience cutting through white fog and rain. Well, she was mostly right because the feeling of driving though sheer cloud is something beyond words! What we missed out on was the climb up 380 stairs at Talakavery. It supposedly gives a panoramic view of the valley below, which the cloud had completed shrouded.
I missed out Bhagamandala / Sangam before Talakavery, which is around 8 km before the latter site. Bhagamandala is a temple set amongst cloud covered mountains and overseeing the confluence of three rivers (though one of the rivers is hidden). The temple itself is very peaceful and beautiful.
Next day we went to Abby Falls, a dangerous but picturesque waterfall. It is known to devour quite a few adventurous ones every year if you are not careful enough. There is no direct access to reach the water, though a bridge is made across it and you can actually feel the water spray at you even when you are standing 100 feet away. All these sites have their own history and lore, so it will be quite interesting if you keep a tab on the trivia for each place.
Raja’s Seat or the sunset point is well-known for its expansive view of the mountains and the wide open greenery across the valley. Due to the on-and-off rains and the fog, we couldn’t manage to see the sunset but the columns of clouds over the mountains were a view in itself. It looked as if the fog is streaming down in pillars and trying to touch the ground. Plus the lush green is simply breathtaking!
Dubare forest, more famous for its elephants, is a place where you can feed the mammals, watch them take baths, ride them and play with them. I was really excited about the place since white water rafting is also present here. But tough luck, we reached the place around 3 pm and the elephant camp gets over by 12 noon. We asked around for rafting, it was 700 bucks per person for a 7.5 km distance and 1.5 hours of dashing across the water. But it started pouring and my desire to go for rafting also went unfulfilled.
Golden temple – my, what an architecture that is! Our initial plans were to skip it, thinking it to be just another temple, but we would have really missed out on the trip if we hadn’t visited it. Vibrant and colourful to the core, this Buddhist monastery reminded us of Sikkim or any North Eastern town. In fact the whole area around the temple was Buddhist settlement, which gave a religious and heavenly charm to the place.
We didn’t have time to visit the other two famous places – Madhikeri Fort and Nagarahole National Park – due to time constraint, but went to see the lighting at Mysore Palace on our way back.
We came back with lots of fresh, aromatic spices, tea and homemade chocolates in our bag. Overall, it was an excellent trip. Two days seemed so less! Three long weekends are coming up guys; the small town nestled in the hills is definitely worth a visit.
Link to our Coorg pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/sanjula.guha/Coorg2223Aug0903#
“…But the name game involves only male names. Because, if it’s a girl, Laila has already named her.” Don’t curse me for giving away the very last sentence of “A Thousand Splendid Suns” but trust me; you won’t be able to gauge the significance of the phrase without reading the book.
There were a couple of reasons that made me pick up the book at Crosswords. Primarily, it was the hype created around it and my colleague went out of his way to recommend it (thanks Venkat!). And the second reason is of course, after Kite Runner I knew that I can rely on Khaled Hosseini when it comes to pulling through a sensitive issue.
Well, I was also a bit wary of the topic since there has been an overdose of Afghanistan in my reading list – parts of Shantaram, Kite Runner and then parts of Age of Kali. And it’s always so much pain, torture and bloodshed involved; I grew kind of immune to it by the end of this 4th read.
I am sure everyone has tried watching the movie remakes of books they loved and there are tons of them in the industry! Only thing is there are very few script writers who can live up to the essence of the books. City of Joy was a complete disaster, Kite Runner was half in Afghani, and Da Vinci Code was tangential.
The point is I DO NOT intend to watch when Shantaram is released and if A Thousand Splendid Suns is made into a motion picture. Blood has always been my weak link. I can see thrillers which are without hints of bloodshed, like Jackie Chan flicks and sci-fi action like Transformers.
To come back to the book I started talking about, it involves the lives of two women who were poles apart, and pulled and bound together with all-pervading ‘love’. The amazing intertwining of the ups and, more frequently, downs in the lives of the duo are beautifully carved by Hosseini. It does start off slow, with almost the 1st couple of hundred pages dedicated to building the foundation of the story, but the way it picks up pace after a point is so gripping that it can challenge a thriller-fiction writer.
There were a couple of issues which I feel were unanswered. One – Rasheed’s surprised look out of the window when he married Mariam and took her to Kabul and second – Tariq’s headaches towards the end. I won’t speak further, read for yourself.
The 400 odd pages also left me pondering on the chaotic lives of the Afghanis. Raids after more raids; the incessant plundering and invasions by Soviets and U.S., Mujahedins and of course the Talibans. The number of deaths, loss of property, destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas; reading about them is so unnerving; I can’t even dare to imagine the reality which swept over the country in the last three decades.
And worst, the treatment meted out to the women – the beatings by husbands, the lack of hospitals, deprivation of education and right to hold office, and complete lack of freedom. Phew…!!!
The thoughts are getting a bit too depressing so I’ll move on. The wondrous part of the book was that the very last paragraph was a tear-jerker. Throughout the book, however much tremulous situations became, it’s really amazing Hosseini could actually reach the nadir in the very end. To hold on to the last straws of hope and dream of living a better life, without discarding one’s responsibilities – a very out-of-the-world feeling!
After these mind-rattling books, I am planning to move on to fiction now; a Stephen King is in queue. Hope to shrug off the disturbing thoughts about worldly sorrows for a while.
Have you guys ever tried to redefine your life, and all you could manage to come up with were synonyms? Off late I had been feeling exactly that way, and had to get out of the city for a few days. That's how the Pondicherry trip was conceived.
But as with all things, what Man proposes God disposes. We missed our bus on 26th of June, Friday evening due to some extremely displeasing turn of events. So on early Saturday morning we started out in a cab. Even though we left by 7am, it took us almost six and a half hours to reach Pondicherry! So whoever says going in your own vehicle would take at least 1 hour lesser than what the bus takes, do a double-check!
We got some traffic till Hosur, but once past that, driving conditions were good. The air was still cool and the road surface lovely. But once you reach Krishnagiri, don't go on the flyover, instead take the left from NH 7, and after about 500mt, take the right turn. You get up on the NH 66, and this goes straight to Pondicherry. This road isn't really worthy of being called a National Highway! It’s a double-lane, pockmarked road with no lane markers and KSRTC buses plying through the same stretch. Our earlier average speed of 70 km/ph tanked down to 40 km/ph. A word of caution – if you intend to eat on the way, I suggest you have some heavy breakfast at Krishnagiri and lunch in Pondi. NH 66 goes through the backwaters of civilisation. Look out for HP gas pumps to find a washroom in case of an emergency.
We finally reached Pondicherry around 2pm, and went straight to the Rishi Aurobindo ashram. Beyond the busy street, the entrance is just 10mt away. And when you are standing besides the great sage's resting place, the outside world just falls off from your consciousness, and your mind goes blank! The only thing I remember from that first visit is the pattern in which the brilliantly coloured flowers were arranged on the tomb. The next day when we visited the place again, I noticed that there was a new pattern in which the flowers were arranged.
We stayed at the Ashram for about 20mins on the first visit. We hadn’t booked a room, so searching for a hotel was very high up on the list. Luckily June-end happens to be off-season in Pondi. Unluckily the weather was mind-numbingly humid, hovering around 80%, and there was no tourist rush for the exact same reason. We managed to get lodging on our fourth attempt, at a hotel facing the sea. The service was pretty much up to the mark, except that you should go out for the big meals. The restaurants are good and decently priced, but the room delivery was a disaster.
After a couple of hours’ rest at the hotel, we set out on a quick trip around the beach road for the sunset. The evenings are pretty cool with a strong breeze that makes walking around quite a joy. We visited the old lighthouse first. Though no one is allowed to go in, we were pretty sure that the view from up there would have been amazing with dusk settling in. We also went to the main square with a live band playing both English and Kannada songs. You just laze around and take your pick as to which ones to lend an ear to! Right opposite the main square is a statute of the Mahatma, with eight beautifully sculptured pillars surrounding it. These are from the 12th century Chola dynasty, and off course they have been transported here and erected by the ASI (for the ignoramus, that’s Archaeological Survey of India).
On the beach road beside the statue of Mahatma, there's another very interesting place you should visit – an 80-year old coffee shop, La Cafe. The coffee can compete easily with Barista and CCD, and the ambience is mind-blowing! Just imagine sipping an Irish coffee with the sea breeze tussling your hair, listening to the breaking of the waves and looking at the dark water stretching to eternity!
We wound up our first day's stay at around 9pm and decided to get to the hotel and order dinner from room-service. That is the mistake I was talking about a while back. But well, you win some and lose some. We kept the room AC switched off and the balcony door open. Good night's sleep!
Now to continue with our journey in Pondicherry, we woke up without an intervening alarm at 5:30am. Nice cool breeze blowing and an almost cloudless sky turning an orangish purple. Haven't had better starts to the day! And just when the sun is about to come up, in trots a troop of about 20 people, standing right at the edge of the beach road, babbling and clicking pictures. Thanks people for the reminder that I am still in India! We had some 20 minutes of quiet before the circus, and a few marvelous shots of the sky gradually changing colour. So thankfully, it was not a complete disaster.
We had a quick breakfast and decided to visit Auroville before the sun made its ascent to the higher reaches. We started out about 8:30 in an auto-rickshaw. One small advice - bargain at will with the auto-wallahs and do not agree to anything above 200 bucks. Auroville is about 15kms away, and if you plan to go to the beach nearby, then the round trip would be anywhere between 35 and 40kms. So, another 30 odd bucks added in will be a good deal.
It took us a little over 40mins to get to Auroville. Once you enter the fenced area, after 50mts you will see the main information center on your left. This building also serves as a museum to the life and work of the Mother, and showcases the achievements of Aurovillites in the areas of sustainable and eco-friendly development. We also watched a 5mins video on Auroville and its extravagant architecture. The Mother started thinking about environmentally-sustainable development more than 30 years ago. The world could count the number of people with similar thoughts at that time!
There is a dome built in honour of the Mother that acts as the meditation center for Aurovillites. It is called the Matri-mandir and is a spectacular view, rising over 100mts from the ground in the shape of a sphere and is built about 200mts from a very old banyan tree (around 300 years old). By the time we reached back the information center it was already past 11, and the scorching heat of the previous day had returned to haunt us. So we dropped our plan to visit the beach, and headed back to Pondi for a cool lunch at the hotel's restaurant.
With the sun blazing away in full glory, we took a nap for about an hour and started out on foot at 3pm. First destination was the Pondicherry museum that houses a good coin collection dating back to almost 300AD, and a decent collection of sculptures, mostly from the Chalukya dynasty. Though Belur-Halebidu offers a greater variety of styles and concepts in sculpting from a similar period, the museum does not bore you. We went to the Ashram after this, and spent some perfectly quiet minutes besides the great Rishi. We also went through some of the publications by the Ashram, and though the themes are similar, the number of languages covered in those publications is quite amazing.
A brief walk to the old lighthouse on our way to La Cafe from the Ashram, and another ½ hour spent at coffee shop – heaven! The next hour went in a frenzy of shopping, and by the time we laid our guns (read wallets) down, it was already 6pm.
There's a jetty that is visible from the beach road, near to the Port Authority enclosure. Walk down the beach road and just as the road turns right, you will come across a gas station. There's a narrow road branching off from the beach road at this point that reaches the dock gates. There are no entry charges. Walk through the gate and to your north-north-west (at '10-o-clock') you will see another gate about 200mts away. That gate leads straight to the jetty. Families need to shell out about 50 bucks per person, but an all-guys group can always bargain with the policemen at the dock gates.
The sight from the tip of the jetty is mind-blowing. It ends around 150mts into the sea, so the breeze is pretty strong there, and by the time we went, all the lights had been lit up, so the whole coastline was a series sparkling dots! The new light house also started sending directional beams about every 45secs. We stayed for 30mins since it had become quite dark and returned to the hotel.
After a quick shower and a happy dinner later, we checked out of the hotel by 8:30pm. The return bus was at 10:30pm, and we reached the pick-up point around 9:30pm. Well, let’s just say things went as per schedule, the Indian Stretchable Time schedule! The bus finally arrived at 11pm and started off at 11:15pm. The return journey was not very pleasant or memorable. Not exactly the kind of journey one can expect to end a trip like this. We reached Bangalore about 7am, and to the beginning of another long, drawn-out week. Guess I need to pack up again soon, just can't see me sticking to that chair for long!
Ahem, don’t bother about the subject. Am sure that all of you have been irritated the days a thought gets stuck on you and it’s very difficult to shrug it off. It can be anything – a song, a dialogue, a completed chore, or a pleasant (or sad – depending on your mood) memory – that will keep haunting you.
Today morning when I got up, very absurdly, my mind got ‘stuck’ on “Aapka yeh jawab……. sach hai”…! There, I see a bulb blink on in the mind of you avid television viewer. Even if you have kept your hands off Star, the news channels and newspapers haven’t allowed the show to go unnoticed. “Sach ka saamna”, another serial ‘inspired’ by “The Moment of Truth” in the west.
Now, I haven’t been thinking about the show per-say, but more from the point of view of the announcer who gets the privilege of stating if the answer was “sahi” or “galat”. That too with such melodramatic pauses; you need training for that tone, huh? I mean, give me a break, Star must be paying that guy for bonkers!
What about a boy and girl connection in every other advertisement that is made? Even if there is no story, just push a couple of models and voila, you have a promotion clip ready!
That got me thinking, does media and the glamour world have the maximum number of such clichéd jobs? What about the corporate world? Surely we don’t need THAT many managers to oversee actual work done, or their indispensable role to hold the innumerable meetings.
Value-addition, they say at these humongous retail outlets. Every corner has a boy/girl stepping up to help you, even if you don’t require it. They will be at your heels, sometimes with a look that you are as kleptomaniac as one can get! Very embarrassing guys, trust me.
No point musing further, everyone needs a job, anything for the bread and butter. And some people will always be lucky and get luckier as the money market gets crazier by the day. Party time people! Enjoy…!
Positive thinking, optimism, fate, better future – is what we are living for, we are working towards or believing in. And the biggest word amongst them – HOPE – a hope for a better job, a better lifestyle, and of course for a lovelier relationship. So how does it feel when our “hope” plays tricks on us?
They say that hope keeps you alive, keeps your will to carry on against societal odds. It gives you the sudden bouts of euphoria in your gut, in anticipation of the wonderful dream you want to live in.
And hope results in praying. An endless praying to pacify the hope that kindles in your heart. Think about the innumerable incidences, occurring at this exact moment while you are reading this piece of article. A woman praying that the swell in her belly results in a boy, so that she doesn’t have to face the wrath of her in-laws. A boy striving hard with his science to scrape through his exams, parental pressure can’t get worse. A girl hopes against hope to sustain her love-life. A poor beggar-child hopes someone gives him a yummy pastry that is displayed in the windows of Sweet Chariot. An old government employee prays that, next day being Monday, his pension is going to be cleared.
All these glorious words are so intertwined – expectation, adjustment, respect, compromise, relationships, and love for that matter. It gets so messed up in your head, sometimes you tend to loose your identity, miss out on the balancing act of life.
There is also the paranoia of the cycle of ups and downs. One day you are happy but deep down you know something dramatic is in store for you. Somehow, hope plays a better role in the opposite case, morose times might lead to a delightful surprise, you never know!
The only respite is hoping that everything is going to be resolved. That the woman will have a baby boy or someone will take pity and treat the beggar-child with a pastry. And when it doesn’t – well, you still live on, taking one day at a time, hoping that the next day might lead you a bit further towards your dream. For people who give up, and finally are called cowards, take their own lives. They don’t have anyone left to rely or fall back on.
So isn’t hope cruel? To survive, you have to come down to the banal life of any other commoner on the road and continue the rat-race. Guess the “Great One” up there didn’t leave us an option, eh...!!!
A long-awaited destination, a curiosity and a fascination – the thirst of all were quenched! I won’t say Kanyakumari is a treat for the adventure lovers but it has a different charm in itself. The conjunction of the three seas and being the southernmost part of India – with Sri Lanka being just 300 km away – you feel like you have hit one corner of the world.
Kanyakumari is some 680 km and by bus it will take around 12 hours to reach. To save time, we took the shorter, and of course costlier route. On Saturday early morning, we took a Kingfisher flight from Bangalore to Trivandrum and then a cab after that for the 80 km distance till Kanyakumari district. There are limited flight options though, the planes themselves are small and are two-seaters throughout.
The flight timing was one and a half hours, then another 4 hours from Trivandrum. But it was worth the expense because the green outfield that lay before us on the way is a treat for the eyes. We reached by noon and luckily the driver took us to a hotel with a view of the Thiruvallur and Vivekananda Rock, set amongst the majestic water waves. We stayed in a place called – Sebaa Palace – and the room cost us 650 bucks a night, a lot lesser than a hotel called Hotel Sea View (4,000 bucks a night), which of course had a complete, unrestricted view of the sea. But it is an option for people who are ready to shell out some extra cash. Again, be sure of booking a place during the peak season.
Many people warned us about the rains and humidity in June, because of which we had our rain gear ready with us. But we were quite lucky since we faced mild rainfall, along with lots of sun and wind.
An evening’s rest and a walk in the market refreshed us enough for an early rise the next day to watch the sunrise. Though it was a bit cloudy, we could catch a glimpse of the red sky. Around 9 am we headed off for the rocks. The steamers cost 20 bucks for a round trip. The route is – shore till Vivekananda Rock, from there to Thiruvallur Statue and then back to shore – none of the short distance ferries are accessible on foot. The time it takes to wait for the next ferry to frisk you to the next destination – you really will wish for a much faster foot-bridge.
The wind is extremely strong in the two rocks, it feels wonderful. You can buy some memorabilia at the Vivekananda Rock. There is one map here that tracks the summer and winter solstice, and a sun-clock. Thiruvallur statue itself is 133 ft tall (besides the pedestal it is put on!!!). The local people said, during Tsunami, the water reached till the statue’s shoulder! No surprises that Kanyakumari was one of the worst affected regions during the natural calamity.
We were back on shore by 11.30 am and went straight for the Kanyakumari temple, set right near the beach. We were sweating like pigs by the time we came out. There are quite a few shell, conch and clothes shops on the way to the temple. I noticed a new tradition in the temples here, which many of you must be aware of already – the male population has to discard their clothing covering their torso before they can enter the temple premises.
A quick lunch later, we started off for Padmanabhapuram Palace, Thiraparappu Falls and Hanuman temple. The entire distance was a round trip of around 150 km through Kerela borders.
Well, it will still be an understatement if I say the palace was humongous! Set amongst beatific, cloud covered hills; the wooden palace was definitely the king’s pride. Even after an hour’s walk in the palace and skirting a portion, we still couldn’t see the entire place. The thing that struck me the most was the flooring of the entire building. Since there was no cement 300 years back, the floor composition was made of jaggery, lime, egg white, river sand, charcoal. It was almost edible and to think of the volume of the materials that went in!
The Thiraparappu waterfall wasn’t as exciting enough as we thought. It was crowded with many people bathing in the artificial fall. Also, many of them were drunk, making the place quite unsuitable for family outings. A bit higher up, there is Thiraparappu temple and boating area where public nuisance is much lesser.
I will suggest you go to the Hanuman temple only if you want to give alms to the lord. It was again quite dark and hot inside, not much of my taste. It is just 18 km from the district, so you can stop by anytime.
One day’s activities finally got over – and you can well imagine how tired we were. We were asleep before we hit the bed.
Rising to another morning’s sunrise and our day of returning, we went for a walk till Sangam and Gandhi Memorial. Sangam is the place from where is it said the three distinct colours of Arabian, Indian and Bay of Bengal can be made out. Gandhi Memorial has his portrait, etched on granite and a rock pedestal. It is said that on 2nd of October every year, the sun shines down for twenty minutes on the rock from a hole above. We chatted with the caretaker – Jalaal – who gave us the details. Jalaal is with the memorial for an astonishing 38 years, so it felt great talking to someone with such fervor for the place.
After a quick bath at the hotel, we checked out and took a cab around noon so that we could visit Kovalam beach. En route, we also visited Kanyakumari church. Our flight was at 7.45 pm, which gave us enough time to stop over at the beach. A lazy lunch and sudden bursts of rain, the rough and vibrant sea, climb a small rock for better view of the waves and coffee at an open air restaurant by the water – it did feel nice.
The beach was just 20 minutes away from the airport and we reached way too early for the flight. The small airport and its meager crowd was quite a different and refreshing experience from the ever-busy Bangalore airport. We were home by 10.30 pm and ready for office the next day.
Take out 10% of the highly cosmopolitan Bangalore crowd and build a new city for them in Hosur. Now hold that thought. I shall come back to it in a while.
The 1st Sunday of June, the weather is so darn amazing that it felt like a crime to stay indoors. Also, we wanted to go to some waterfalls, with the recent rains swelling up the water level.
I had heard a lot about Hogenakkal. The Cauvery River flows through it and divides Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The water flows into Chennai, providing the drinking water for the citizens. The added attraction of the falls is the shooting of a couple of famous songs from the movies Roja and Guru. So on Sunday, we set out around 9.30am, with the target to reach the location in 3&1/2 hours.
What really amazed me was the absolutely great road throughout the entire 180km. Even as we crossed the villages, we came across not a single crater or a bump. In fact, after we crossed into Tamil Nadu border, it was a biker’s paradise and a driver’s highway to hell! You just won’t feel like pressing on that brake lever.
With the green and serene surroundings, almost a trickle of traffic, and the perfect weather to match the excitement, I could have sat in the car the entire day without complaining.
Now to come back to the first sentence, I don’t intend to spoil the virgin beauty of Tamil Nadu, but trust me, the faction of people who love peace and quiet, and clean breathing, the idea of shifting them just beyond Hosur won’t be a bad idea – especially if it is voluntary. So we will have a reciprocal benefit, Bangalore can relieve some of its ever-increasing population and Tamil Nadu can welcome some urban development. And they won’t be far from Bangalore also; it is just 40km away.
Hogenakkal seemed like a mini-Niagara Falls to me. It gets even more beautiful after monsoon, since some of the bigger falls are dry now. The only activity here will be boat-rides and bathing, so be sure to carry an extra set of dry attire with you. The big circular shaped boats take you right under the waterfalls, which is an unforgettable experience. In fact, the view from top of the cliff takes your breath away!
One more fantastic thing that we got to see was rock holes made by whirlpools, which drilled the granites right till the top. The rock-faces are as smooth as a porcelain cup!
The waterway we had taken becomes inaccessible during monsoon and the boatmen have to take an alternate route for the rides. From what we saw, a three hours’ stay is enough to enjoy Hogenakkal and we were back home by 8pm.
I intend to go again after monsoon, when the water swells to its fullest and reaches its purest and frothiest white!
Note: I have uploaded some pictures in the following link http://picasaweb.google.com/sanjula.guha/Hogenakkal#
Ever wondered how it might feel if your to-be in-law looks at your butt and says – oh it’s wet!!!
Now before your imagination starts galloping to conclusions, I’ll give you the correct context to the build-up of the comment.
On the 2nd Sunday of June we went to Hogenakkal – a lovely day trip in Tamil Nadu. The ‘we’ includes my fiancé, his mom and me of course. As most of you must be aware of the fantabulous waterfalls, which divides Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, the only activity here is a ride on the circular shaped boats. The end result – you just have to have a spare set of clothing if you want to return dry and ‘safe’ from being commented on!
The mistake I did was, the bag-pack I carried was of cotton material and the intelligent girl as I am, I had my fresh set of garments in that bag. I was quite oblivious to the fact that it conveniently got wet while we were taking our boat-ride.
Back on shore, with my pair of jeans and top dripping wet, I couldn’t wait to get out of them and you can imagine my shock when I discovered the disaster in my bag! So changing into them didn’t help much. Going back to the comment now, my to-be-mom-in-law happily and mischievously chirped – oh your butt is still wet!!!!! And my fiancé also HAD to peep in unabashedly.
I didn’t know how to react; all I could do was ask them to walk in front of me. At least the general passers-by were too busy to notice.
I had my bit of fun when, out in the sun, she turned her back towards the heat to dry her sari (since she didn’t have a fresh set of attire). I followed suit, it was like a mutual respect and acceptance since both of us wanted to get a little drier before getting into the car.
Moral of the story – Don’t go out of your way to impress your in-laws, you can’t change your comical self, so go out and have fun!
The subject sounds like an animation movie sequel but I’ll only be concluding my trip to Sundarbans in this article. In the last article, I took you through how to reach there, the accommodations, and the time you need to take off from office to visit the land of tigers.
The best thing that I liked about Sundarbans is the vast greenery, clean blue sky, and the innumerable islands that form the complete forest area. It has around 200 islands, which are part of both India and Bangladesh. Then there is the rise and fall of tide, the water recedes early in the morning and by late evening, you can hear the gurgling of the water almost near the hotel where you put up.
A couple of items you should buy from the place are – honey and tiger paw prints. You get the purest of honeys in the area, fresh from the forests. The paws are imprints taken to determine the number of tigers alive in the area, as well as the sex of the beasts. These two things make for a perfect visit, a memorabilia of the place and a feeling of being as close as possible to the ‘wild’.
Amongst the places to visit, there is a museum at Shojnekhali, Hamilton’s bungalow in Gosaba, tower at Sudhanna Khali from where you can see the animals at large, and Sonakhali where there are some guest houses and small shops. Barriers and check points stand tall in Sudhanna Khali from where you might get to see some deer and if you are extremely lucky, a tiger. The most adventurous part is that all these spots can be reached only through water body.
And don’t think that your day of fun ends at sun-down. If you are willing to take a little pain, you can contact the Forest Officer and obtain permits for tiger-watching at night. But the chance of catching one in action is almost nil. You can also spend the evening around a nice and cozy bonfire with a guitar and a bottle of beer.
Sundarbans is a haven for bird watchers and photographers. Migratory birds are pretty abundant here, displaying their multi-coloured plumes. The sunset and sunrise gives picturesque view of the extended Bay of Bengal. The golden reflection of the sun poses a fantastic catch for a photographer.
A word of caution: drink safe. Even though the place is a government aided tourism haunt, the water used for cleaning utensils in the boats is from the river where all these steamers function. Also, if you are sea-sick, you might come back with an upset tummy, so keeping some medicines and bottled water at hand will be useful.
I know too much packing and planning ruins a trip, but trust me, for some trips you have to have prior knowledge to enjoy a comfortable and fruitful holiday. Sundarbans is one of those. Have fun!
Moving away from weekend outings, this time I thought I’ll take you to the wilderness of Sundarbans. A five-day off can take you to amazing greenery, with lovely blue water, and the vast open sky. It is a vast area covering 4264 sq km in India alone, out of which 2585 sq km forms the largest Tiger Reserve and National Park in India.
One trivia about visiting the place: there is a constant anticipation of catching a glance of an animal, wild and free, for any tourist, but all you can see might be some poor monkey in search of food or a skinny croc lazing on the coast. In fact when I went there, the first animal we came across was a monkey and we were so excited to see it, it was almost like we have never seen them in the cities! The colourful birds, on the other hand, will be a treat to the eyes.
To go back to the five-day take-off, I did include the weekends. Two days and three nights are enough for the visit but if you are flying down to Kolkata, you might as well visit Murshidabad, which is famous for its historical ruins.
A 3&1/2 hours’ drive from the City of Joy will take you to Basanti, Shonakhali, from where you will have to book a personal steamer (sufficient for 10-12 people) across the water. There are a few other convenient points of entry in to the Sunderbans, like Canning port (Diamond Harbour to Kakdwip and Namkhana) which also offers similar facilities of booking steamers/launches. If you leave around 7am, you will reach the coast around 10.30am. There is parking near the coast for 50 bucks per day, because steamers will be the only mode of transport thereafter.
You can choose to stay in one of the small hotels on the shore or if you are adventurous enough, you can stay in your steamers also. It will be better if you book hotel rooms beforehand during peak season (i.e. in winters). The boats are self sufficient, with cooking area below, a make-shift washroom and the open sitting area on the deck of the boat, where the driver’s cabin is also situated. The only scare of staying on water overnight is the possibility of robbery by pirates, since the Bangladesh border is also very near to the place.
Sounds exciting? Well, I’ll leave the post here now and conclude the extravaganza of Sundarbans in my next article. Till then, start planning!
Staying in Bangalore and not visiting Mysore is quite unimaginable, or that is what I thought. I decided to take my friend, who has recently shifted to Bangalore, for a day-trip on Good Friday’s weekend. But the visit to the City of Palace was a little less than a disaster!
Three to four years back, a day trip to Mysore was like visiting a haven for the daily-harassed Bangalorean, with lots of greeneries, lovely locales, and of course the un-missable Mysore Palace and Vrindavan Gardens. But the actual visit to the “must-visit” city took me more by shock than surprise.
We left at 7am and wanted to cover as much as possible in the day. We hired a car with AC, which was the one good decision we took, or else the scorching heat and the excessive sweat would have left us dehydrated to the bone by the end of the day.
The trip started with a whirlwind tour of Srirangapatna, just 20 km before Mysore. We went to the Sriranganathaswamy temple, followed by a visit to the spot where Lord Wellesley found the body of the great Tipu who fell to a bullet from the British soldiers, led on to Sangam, Gol Gombuz, and Meenaxi Temple. These three were at a distance of 2-3 km of each other but what struck us most was, with each stop we took, we had to shell out 20 bucks for parking. Money plays a great role these days, the toll gates, entry fees, extra charges for camera, in fact at Mysore Palace, we noticed that entry fees for foreigners are exactly 10 times to what we are paying!!!
Understandable, India is trying to promote its “incredibility” to it visitors but not to the extent that you literally exploit them. The veil of the age-old welcome feeling India used to give is lifting up. Commercialization is taking a toll on the actual beauty and pleasure of a tour.
“Sir, you have to pay here to enter the mosque”, “Two rupees per person to keep your shoes”, “The charge is 100 rupees to take your still camera in and 200 if you have a video camera”, “Pay 10 rupees for queue-less special entry to the temple”, “Three rupees for you to pose and I’ll click your picture in your camera”! These are some of the sentences we heard throughout the day.
True, maintenance cost is required for all the sites, but aren’t these trusts given enough funds by the tourism department to take care of the relics? The tourists are here to savor the beauty, learn about the lost heritage, relax and be carefree. Instead, it is more of a pain because one has to prepare so much beforehand that the whole anticipation is lost.
I know I digressed from the topic but the frustration was too much to hide. Getting back to Mysore, the first and possibly the tallest church I have ever visited personally, the Philomena’s Church was our first destination. Everything about the structure was grand, including more than 5000 name plaques that have been engraved in the walls of the catacomb. We didn’t enter Mysore Palace because of the sheer swarm of people. Instead we took a walk along the perimeter of the palace and had some of the best views of eagles swooping around the spires of the domes.
Then it was the turn to visit Chamundi Hills, which was quite a peaceful visit with nice views from the temple. On our way to the Vrindavan Gardens, we halted at the Karanji Kere Lake, which is right adjacent to the Mysore Zoo and a paradise with some amazing species of migratory birds. That half-an-hour was probably the most peaceful and quiet time of our whole trip. We had intended to make a half-an-hour trip to the Vrindavan Gardens, which turned out to be an hour due to one-way traffic diversions and of course the heavy traffic. The garden itself didn’t look less than a seasonal fair, a thousand plus cars, no parking area left and a maddening shoveling inside to move around.
I’ll suggest if you are keen to visit Mysore, go on a weekday. And don’t forget to carry cash since we had a tough time searching for an ATM which actually dispensed money.
We finally made our way out and reached home around 12.30 midnight. A journey of 380 km in one day, the heat, and the traffic squeezed out all our energy and we had dozed off even before our heads hit the pillow!
Don’t kill me for the weird subject line guys! Well, for those who have already been to this natural wonder might have already guessed the place I am referring to. Mekedatu or goat’s leap is a narrow ravine, which forms a passage for the river Cauvery in its course of journey. Legend has it that in some places, the ravine becomes so narrow that a goat can jump over and cross the gorges, hence the name.
It is 90 odd km from Bangalore and is a great one-day getaway from the city humdrums. You can comfortably leave around 10am and be back by 6pm. After crossing the town of Kanakpura, a left turn directs you towards Sangam and Mekedatu. The road directions will prod you on, and still if you are not sure, there are the locals who will always help you out. Around 35 odd km on this route and you reach a junction which forks out for Sangam (on the right) and Mekedatu (on the left).
The first impression of the place will vary, depending on the season – steaming hot from February till pre-monsoon, with water level up to your knees in the stream, and pleasant weather during monsoon till January, with water up to your waist. The heat is even more intolerable, during monsoon because there are tons of rocks alongside the river with very less shade from the sun. Also, be careful of the idiosyncrasies of rowdy tourists, who will prefer to drink and create a nuisance.
You can trek up to a certain level besides the water body, splash around and get tanned, but the major fun is if you take the bus service which is available on the opposite side of the first stream that you have to cross. Battered, age-old buses, suited for ‘trekking’ purpose only, a distance of around 5km and a charge of 40 bucks will take to as far as the gorge – which again is a treat for the eyes. Another attraction is the varied colors and the contour formation on the rocks, a result of the water flowing in and out of the cavities.
Personally, I haven’t been to Sangam yet but if you leave early enough, you can make it to both the places. I will suggest Sangam first, which is the confluence of Arkavathi and Cauvery rivers, then Mekedatu, simply because the former will be quite a treat to your legs after the sunny trek in Mekedatu, and finally Cauvery Fishing Camp, a fishing haven, if you intend to stay overnight.
I did say that the trip can be made in some 8 hours, but for a longer trip, you can go to all of Chunchi falls, Sangam, and Cauvery Fishing Camp, all in the radius of 10km around Mekedatu. The place to stay is the fishing farms that have jungle resorts. Charges are around Rs. 2,200, a double bed, sufficient for maximum 4 people room.
Well, who doesn’t like a visit a peaceful countryside; listen to the innumerable birds chirping; read a book on a boat with a fishing rod waiting for a fish to take the bait; and of course gaze at a star-filled night. An extra day to your weekend and you can pack a couple of jumpers, a book (that is long awaited to be read) and goggles into your car, and drive off to anonymity! If you are craving for these simple luxuries in life, this destination is perfect for you. Have fun!
Note: The thoughts in this article are from November 2008. Posting it now, updates will follow.
If you are thinking this is another lecture on the current scenario of market going haywire, then you are about 10% correct. With the numerous biggies going bankrupt, the “safe” ones are trying out ways and means to save their asses. There is acute lack of funding, with employees being retrenched at the drop of a hat! The joke is around that says there is a shortfall of pink-slips in the market.
Panic has been over-bearing on the people’s minds. Many companies that were taken over had given the option to the employees to join the acquirer’s firm, which most gladly consented to. But tough luck for the people who were simply asked to leave. They were seen walking out of the office premises with their stuff in boxes. It was a sad trudge towards home with an indefinite tension of getting employed again.
Then again, companies also took this opportune moment to declare no raise for their employees. With top tier management giving up their yearly allowances to save the firm’s financial status, it only seems reasonable and even “justified” that the people give up their raise and just be glad with the fact that they have a job at hand.
Now coming to the point I started writing this article about, there are ongoing team changes that are happening because of sudden hacking of funding from the clients. It does seem very easy for people without jobs. They can always stand up and say, “Monsieur, be glad you still have the option of a monthly bulk of money being transferred to your account.” I agree and empathize with them. This article is not to demean their condition. It is about the self-doubt and dread a person goes through while he/she is being shifted to another team.
One – the doubt (and sometimes the fact) that you weren’t productive and important enough for the team to be selected to move out. It’s like implicitly shattering your morale. Two – before you are absorbed in another team, there is always the bell that rings in your head and says that if there is no requirement, they might as well ask you to leave! Moreover, the receiving end of the employee, as in the team that is going to recruit you, will know for sure that the manager is not going to push his/her best employees to them, so they also will be over-cautious of selecting new members.
By now you must have guessed that it is me who has to shift teams within three months’ of joining a company just because the client has no money to fund the entire team.
As for the flip (read better) side, office life is quite lazy due to this redeployment. With the team to change, there is around 10 hours of productive weekly work currently (the operative word here being ‘productive’)! Can you beat that? My project manager calls it honeymoon period and coaxes me to take full advantage of it.
Frankly, my second job has been a lucky break. I landed with a good hike and great work profile just before the economy touched its nadir. The current situation is that I was on the verge of settling down, getting comfy with my colleagues and starting to interact with people around, when this thing popped up! I’ll have to start all over again, of acquainting myself to the new work and people.
I have a problem, not a drinking one though. Throughout my 25 years of life, I have been very conscious about what others think about me. And by some weird calculations, I figure out if a person is better or worse than me. You know what I mean? Let me try and explain it. I get a fantastic instinct in my gut that ‘voila babes’! This nerd (in both male and female version) is better than me in some respect and ‘kapoot’ – there goes my confidence up the fire-shoot. I stammer a bit, smile a bit and pull through the conversation as smoothly as possible. Trust me; I do it pretty well too.
Of all surprises, guess what people actually think about me with about 3-4 months’ acquaintance! If I tell them I am a worry-head, they shrug it off and say – “You don’t look like one”. Now that comes as a pleasant comment for me, for someone who has heard throughout in life - “Your tension gets us nervous” (my school friends will testify happily).
Anyways, the point I am trying to make here is that the redeployment thing didn’t really help my confidence here but I have been consoling myself saying that it is easy to transfer a new recruit to another process.
To get back to what I started with saying, you can call me plain lucky. As the age-old adage goes – All’s well that ends well. I will be commencing work soon with a similar profile but seemingly better learning. Tons of work and responsibilities is imminent, so I am happy! You can say that all the apprehension bore fruit.
To sum it up, would like to say that my heart reaches out to people who are actually going through terrible nightmares due to job hacking. On my part, it is just another day, with a bit of learning, a bagful of dreams, and a couple of hours of free time in office which allowed me to finish this article.
“Visit Me”! No, it is not the name of the place I am going to tell you about, but that’s what it conveys when you see the extravagant entry to this humongous fun park outside Bangalore.
Innovative Film City is 40 odd km away from Banerghatta Road. You just need to find your way on to Mysore highway and from there on 25 odd km towards Mysore. Mind you, do not miss the fork which leads you to the park, or else you will end up almost in Mysore. Just keep a look-out for Wonder-la, Film City’s fork is around 7 km after that on the left and another 2 km once you are on the forked out road.
The highway is a driver’s paradise, sit back and step on the accelerator, but do drive safe. If you take the toll-road from Banerghatta to reach Mysore road, it is even better. It will also be fun to ride your bike to the park, simply because of the windy and lesser polluted roads.
The entry gate has some sculptures of European architecture, and with the pictures of the amusements painted on it, it gives a very presentable welcome to the visitors. The fun part is you can spend one whole day here!
Innovative was inaugurated in 2007, in the lines of Ramoji Film City in Hyderabad. I haven’t visited the latter but was quite content with the Bangalore version of it. But whenever you go, you need to have a fun-loving and adventurous buddy group to accompany you. Or else there is nothing exciting to just look around, unless of course if you would like to window-shop several kilometers away from the city! The place itself is ensconced in the middle of hills and is a lovely getaway from city humdrums. Some of the must-see stuffs here are – Ripley’s Believe It or Not, Mirror Maze, and 4-D cinema in Fun City. The rest of the attractions depend on your time and budget. There is Tussaud’s museum, Roller Skating, Dinosaur Park, Cartoon City, Aqua World, the gaming consoles at Fun City, horse riding, Karaoke, Kid’s World, and etcetera. As per recent news, Charlie Chaplin’s 67 feet sculpture is also going to be set up in this park. The entry fees is 50 bucks and each ride ranges from 50-100 bucks. If you want a package for all the attractions combined, it will be 699 bucks.
One more thing that really excited me was the Stallion restaurant in Wild Wild West. The place is set in a huge compound and they have very nicely replicated the cowboy environment, complete with sand and hovels set in their style. The Mexican food here is not exorbitantly costly, so you can sit back and have a nice time inside the restaurant or take your food while sitting outside underneath the king-size cowboy hats! There are other choices of eateries in Innovative Film City, catering to different palates.
The place is still under construction. There are quite a few buildings and rides which are coming up. But these don’t hinder you from having fun. The place is pretty organized and clean. If you plan a trip on a sunny day, be sure to keep a hat on or lots of sunscreen (message for the girls, of course!).
So what are you waiting for? Enjoy a lovely outing!
Scrrrreeecchhhh........dharrrr... karannnnngggg... jhaannnnn... and hence follows a gush of swears and curses, some of which you may not know of also but will pick up at the next incident...
I am sure you know by now what I am talking about...
Traffic these days is malicious, and traffic signals are like R.K. Narayan's story, "Martyr's Corner". A smart swivel of the biker, a practiced swerve of the car driver, the bullies of truck drivers who claim the road to be theirs, the Volvo buses who take for granted that they have the right of way, not to mention the drivers of state buses and the auto rickshaws who were never taught traffic rules (or rather they prefer the bliss in ignorance).
Minor road accidents have become a part and parcel of our daily lives. Everyone wants to think, "I’m the best" and the rest just goof up!! Maybe they bring along frustrations from home and office too, which they gladly inflict on the passer-by, who might have just managed to scrape past him.
What with the kind of soot and black smoke that some of the vehicles emit, it’s a wonder that they may possess a PUC!!
Then there are the vulnerable pedestrians who really don't care to wait for the green signal for them to walk. The constant movement of the vehicles has made them loose their road sense too. They are buffaloes impersonated!! A lazy gait, a cell phone attached to one ear, they cross the road, completely oblivious to the angry honks. The walk kind of says, "Wait dude, I need to cross first!"
Accidents have become inevitable and common-place, what with the high volume of vehicles just managing to fit in the roads. Solution, I see none. A bit more patience and empathy towards others sounds plausible but life's become too fast to retain our humaneness.
To start off, I do agree with you that the subject-line is pretty clichéd, but I wanted to try my hand at some stupid alliteration. So the refined version will be – Kolkata Not Calling.
I have never been a fan of Dominique Lapierre; simply because he couldn’t keep my interest going for his “It Was Five Past Midnight In Bhopal”. I had read around 50 odd pages before I gave it up 2 years back, and it’s still lying deserted under some stack of my books. Of what I remember, it was full of misery of the poor, and so disconnected with each chapter that it finally became a bore.
The point here is not why I didn’t like reading Lapierre then, the point is the same elucidation of misery and disconnection which is holding on to my fascination for “City of Joy”. I was quite apprehensive when I picked up the book to read because Kolkata has been a big debate in life. It is even wondrous because I have never stayed in the city per say – it has always been a brief visit to my numerous relatives or a trip as a tourist to relish the old architecture of the evergreen city.
Kolkata – now to explain why I have always been confused about the place. Some things about the city have been either repelling or fascinating for me. The roads, the countless yellow and black cabs, the feeling of moving on to modern architecture within half a kilometer of a slum, the metro, the sweating heat, the eve-teasing, the dozing passengers in trains and buses, Eden Gardens, Victoria Memorial, the human carts (rickshaws), the expanse of cosmopolitan culture and their acceptability with each other, phew, I can go on and on!
I still feel that the inhabitants of this old capital have a different genre of blood running in their veins. Especially the been-there-for-many-generations crowd here loves the city so much that their mother’s name might as well have been “Kolkata”! They hate the idea of leaving their ancestral home and try their fortune in some new city. Anjan Dutta has created this love very beautifully in his all-time favourite album “Priyo Bondhu”.
As for me, I have always been a bit skeptical of this love and glad that my parents didn’t decide to bring me up here. Mainly because I feel that Kolkata people lack the spirit of adventure. They are so damn happy with the laidback life and too much of family bonding that they are scared to live alone outside their small world. Hold on, I am not generalizing. I have actually seen it happen with one of my own uncles and the situation might well be evolving with our generation. With the comparatively lower cost of living here, youngsters are venturing to the more posh cities in search for higher salary.
Earlier, I guess there was a tinge of jealousy because I could never understand how a whole clan can be so bloody proud of the place they live in. But over the years, moving from Bangalore to Pune and back again, I realized that it is natural to have that feeling of belonging, to reach out to roots – and which I very well lack. I am usually content with either visiting my parents once in a while or them coming to Bangalore to see how their daughter is faring in her career. My Mom has asked me several times to find a job there so that I can be near home, but I have never been able to even dream close enough of living in the city. I am glad to think of the city as a fantasy, instead of being a part of the awe I have for the metro.
Well, this is not about me now. There are still 200 odd pages left to read in “City of Joy” but whatever I have gleaned till now has left quite an impact. The rich have their own comfortable shack but when it comes to the under-privileged, the hope which sees them through the excessive heat, the floods during monsoon, the illnesses, and their acceptability for the other. It is like a constant fight for mere existence, a race, a love, and a hatred which I just don’t understand. If you have forgotten, I did say I am in awe of the city!
As a second thought, I guess I couldn’t read “It Was Five Past Midnight In Bhopal” because I couldn’t relate to the tragedy that hit the city due to the emission of poisonous gas. I might dig out the book and give it a try after I am done with “City of Joy”.
I won’t say that all my feelings for Kolkata are encompassed in these few words but the city sure will remain one of the biggest debates in my life. It has not called me yet but who knows, down the lane responsibilities might call me to settle down here, and trust me, the simple thought of it is a mixture of feelings, 90% of which is dread!
Note: This article is strictly for people who love to pick up their bags and rush out for any extended weekend trip!
Just kidding guys! This is going to be my very first post and I’ll feed you with my latest escapade (to ensure that it is a fresh-out-of-my-mind article).
By now, I believe most of you have noticed that 2009 presents its public holidays mostly on a Friday or a Monday. And the first thought that came to my mind was the numerous weekends that I have to explore around Bangalore.
My first opportunity came in the very first month of the year, when we had the 26th Jan’s leave on a Monday. All I had to do was talk three more of my friends into the trip, book a car and zoom away! Well, of course we decided on the place first.
The trip was to consist of Belur, Halebidu and Chikmagalur – all in just three days. There were lots of speculations as to which is the best time to leave, i.e., drive during the night or leave early on Saturday morning. Finally, we took the driver’s suggestion and started off at 6.30am on Saturday, since he said we can catch up on Belur-Halebidu on our way to Chikmagalur, instead of doing the other way round.
The pleasant January cold and the mild sun did wonders to our journey. Sleepy-heads though I am, I surprisingly stayed awake the entire way to Belur. Whenever you plan to go, try not to miss the yummy idlis (each of which was the size of a big plate!) and the coconut water from the road-side vendors (mere 10 bucks and the water so sweet and in so much quantity, it’ll make you realize the difference of healthy country-side food and the polluted junk we get in the cities). One note of caution: try to take a 4-wheel drive instead of a small family car. The roads are BAD, sometimes beyond comprehension. Especially once you reach Chikmagalur, the uphill pot-holes will sure be too much for your Santro or Zen.
We reached Halebidu around 12.30pm. By that time we were actually cursing the heat. The sun scorched its fullest and a bare-footed tour of the temple didn’t help much either. Still we rolled up our sleeves and started looking around. I have heard from others who have already visited the place that is it similar architecture like that of Hampi. Maybe it was, but for us it was a marvel. The carvings were so intricate that it leaves you amazed that the masons didn’t chip off their fingers along with the stone. One more thing to keep an eye for is the angular structure of the temple. As you cover the circumference, I assure you complete awe of the symphony of the various stories that were carved on the walls, along with the temple construction itself. Then there is the serene lake beyond the green grass around the temple. You can sit under the shades of a tree and spend an entire day in its quiet and beauty.
We reluctantly left Halebidu and headed towards Belur. The second destination was somewhat a bit of disappointment as compared to the first. After the extravagant engravings of Halebidu, Belur looked somewhat bland. The temple supposedly still under construction, so many parts were of cement, which took away the charm. A brief and already tired look around Belur and we moved off for Chikmagalur.
One mistake of a hurried trip is lack of planning. We took for granted that hotels will be available, since it is not the peak season. We were definitely wrong, since it was not only us who decided on stealing away the weekend in the lap of nature. The search for a room lasted over an hour before we could settle down on a nice soft bed. I don’t need to say how tired we were. A thorough wash and a quick dinner that helped us sleep a dead man’s night.
Next morning, we left around 9.30am and headed for the Baba Budan Giri range and Baba Budan’s darga (Datta Peeta – Manikya Dhara falls) at the top of one of the hills. It was supposedly a falls but a big disappointment for us. I’ll suggest you skip it and head for Hebbe falls directly. Another caution: you won’t be able to visit the falls in monsoon because of its sheer bad roads. You CAN’T take your car to the falls directly. There is a point where you have to let go of your vehicle and book jeeps (per person 100 bucks and they will require eight people, or you can book one jeep for whole 800 bucks). The road leading to the falls wasn’t a road actually. Amongst boulders and dirt tracks, we bumped and jostled in the truck, sometimes we were on the slope of the hill-side, since there were no roads at all! It took all of 40 minutes to reach the village, and another 20 minutes’ walk through streams, hillocks and thin pathways.
The sight that awaited us, Police couldn’t have sung – ‘Take my breath away’ – with more emotion! Some 170odd metershighwaterfall, it was like God is pouring tons of milk. The water splashed and gurgled with all its beauty. Numerous photo clicks later we left the place, with the promise of visiting it again and another falls that we missed – the comparably beautiful Kalahatti Falls.
A shocked realization woke us up the third and final day – it was our day to head back. We packed up and left the hotel around 9.30am. We were going to the Bhadra Wildlife Sanctuary first, covering an area of about 500 sq. km. Another lovely getaway, you can book cottages here for just 500 bucks a night. Safari happens at 9am and 6pm, so obviously we missed it. We couldn’t wait till evening to head back for Bangalore, but a small stream hidden amongst the pine trees consoled us. We couldn’t have asked for a better time there. The added surprise was the wonderful lunch we could glean from the residents of the area.
We started off around 2pm, thinking we will reach Bangalore by 8pm. Our driver had something else stored for us. On the way, around 5pm, he asked whether we would like to see Gomteshwar. Not knowing what it is, we played along. What we experienced was a climb of numerous stairs, climaxing in an 18 meter tall granite monolith of Buddha and an expansive view from the hill-top! It was only after we climbed down counting, we realized that there were 1,200 stairs up and down. Sounds mind-numbing, but yes, we actually made it to the top and down again. Being a holy place, it was even more surprising to see old people climbing with the same enthusiasm that we had.
After a break for dinner, by the time we reached home it was around 11.30pm. It was a long day for us, but we knew it’s going to be even longer day at office the next day.
