Happenings in My Life

Thanks to Nizam chacha

2011-10-29T16:50:00.005+05:30

Since my son's birth I have been traveling a lot between Bangalore and Vizianagaram by train (Prashanti Express) which is a 24hrs journey.

Every time during the journey I eagerly wait for the Dharmavaram station, which Prashanti Express reaches at 6pm while going from Bangalore to Vizianagaram and at 7:35am while coming from Vizianagaram to Bangalore, to have the 'special chai' as Nizam chacha calls it. It's tea made with milk with little water added and not vice-versa, which is what we get these days in trains/railway stations. And if you have guessed that the price would be more, then you are wrong for the price is the same: Rs 5/- per tea and there is no reduction in the quantity either. I have never tasted this tasty tea anywhere in all the train journey/railway stations so far. Every time I pass through this station I make a point that I have tea from Nizam chacha and he too as soon as he sees me, hands me a cup of 'special chai' for me :-) I will remember this Chacha for making the numerous train journeys a pleasant one with his 'special chai'.

My Son (13 Aug 2011)

2011-08-27T15:17:00.007+05:30

12 Aug 2011: As usual everyday morning I had a video chat with my wife (as she was in Vizianagaram at her parent's place for delivery of the baby) and Hema told me that she was feeling little uncomfortable. In the afternoon she went to the doctor and the Doctor said that it was false pains. Anyway since the expected date of delivery (EDD) was 04 Sep, we thought that there is still some time. In the evening I was leaving for Hyderabad from Bangalore for the Rakhi festival.

13 Aug 2011: I switched off my mobile during the bus journey. I switched it on back again at 6:30am when I am 3hrs away from Hyderabad. I got a call from Swathi (Hema's sister) that Hema was admitted to the hospital in the night at 2:00am and anytime the baby would be delivered. I informed my parents and I started reading prayers for good health of the baby and mother. There were several thoughts in my mind -
1) how I should have planned trip to Vizianagaram instead of to Hyderabad?
2) would I be able to handle this responsibility?
3) how would be life be after the baby is born? and many more...

At 7:35am I got a call from my in-laws that Hema delivered a baby boy at 07:31am. She has undergone 5hrs of pain in delivering the baby. Please find some photos of the baby at this link.

There was tremendous joy at home and everyone were happy on hearing this good news. I reached home in Hyderabad at 10:05am, sisters and brother-in-law's came home to share the joyous occasion with us. I started for Vizianagaram the same day evening by bus, whose ticket my brother-in-law booked in emergency quota with Sree Kaleswari travels.

14 Aug 2011: I reached Vizianagaram at 10:05am and directly went to the hospital. On seeing the baby for the first time I was afraid to lift the baby in my arms as he was very thin. But after sometime I took him in my arms and that moment is truly a memorable one. The next 10 days I was with my wife. Looking at her condition, I agree with someone who said that "It's another birth for a woman after giving birth to a child" and I now truly and completely understand the meaning of "Mathru Devo Bhava".

Trip to Kukke Subramanya and Dharmasthala (30 July 2011)

2011-07-31T01:05:00.005+05:30

Hema left for her hometown on 25 Jul and my parents left for Hyderabad on 28 Jul. I felt like going to Kukke Subramanya and Dharmasthala. I booked the bus ticket to Kukke for Friday evening (@ Rs 333) from Majestic. The bus started at 9:45pm and it dropped me at Kukke Subramanya at 4:55am.

As I went alone I didn't book a room, got refreshed using the public toilets (near Choultry office near temple), had bath on the bank of Kumara Dhara river. I enjoyed the bath early in the morning at 5:15am and that too in a river :-) I reached back to temple by 6:15am after bath, on the way visited Abhaya Ganesh and Durga temple. I noticed that there is an underground cave in the park, adjacent to the main road, oppposite to BSNL office. During my first trip to Kukke with Hema we stayed in the hotel adjacent to the BSNL Office and we even took an auto from this park but we didn't notice this underground cave :( One requires a torch to go inside this cave as it's pitch dark :( I couldn't go inside as I didn't have a torch and moreover the sunrise didn't happen by then (it was around 5:50am). I was near the temple by 6:05am, had 3 times darshan of Kukke Subramanaya
swamy...there was no rush. Really had a good darshan of Lord Kukke Subramanya Swamy temple. Spent some time in the temple premises. Later took the 8:40am bus to Dharmasthala and reached Dharmasthala at 9:52am. Kept the luggage in the luggage room after refreshing myselves using the public toilet I left for having darshan of Lord Manjunatha. I should appreciate that the public toilets at both Dharmasthala and Kukke Subramanya are very neat...the best and well maintained of all pilgrimage places that I visited till now. I had two darshan's of Lord Manjunatha swamy...the first trip took around 1.5hrs (10am to 11:25am) and the next darshan took around 1.15 hrs (11:45am to 1:00pm). I had my lunch in the free meals in the Annapurna hall. This time, unlike my last time visit, we were served food in plates as seen in the video ;-) After lunch I took the 2pm bus (@ Rs 335) and reached Bangalore by 9:15pm and was at home by 10:15pm. I shall remember this bus journey from Dharmasthala to Bangalore for three reasons:
1) For the first time I saw the rubber trees...there are lots and lots of rubber trees.
2) I enjoyed the bus ride in the western ghats especially till the bus reached Sakleshwar...reminds me of Malshej Ghats, the lovely treks that I used to have during my stay in Mumbai/Pune.
3) I am impressed by the huge Hassan District bus-stand - very huge and cleanly maintained.

10K Snap Fitness run

2011-06-26T18:29:00.003+05:30

Today I ran the 10K Snap fitness run. It was organized by the Snap Fitness which I am a member of. With little practice over the past few days, I aimed for sub 55 minutes.

The highlight was the new technique that I applied during the race. The first 4 kms was easy, but afterwards I started getting pain near the stomach. I thought that I would not be able to complete the 10K. It's then that I remembered the technique of 2 minutes running and half a minute walking. I applied the technique for the rest of the race and I felt really good. I clocked 50 minutes 30 secs for the 10K (actually it was 9.56Kms). I am happy with my timings..for 10K it would have been. Lets improve from here...

Trip to Kukke and Dharmasthala with parents (27-29 May 2011)

2011-05-28T17:27:00.003+05:30

Last week on 20 May 2011 parents have come to Bangalore. Parents wanted to visit Dharmasthala and Kukke Subramanya, the pilgrimage places of Lord Manjunatha and Kukke Subramanya Swamy respectively since a long time.

On 27 May evening we all left for Mangalore by the Kannur Express train which starts at Majestic at 8:50pm. We got down at Subramanya Road (@5:45am) and then took a 3-wheeler auto (Rs 150/-) from there to Kukke Subramanyam temple. The distance from the Subramanya Road Railway station to Kukke Subramanya is around 12Kms. There are also shared taxis who charge Rs 25 per head. The autowala took us directly to the Anugraha guest house, which is adjacent to the temple. This guest house is not good :( As we wanted to get ourselves refreshed we took it, got refreshed and went for darshan, then had breakfast and went to see Lord Abhaya Ganesh and Goddess Durga temple, which is hardly 10 minutes walking distance from the Kukke Subramanya swamy temple. But since we didn't know how far the temples were, we took an auto and he charged us Rs 30 for to and fro. BTW the minimum fare there is Rs 10 and I have heard that localities pay minimum fare of Rs 5. We came back to guest house, took rest for half an hour and started for Dharmasthala by 12:05pm bus. We reached Dharmasthala at 2:05pm. We checked in to Gayathri guest house, which is close to the temple premises. It's a very nice guest house. I would recommend this guest house. We had our lunch, took rest, slept till 5:30pm, got refreshed and went for darshan. We were in the queue at 6pm and it took around 2hrs 5minutes to have darshan of Lord Manjunatha.

The next day we had another darshan in the morning had lunch in the Annapurna Hall in the temple premises. Like in Tirupati the rate at which they serve food is very fast...literally in 15 minutes one batch of around 200 people complete their meals and there is always rush. You can see this nice video on Annapurna Hall, Dharmasthala. Unlike in this video, the meals were served on banana leaves to us. I think that this steel plates were introduced later. We took rest for 1-1.5hrs and then started for Mangalore by the 1:30pm bus. We reached Mangalore by 4pm. As the train from Mangalore Central to Bangalore was at 7:30pm, we dumped our luggage in the cloak room and went to the Panambur beach (around 11Kms from Mangalore central) and came back..hired a cab to & fro from station (Rs 300).

Some history of Kukke Subramanya and Dharmasthala can be found at the following urls:
1) http://www.karnatakavision.com/kukke-subrahmanya-temple.php
2) http://www.karnatakavision.com/dharmasthala.php

Some links about the contribution of Shri Veerendra Heggade can be found at http://www.shridharmasthala.org/pages/places.html

Brief description of Lord Manjunatha Swamy in Dharmasthala can be found at http://www.mustseeindia.com/Dharamsthala-Manjunatha-Temple/attraction/13920

Detailed description of Lord Kukke Subramanya can be found at http://www.mangalore.com/documents/subramanya.html

Some map related photos can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/talakoti

Good to run again (12-01-11)

2011-01-12T14:29:00.007+05:30

Wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New Year 2011 !!!

Lets start this year with some good news. After all the physiotherapy sessions at Hosmat Hospital and rest at home, today I hit the GYM in office. The reason I started going early is because of the running nose... Yeah since the past 3 days I am having severe cold. I did light cycling followed by wall-squats and then finally 5 minutes of slow jogging (@ 5Kmph). Looking at myself running on the treadmill made me so happy that I could feel my legs alive. So the next 2 months I will not be running long distances but only light jogging in the GYM + exercises for strengthening legs and upper body.

Also I need to keep myself fit as the responsibilities are increasing day by day...This is one of the goals for this year: "NOT TO GET INJURED AFTER/BEFORE THE RACE.The others are obvious: complete marathon or 50Kms in good timings, learn new things and earn more money". Lets wait and see...Till then keep watching this space for more updates/news (hopefully all of them are good news) !!!

BTW today we got our Windows 7 phone from the company as promised in last year :-)

Weak knees and rest for 2 months

2010-12-25T12:12:00.001+05:30

Participating in the the Bangalore Ultra race made me realize that my knees are weak, that too after 2 visits to Hosmat Hospital in Bangalore. The first few days after the race, the muscles were stiff, I couldn't use stairs :( Later I started having light pain in the left knee. The first time I went to the hospital (on 29 Nov 2010), the doctor said that it was Synovial Fluid swelling and that it would reduce in 2 weeks. He prescribed me an anti-inflammation ointment and tablets. The pain has subsided but I still get some pain in the left knee, especially after sitting for few hours and then suddenly getting up.

The second time I visited the doctor (on 18 Dec 2010), my wife accompanied me. The doctor said that everything is ok and that I just need to strengthen my knee as they are weak. The doctor suggested that I get an MRI done to clear all the doubts regarding any ligament/tissue problem. My wife insisted on it and it was the first time I got an MRI done (it's expensive man... Rs 5,500). The results came out normal and Doctor suggested me to take rest for 2 months doing light exercises suggested by the physiotherapy to strengthen my knees. So I was regular to the hospital daily in the morning for the next 1 week (20-25 Dec 2010) for the wax-treatment followed by exercises for strengthening my knee. Below is the description of the knee strengthening exercises:
1) Lie on a flat surface. Place some soft substance (say a pillow) under the knee and press the whole leg downwards horizontally. Concentrate on the knee. Do this for 10 times, counting 1-10 each time.
2) Now move the soft substance from under the knee to foot. Now try bending your foot in the direction of your face and count from 1-10. Repeat this for 10 times.
3) Remove the soft substance. Now bend your leg at the knee (such that the leg is in the shape of a hill) and press downwards. Concentrate on the knee. Relax, bring back your leg to horizontal position again. Do this 10 times.
4) Bring back your legs straight. And press only your feet both forward and backward. Concentrate on your knee while doing this. Do this 10 times.
5) Now hold your knee tight by pushing your foot towards your body and raise the leg straight holding it in air at an angle of 35-45 degrees and count from 1-10. Do this 10 times.
6) Now sit on a table such that both your legs don't touch the ground. Now raise one leg till it's horizontal, hold it for 10 secs and do this for the other leg alternatively.
7) Keep one leg down while the other leg resting on a table horizontally. Now try touching your feet with the hand, hold it for 10 secs and relax. Repeat this for 10 times.

Trip to Kukke Subramanya and Dharmasthala (04 Dec 2010)

2010-12-04T15:09:00.004+05:30

We started from Bangalore on Friday (03 Dec) night by Rajahamsa to Kukke Subramanya Swamy temple. The bus started at 11pm and reached Kukke Subramanya Swamy temple at 6:00am. As there was no prior room-booking done, we asked a tea-stall guy just outside the bus-stand where we could get an accommodation and he guided us to a small hotel- Hotel Shriddha (Owner: Sowmya Pai (9448696257), Balakrishna Pai (9449664132)). This hotel is a little far from the temple (around 500mts from the temple). All the lodges were occupied as it was a festival season. The fare was Rs 300/- per day. We took some rest in the hotel, got refreshed and then went to the temple at 8:00am. There was less crowd in the morning. We booked ticket for Naga Pratishtha pooja (Rs 250). As per the ticket the timings of this pooja was from 10am to 12:30 noon but it started only at 12:00 noon and ended by 12:15 noon. We didn't have anything since morning and we were feeling very hungry. We quickly had lunch after the pooja and then went to book tickets back to Bangalore as we were tired. Yeah there is a KSTC booking counter in Kukke Subramanya, near the temple :-)

The travel agent told that the darshan at Dharmasthala would happen in 1.5 to 2 hrs. So we decided to go to Dharmasthala inspite of our tiredness. We booked ticket from Dharmasthala -> Bangalore in Kukke Subramanya. We went to room, got refreshed and left Kukke Subramanya for Dharmasthala by 3pm bus. The frequency is good and every half an hour you get a bus to Dharmasthala. The last bus from Kukke Subramanya to Dharmasthala is at 6:30pm.

We reached Dharmasthala at 4:30pm (1.5hrs bus journey - the journey was really good, but we were so tired that we slept within 5 minutes after boarding the bus). We kept our luggage in Hotel Vaishali, refreshed ourselves there, had some tea/snacks in Trupti Uphar Gruha hotel, opposite Nethravathi lodge. Since the temple was closed till 7pm, we went to see the Car Museum (Rs 3 per head entrance ticket) and it has some good collection of old vintage cars. We then stood in the line for darshanam at 7:15pm and we had darshan by 8:45pm. Had we been 5-10 minutes late in getting in to the queue it would have taken more time as the crowd increased a lot after we were in the queue.

We then had a masala dosa in the same Trupti hotel, which was very good, and then started back to the bus-stand for boarding the bus for Bangalore. Enroute to the bus-stand we clicked some photos as the streets were well lit as it was Lakhsa Deepa Archana (i.e. 1 lakh lights being lit during the month of November/early December). We walked till the new bus-stand and waited for the 10:50pm bus for Bangalore. We reached Bangalore the next day morning at 6:00am and we were in home by 8:05am.

Bus fares (for 2 persons) are as follows:
Bangalore -> Kukke Subramanya Swamy Temple: Rs 614
Kukke Subramanya -> Dharmasthala: Rs 86
Dharmasthala -> Bangalore: Rs 640

You can find photos of the trip to the above two pilgrimage places here at this link. I bought four maps for Rs 10 of the pilgrimage places near by Kukke and Dharmasthala which I uploaded here.

TIP: There is no signal in Kukke Subramanya, atleast for Tata Docomo/Indicom. I could see that the only mobiles that work over there are MTS, BSNL. So let your well-wishes, near/dear know of your visit to this place so that they don't worry if they are not able to reach you on mobile. There are few STD booths from where you can make calls.

Bangalore Ultra (50Kms) race

2010-11-14T15:40:00.008+05:30

Finally I achieved the milestone of running 50Kms. Thanks to my friend Jothi who was the main person responsible in this achievement. He is the person who used to call me, pull me for practice every weekend.

I took part in the Bangalore Ultra, organized by Runners for life and was able to complete the 50Kms that too in less than 6hrs (which happened coincidentally ;-)), to be precise in 5 hours 58 minutes 56 secs and 65 milliseconds. The split timings are as follows:

Distance	Ravikanth	Jothi
06.25 Kms	0:38:20:50	0:37:24:60
12.50 Kms	1:14:25:25	1:14:48:50
18.75 Kms	1:49:17:80	1:51:54:05
25.00 Kms	2:29:20:90	2:30:15:90
31.25 Kms	3:10:41:40	3:12:18:95
37.50 Kms	4:08:40:55	4:02:07:10
43.75 Kms	5:05:40:95	4:56:31:50
50.00 Kms	5:58:56:65	5:46:22:85

You can find the description of the race, very nicely and precisely written here by Jothi at his blog. The next race is Mumbai Marathon, which is on 16 Jan 2011. I am planning to have a 10 day trip to Mumbai/Lonavala/Pune and if time permits to Shirdi along with parents and wife.

Trip to Tirupati (04-05 Sep 2010)

2010-09-06T12:45:00.002+05:30

My parents-in-laws have come from Vizianagaram to Tirupati for Sri Lord Venkateshwara swamy darshanam. I along with my wife left for Tirupati from B'lore by the Tirupati passenger train (213). This train taught us a new lesson :-)
"We reached the station just 15 minutes before the departure time of the train. The train by then has not come on to the platform. We got down the stairs and were waiting on the platform where S6 coach was supposed to halt. Our's was S7 coach. Since it's adjacent to S6, we didn't bother much. The train arrived and we headed towards our coach...S6 came, S5, S4...S1 on one side, 1st AC, General on the other side but there was no S7 coach. We ran towards the end thinking that it might be after the General but it was not there...There was just only 5 minutes left for the train to depart and we didn't find our coach :( We checked the ticket if the date of journey is correct? while running from one end to the other end of the train. Reached the other end but still there was no S7 coach. Luckily we caught a TT who told us that S7 coach is being added at the B'lore station." This experience taught us to look well in advance where our coach would come on the station and be there at least 2-3 minutes before the train arrives.

Other few things that I learnt/observed during this Tirupati trip are as follows:
1) Say if you are having advanced room-booking, when you go to collect the receipt of the room-allotment, say at time 5:00pm and you want to vacate in 1 day, then by 5:30pm next day you should vacate i.e. an extra 30 minutes is allowed.
2) A new laddu-complex has come up. There are seperate queues for different types of darshanams: Rs 10 token/Rs 100 token/Rs 50 token/SBI Employees/ etc.... You need to see which token you have got and go and stand in the counter line to collect the laddu's.
3) Usually you get 2 laddu's for each ticket. Now you can stand in a seperate queue (just before you reach the laddu complex) to get 4 more extra laddu's for each ticket @ Rs 25 per laddu i.e. Rs 100 per ticket. So on ticket you can get 2 free laddu's + 4 extra laddus (@ Rs 25 each).
4) These days the dress code is strictly followed. No jeans/skirts for women, no half-pants/bermudas/3-4ths for men/women. Also they are not allowing women to wear flowers in their heads while going to darshanam.
5) The bus ticket from Tirumala to Tirupati has not been increased from Rs 25 to Rs 30.
6) We took an auto from Srinivasam lodge to Alpiri, which costs Rs 35 so from Railway station it should not be more than Rs 50. Last time we paid Rs 60/Rs 75 :-(

Urban Stampede 2010 (08 Aug 2010)

2010-08-08T15:09:00.011+05:30

This year I took part in the Urban Stampede race for Microsoft company as I moved from Yahoo to Microsoft as part of the Yahoo-Microsoft search deal in Feb 2010. Unlike last year event, this time I had enough practice as I have been preparing for the Kaveri Trial Marathon 2010 and Mumbai Marathon 2011 along with my friend Jothi Padmanabhan. Last to last Friday (i.e. on 30 July 2010) I gave a 5Kms trial and I clocked 21' 45" (21 minutes and 45 seconds), my best timings in 5K race.

In this year's Urban Stampede race I clocked 21' 52" 500"" (21 minutes, 52 seconds, 500 milliseconds). My other team-mates timings in the order of running were Sandeep Sekhar (24' 49" 200""), Caroline Challans (30' 53" 50""), Sandeep Kaliyath (27' 51" 50"") and myself (21' 52" 500""). The overall team timings was 1 hr 47 min 13 sec 700 millisec (including the transition timings of 32" 250"", 39" 000"", 36" 650"). The team overall rank was 49 out of 294 teams and in Mixed Category it was 14.

Individual rankings in the event were as follows: Sandeep Sekhar (180), Caroline Challans (615), Sandeep Kaliyath (409) and myself (55) out of the 1176 runners who took part in the event.

There were total 6 teams from Microsoft that took part in this event (of which I have got the details of only four teams):
• Microsoft Team 1 (Running order - Ashish Kanwar, Ajay Rodrigues, Rohan Makhija & Pawan Kapoor) finished 73 amongst the 127 teams in the corporate open category. This team finished 114th overall amongst the 294 teams. Timings: 1hr 59min 42secs 350millisecs.
• Microsoft Team 2 (Running order - Naveen Saini, Floyd Mathias, Sanchayita Roy, Bhuwan Upadhyay) finished 42 amongst 84 teams in the corporate mixed category. This team also finished 134th overall amongst 294 teams. Timings: 2hrs 03min 33secs 350millisecs.
• Microsoft Team 3 (Running order - Sandeep Sekhar, Caroline Challans, Sandeep Kaliyath, Ravikanth Talakoti) finished 14 amongst 84 teams in the corporate mixed category. This team also finished 49th overall amongst 294 teams. Timings: 1hr 47min 13secs 700millisecs.
• Timings for Microsoft Team 4 (Running order – Rohan Deshmukh, Mohit Mital, Akshay Katti, Pankaj Sahni) are not yet available, but I am sure that they would be not be far behind with some strong finishes.

BTW, in this race, each team consists of 4 runners each running 5Kms. There are different category teams: Corporate Open, Corporate Mixed, Corporate Women, Non-Corporate Open, Non-Corporate Mixed, Non-Corporate Women. For complete list of teams that participated, winners and timings visit http://www.lucozadeurbanstampede.com. The timings are available if you know the team code which are numbered from 1-194.

For some interesting info on the statistics in conducting the race visit http://www.lucozadeurbanstampede.com/racedayinfo.htm.

You can find photos of the Microsoft team members here at http://cid-1980ee2b41d33ec5.office.live.com/browse.aspx/MyPictures/UrbanStampeded2010. Thanks to Mohit Mital for bringing the Camera to the event, without which we would not be having these photos.

One can access my training schedule at https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Ag5w7KEOfi8qdE1ydkNKZjRhUzBCdVhZeE1rWTI0V2c&hl=en

Kolar Trip (24 Apr 2010)

2010-04-24T14:31:00.005+05:30

We thought of starting from our place early morning at 6:30am but the cab, which we booked didn't arrive on time and finally we started from our place at 8:15am. As Whitefield, was on the way we decided to see the Sri Sathya Sai Hospital and Sri Sathya Sai Baba Ashram. After seeing the hospital we decided to have breakfast in Whitefield. We went to Udipi Darshini hotel in Whitefield. The service was very slow and it took around 40 minutes, which could have been completed in 10 minutes.

After having breakfast, we left for seeing the ashram. The railway gate near Kadugodi bus-stand was closed and we couldn't get to the other side. So we directly left for seeing Chikka Tirupati temple. We had darshan at the temple and left for Kolar. We directly went to see the Someshwara temple and Kolaramma temple. We reached the temples at around 12:40pm. By that time both the temples were closed. Any we had darshan of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati through key holes in the door. Took some rest and then had lunch in Shanti Sagar Hotel, Kolar. After lunch we started for the Koti Lingeshwara Temple. We spent aroudn 1.5hrs seeing all the shiva linga's and taking pictures inside the temple. We has little snacks outside the temple and left for Bangaru Tirupati temple, which is another 10 kms away from this place.

We then returned back to Bangalore as it was already 6:30pm by then and it was raining very heavily. It was a nice trip. We reached home by 9:45pm, had light dinner and slept off immediately as all of us were dead tired. Parents really liked it especially the Koti Lingeshwara Temple. You can find the pictures of the trip here at my community.webshots.com.

From this trip I learned the following:
1) Find out the temple timings when they are open, if you are planning to visit temples.
2) First try to visit the far off places first so that if time doesn't permit you can cover the near by places later.
3) One should start as early as possible for such 1 day trip so that you have plenty of time to see other places too.

Few things I liked in this trip:
1) The view from the top of Bangaru Tirupati temple is really beautiful. After a long time I saw a flock of birds flying...
2) There was no rain during the whole trip, the journey was also among thick green vegetation and the climate was cool. It rained in the evening while returning.
3) Had good darshan and there was less people in the temples and above all
4) My parents enjoyed this trip.

Big Banyan Tree (18 Apr 2010)

2010-04-18T20:24:00.006+05:30

My parents arrived in Bangalore on 09 April. We decided to visit many places this time unlike their previous visits (1st, 2nd, 3rd) to Bangalore. So last Friday we booked an AC car for 4hrs/40Kms (for Rs 550; thereafter Rs 50 per hr AND/OR Rs 6 per km) to go to this place Ramohalli, where there is a Big Banyan Tree (called as "Dodda Aalada Mara" in Kannada), which is around 400 years old. You can find more information about this place and nearby places around Bangalore here.

The cab didn't arrive on Saturday as it met with an accident on Saturday before it reached our place. So we booked again for the next day (Sunday, 18 April). We started from our place at 2pm. The cab-driver took us through JP Nagar 2nd Phase, Kanakpura Road, took a right turn after the "Metro" shopping mall, Vasantpur Road, Subramanyapura to reach Kengeri. From Kengeri we took the Mysore Highway for around 3kms, took a right turn immediately after the RajaRajeshwari Dental College and went straight ahead for another 7.5kms to reach this place "Ramohalli".

There are also direct buses from Krishna Rajendra Market (aka KR Market) to this place (Route: 227K) or you can catch any bus till Kengeri and from there to Ramohalli by route 374M. The frequency of the buses to this place is around 30 minutes. You can find the bus route and more details at Bangalore Transport Information System website.

We reached this place in an hour i.e. at 3:00pm. We spent time, played around there, climbed the tree, took some snaps, had snacks, rested for some time and then started our return journey at 5pm and were back in the house at 5:50pm. This was a small, sweet, comfortable trip. The exact distance from our place to this Big Banyan tree is 30Kms.

My father brought up an interesting thing while we were resting here under this Banyan tree. As I and Hema climbed the tree, he asked Hema if she was afraid of climbing trees. She replied in negative. Then father told us that in earlier times when a man wants to get married, the bride/bride's parents used to ask him if he was afraid of climbing a tree/trekking up a hill as in those days it was sufficient if one posses these skills as they would survive with the food available in the jungles and income earned from the forests. There was also a telugu song, written by Arudra from an old telugu movie titled "Chenchulakshmi" (1958) which goes as follows:
Chettu lekka galava Oh Narahari Puttalekka galava
Chettlu Ekki Aa Chitaru Kommala Chiguru Koya galava
Should really appreciate the lyricist.

You can find the photos of this trip here. The photos also has some comments/tags with them. Enjoy reading them while scrolling :)

Car Fares:
Scheme 1: For 4hrs or 40Kms - Rs 450 (for non-AC), Rs 550 (for AC). And after 40Kms, every Km it's Rs 5.50 per km (for non-AC) and Rs 6.50 (for AC) extra. After 4hrs, it's Rs 50 per hour extra. There are no driver charges.
Scheme 2: For 8hrs or 80Kms - Rs 750 (for non-AC), Rs 900 (for AC). And after 80Kms, every Km it's Rs 5.50 per km (for non-AC) and Rs 6.50 (for AC) extra. After 8hrs, it's Rs 50 per hour extra. There are no driver charges.
Scheme 3: You can hire a cab on per km basis: Rs 5.5 per km (for non-AC) and Rs 6.5 per km (for AC). Minimum distance that is charged is 250Kms (6am to 10pm). Driver daily charge (from 6am to 10pm) is Rs 150 applicable per day. If time crosses after 10pm then you need to pay another Rs 150 towards driver charges.

Trip to Davangere (07-08 April 2010)

2010-04-16T11:52:00.005+05:30

I started from Bangalore to Davangere to attend my friend Santosh's wedding with Vidyashree on 08 April 2010. Along with me was Murali Guggilam and Thrushanth Nayanagari, both colleagues and Santosh's teammates. We took the Inter-city express which departed from Bangalore City railway station at 13:00hrs. The train was supposed to reach at 18:10hrs but it was 40 minutes late. By the time we reached Davangere it was already night and we couldn't see much of the city then.

We directly went and checked into the room at PWD Inspection Bungalow (IB), which is walking distance away from the Davangere railway station. We got refreshed and went for dinner at Tirshul Kalabhavan where the engagement happened that evening.

In the night I and Thrushant went for a small walk in the city and we found lots of piles of flowers being sold very close to the old bus-stand. The roads are almost empty after 10:30pm.

The next morning I got up at 7am and went for a walk with my camera, taking pictures of the city. I then had a benne dosa (which Davangere is famous for) in "Old Sagar Hotel", reached room and we all left for attending the marriage, which was already over by the time we reached the kalyana mandapam at 10:00am :( During my morning walk in the City I could find more than 3 theatres all within walking distance from one another. Also there are 3 theatres side by side: Geetanjali, Pushpanjali and Padmanjali, very close to the railway station, which one can see from the train travelling towards Bangalore.

We started back for Bangalore by the 16:00hrs Jan-Shatapdi express, which reached Bangalore at 21:25hrs. By the time I reached home it was 23:00hrs on 08 April. Since my wife was alone at home on 07 April, she didn't sleep the whole night as she is afraid of staying alone. I felt bad about it :(

You can find few photos of the Davangere city here and the post-marriage photos here.

The things that I liked about this city are:
1) there are not many big buildings, almost all of them are individual houses
2) less number of vehicles on the road and less pollution
3) lots and lots of open spaces/grounds and
4) ofcourse "benne dosa" :-)

The thing I missed during this trip:
1) my wife. I wish I could have taken her too. She couldn't come because of her office work :(
2) should have reached the Kalyana mandapam early at 8am instead of waiting for friends. Missed Santosh's marriage ceremony :-(

To Do:
1) visit this place once again and see nearby places: Hubli, Chitradurga...with my wife and parents.

First time I fell unconsciousness (17 March 2010)

2010-03-17T21:15:00.003+05:30

On 12 March night my wife complained of severe tooth pain. So we decided to go and check up with the dentist the next day. On 13 March evening when we visited the dentist she told us that both pair of wisdom teeth in her mouth have been spoiled and need "Surgical Vertical Extraction". We decided to take a second opinion from a family dentist in Hyderabad (as we left for Hyderabad on 14 March night for Ugadi festival) if it can be cured with out "Surgical Vertical Extraction". The family dentist too suggested the same.

So on 16 March evening my wife got her cavities filled (3 permanent and 1 temporary filling as it might require a root-canal treatment). The surgical extraction of the right pair of wisdom teeth was scheduled for 17 March morning. I and my father went along with Hema to the dentist. We both were watching the operation and slowly I fell unconscious. I had to come out of the operation room and I remained like that till the operation was over (which went for 30 minutes around). This sort of unconsciousness is called "Vasovagal syncope". This was the first time that I fell unconscious.

Now Hema is recovering well. There would be Surgical extraction of the other wisdom tooth pair in next month and hopefully I would not fall unconscious then and I pray that operation is very less painful to Hema compared with the first one.

Few more updates:
27 March 2010: The stitches (three) were removed today evening.
31 March 2010: She went for a root-canal for the tooth which was filled with temporary filling.
01 April 2010: The post-filling (temporary) for the root-canal tooth was done today. The permanent filling was done on 05 April 2010. The cap was fitted on 10 April 2010.
We planned to go for the left pair of wisdom-teeth surgical extraction in the first week of May 2010.

30th Birthday celebrations (09 Feb 2010)

2010-02-09T16:43:00.005+05:30

Today I completed 30 years. Hema gave me two surprises on my Birthday. Yesterday (08 Feb 2010) morning she gave my name for today's Pala Abhishekam in Shiv temple. So we got up early at 5:30am to get ready and attend that pooja.

The second surprise was given to me at the time of cake-cutting at midnight. She prpeared "semiya" (sweet made with bambino) and "annavaram prasadam" yesterday morning and brought it at the time of cake-cutting at midnight. I shall never forget this 30th B'day.

And when it comes to friends at office, the one thing that you can mention is the bumps that the B'day person gets. I too couldn't escape and I too had B'day bumps after cake-cutting.

You can find the B'day celebration photos at home and at office at this link.

Third major item after marriage (25 Jan 2010)

2010-02-05T11:38:00.007+05:30

On the auspicious day (Ratha Saptami) of 22 Jan 2010 (Friday) morning at 12:03pm I gave the cheque of Rs 54,300 to Silicon Motors for advance payment of Honda Shine bike (self-start + alloy wheels + black with grey color). The price includes the cost of the accessories like grip cover (Rs 80), seat cover (Rs 225), tank cover (Rs 125), crash guard (big) (Rs 492), buzzer (Rs 60), engine plate (Rs 175), ladies handle (Rs 150), helmet lock (Rs 220), teflon coating (Rs 450) and number plates (Rs 150).

The on-road price (excluding the accessories) was Rs 52,834/- (which included the following cost: Basic (Rs 47415), Insurance (Rs 896), Road Tax (Rs 4173), Reg Fees (Rs 120) and Smart card (aka RC) (Rs 230)). The total cost was coming to Rs 54961/-. Thanks to my friend GaneshP who told me to bargain as I was paying the amount in cash. I tried at two show Honda show rooms near my place: Silicon Motors (RV Road, Basavangudi) and Sapphire Honda (near Ragigudda temple). I got the discount at Silicon Motors. To get the discount I had to talk to the manager of the respective showrooms as the sales persons don't have a say in this.

Some few points which I thought is worth mentioned here:
1) Better to buy an helmet in advance so that you need any problem from the traffic police when getting the bike from the showroom to your place.
2) Find out the nearest petrol pump close to the show-room as it's better to fill petrol in the vehicle as the showroom guys gives you just 0.5/0.75 ltrs.
3) Make sure that all checks are done before taking the bike like
* buzzer working?
* all choosen accessories fitted?
* high beam and low beam working?
* break light working at the rear? - make sure that the front light doesn't glow when break is applied.
* make sure that the pollution certificate is present
* tool kit is not missed
* the choke is turned off after starting the bike (if you have used it). Failing which there would be continuous humming sound from the engine (I learnt it on 05 March 2010, Saturday).
4) Preserve the in-voice statement as it's needed till you get the RC book (which would take around 1 month) and also while transferring the vehicle from one state to another state.
5) Keep a xerox copy of your Driving license, Insurance, Invoice, RoadTax and RC (when you received it) all time.

Some tips when buying the helmet:
1) Take the person for whom you are buying the helmet as the helmet should fit correctly to their head sizes. Also they need to feel comfortable wearing it, especially in case of ladies make sure that there is space for hair-clips/flowers etc.
2) Choose for helmets which have provision for air-circulation both at the side/front of the helmet and top of the helmet.
I bought the helmet from Lalbagh Road on 22 Jan 2010 (Rs 300).

You can find my bike photos at http://picasaweb.google.com/ravi7us/NewBike. You can also find some tips on bike riding and maintenance at http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/

Second major item after marriage (22 Nov 2009)

2009-11-22T12:50:00.003+05:30

Today Electric Mixer Grinder (Panasonic Model MX-AC300-H) and Electric Rice Cooker (Panasonic Model SR-WA22H) along with Idli cooker and some more kitchen utensils were added to the already existing items list in my home. My parents-in-law have come to Bangalore on 20 Nov 2009. This was their first visit to our home after marriage. They bought all these items along with some other kitchen necessary items that they brought from Vizianagaram.

My first running race after coming to Bangalore (22 Aug 2009)

2009-08-26T16:01:00.006+05:30

Since coming to B'lore I almost stopped running. I took part in the corporate race event "Urban Stampede" on Aug 22, 2009 (saturday). I trained for few days with Jothi Padmanabhan, who stays close to my house. He is the person responsible for bringing me out of the slumber and we used to go practising in the mornings. Below is the description of the event in Jothi's words (u see I am still lazy):

What is the best way to spend a chilly Saturday early morning? Settle snugly in bed and go back to dreamland or don your running attire and head for a 5K run at a location several miles from the city?

While most would likely prefer the former, a few of us just did the latter. We headed out to Olde Bangalore, a resort located about 15kms from the Hebbal Flyover, in the wee hours of Saturday morning to participate in the Urban Stampede corporate relay race, organized by the city’s well-known running club – Runners for Life.

If at all there were any doubts that we were a minority of crazy runners, this was dispelled at the venue where runners from more than 140 teams had assembled. The race itself was a little unique, it was a middle distance relay race where each team comprised four people and each member ran 5 kilometers passing the baton to the next in line. So, it meant that the area was teeming with around 600 runners, all charged up and with high excitement. Y! had three teams – one in the mixed category and two in the men’s category.

The race itself started (surprisingly?) on time (7 am) as the excitement reached its crescendo. The course itself was loop of 5 kms with a few ups and downs so it added some challenge. It was a great scene watching runners anxiously waiting for their team member to arrive so that they could get the baton and start running.

Running is perceived as an individual sport, but the race on Saturday proved otherwise. The way team members were cheering each other and pacing them towards the end of their run showed that there is a lot to learn about camaraderie in a sport like running too.

At the time of writing this, the timings and standings have not been announced, but that hardly matters to us at all - it is just the feeling of participating and running that counted for all the team members.

I had a seen an interesting placard in one of the marathons -- "Running is a mental sport and we are all insane". If any of you want to join this ‘insane” club, you could subscribe yourself to the blr-runners ilist and join some of our practice runs together. Maybe next year, Yahoo could rival I2 technologies (they had 11 teams participating in the race!) and even bring home a few medals!

The teams:
Men’s A – Myself, Jothi Padmanabhan, Deepak Rajanna, Ashish Gite
Men’s B – Ravi Krishna Mondreti, Nelson Moses, Balaji Narayanan, Gandikota Raju Venkat
Mixed - Arvind Kota, Anita Bora, Raghavendra Mohan, Anjana S
Back-up runner and photographer: Gopal V

The results are as follows (in the same order as above):
Men's A: 24:40, 26:00, 26:17, 25:54 (13 position in the men's category)
Men's B: 27:33, 28:46, 27:40, 26:56 (28 position in the men's category)
Mixed: 31:38, 36:01, 23:14, 30:47 (18 position in the mixed category)

You can find few photos of the above event at http://sports.webshots.com/album/574325352hmqapI

One year completed since I saw Hema (21 June 2009)

2009-06-22T10:57:00.001+05:30

As you all know I believe that everything that happens, happens for one's good. Yesterday it happened the same. Yesterday (21 June 2009), Hema's train ticket from Bangalore to Chennai was not confirmed.

Hema has come for the weekend to Bangalore. I booked a train ticket for her from Bangalore to Chennai for Sunday night (21 June) by the Chennai Express, whose status at the time of booking was WL 129. The status on the day of journey was showing as "RS9, 17". I thought that 'R' stands for an additional bogie that might have been added to the train as it was a weekend. As we were doubtful I went along with her to the station, incase if there is any chance of non-confirmation of the berth we could return back and I would be able to give her company in the return journey from the railway station to home. When we went to the station we found that 'R' stands for RAC. Incase if your WL ticket is confirmed then the status would be just S9,17. Since it was RAC it was shown as "RS9, 17". We both learnt this lesson today. Hema felt happy as her berth didn't get confirmed and she didn't feel like going to chennai, same was the case with me. During the night we talked about the beautiful moments that have passed since we met, right from pelli-chupulu to current day. But we didn't realise that yesterday was the day in last year when I met her for the first time.

The next day (22 June) I came to office to book the train ticket for 22nd evening train. As a routine I checked my calendar and then I noticed that yesterday (21 June) was the day when I met Hema for pelli-chupulu. Probably GOD wanted us to both spend that special day (21 June 2009) together. It was a good feeling that we both had on realising the fact that we knew each other for 1 year. Such small incidents are worth memorable and since I do keep forgetting things, I wrote this blog. I am lucky have her as my life-partner.

First major item purchase after marriage (28 May 2009)

2009-05-29T16:34:00.003+05:30

Today I bought a TV (Philips 14PT2118) for my home. This was the first major purchase after my marraige. My parents have come to Bangalore on 26 May, which is their third visit to Bangalore. The first time they came I was a bachelor, the second time they came it was a short visit and during this trip they took me to see a girl in Bangalore, and the third trip was after my marriage :-)

Many house-hold items were bought with each visit - first visit, a mattress and some kitchen utensils were bought. The second time - 2 chairs and table, another small mattress, plastic box containers for storing dal, rice etc. After marriage when my wife came to Bangalore, she made me buy many house-hold items ranging from dustbin, soap boxes, footmats to diya stand for lighting diyas at pooja place. My house entirely changed its look from a bachelor house to a family house. In this third visit of my parents I bought the TV. They say that these are all needed for a comfortable life. So what next? Let's wait and see... BTW I shall be updating a blog on my post-marriage life very soon. Till then I just wanted to say "I am enjoying my marriage life very much." I hope so that I would keep doing the same in the future too...

A smooth hectic day (04 April 2009)

2009-04-06T01:59:00.005+05:30

Looks like this day (04 April 2009) is very good for me and Hema. Today was Sri Ramanavami in Andhra Pradesh (In Karnataka they celebrated Sri Ramanavami on 03 Apr). Today was also my younger sister's engagement anniversary, also the day we (Hema and I) celebrated our 4th month wedding anniversary :)

We went to Jayanagar BDA complex, to collect Hema's voter card. I also got my father's name corrected in my voter card.

We then left for Food and Civil supplies office, where we submitted a form for capturing Hema's photo on the ration card. Got the new ration card in few hrs.

Few days back i.e. on 02 April I got the acknowledgment letter from the Sheela Gas Agency. In the acknowledgment letter they asked me to get a non-judicial Rs 20 stamp paper affidavit duly notarised for getting the gas connection. So I went to the Sub-Registrar's office near Jayanagar 4th Block, got it done along with room-agreement extension.

Then in the evening there was a small get-together of my batchmates in Bangalore along with their family members. Met Rana, Malde, Bunny, Jalem and their wives Archana, Megha, Rimi, Samata respectively and the newly would be groom Sinha.

It was a nice day. All things went smoothly without any breaks/delays.

Trek to Antaragange (23 Nov 2008)

2008-11-24T11:24:00.003+05:30

On Saturday (22 Nov 2008), I cycled in the city to give my friends/batchmates my wedding card. The whole day I cycled around 40kms giving just only 6 cards in total: (Rana, Shweta/Basak, Rapa, Ro/Jaggi, VKB, Nits). I started from my place at around 8:30am. It was little cloudy and it was drizzling - suited for my journey. Since it was after a long time I was meeting some of my friends, I spent around 1-1.5hrs with each of them.

The next day, Sunday 23 Nov, along with my teammates we all went to Antaragange trek. You can find more details about this place from the following links: link1, link2. I (neither anyone of us) didn't go inside the temple, so we missed seeing the Nandi (Basava) from whose mouth there is continuous flow of water all throughout the year :( We couldn't see it during the return journey as one of the member got his leg twisted, so we came down by road in the vehicle. The one thing that I enjoyed here is rock-climbing. There are many rocks and you can have a great doing rock-climbing here. I will remember this place for the rock-climbing experience that I had and also for the simple reason that this was my first trek to after coming to Bangalore. You know the time has flown very fast :( It's almost an year that I arrived in Bangalore. I reached Bangalore on 24 Nov 2007 in the evening at around 4pm (my joining in the new company was on 26 Nov 2007).

You can have a look at the trek photos at my photo album.

Lost my mobile (05 Nov 2008)

2008-11-05T16:29:00.003+05:30

Today morning I forgot my mobile in the office cab. I usually keep all my things i.e. bag, purse, phone etc on the last back seat of the Tempo Traveller. I forgot to collect my mobile while leaving the cab and I remembered it only while having breakfast, which is after 10 minutes I left the cab. By the time I called my cab driver he has already left the campus to pick up another company employees. On the way to the other company, he gave a ride to few security guards. So don't know who picked up my mobile :-( I called the cab driver and he searched the whole cab, but couldn't find the mobile. I tried calling on my mobile number, but I was getting switched off message :( I lost it :-(

I immediately called up the Airtel service and blocked my outgoing calls. I then went to the Airtel office in the afternoon and got a duplicate sim (with the same number) by filling a form, with an identity card attached. I didn't have to shell any amount for getting a duplicate sim card with the same number. The identity can be any of your company i-card/PAN/Passport etc......

My Nokia 1110 mobile served me for only 3 years. I bought it in Dec 2005 for Rs 3150 in Pune. Now I need to buy a new one. Currently one of my friend said that he has an spare mobile, which he said that he will lend it to me. So for the next 2 months I will be using it and afterwards I will think of buying a new mobile one.

Trip to Chennai (19-20 Oct 2008) and ...

2008-10-24T11:52:00.016+05:30

After my engagement with Hema on 11 Oct 2008, I decided to meet her in Chennai this weekend as it's the only weekend I will be free before my marriage on 04 Dec 2008 Thursday night (i.e. 05 Dec early Friday morning). I will be in Hyderabad during the following days: 28 Oct to 02 Nov, 08 Nov to 09 Nov and 15 Nov to 16 Nov. The next weekend 22-23 Nov, I didn't plan anything so as to complete some office work in case if I have any, before I take leave for my marriage which is from 29 Nov to 15 Dec 2008.

As I returned to Bangalore from Hyderabad on 13 Oct, I didn't have much time to book the tickets so didn't get a confirmed ticket both for the onward and return journey to Chennai. The ticket status from Bangalore to Chennai was WL 86 and return journey was WL 199 when I booked. Luckily the onward journey got confirmed even for WL 124 too. Looking at the onward journey I expected that the return journey would atleast get to RAC if not confirmed, but it didn't and I had an interesting experience which is mentioned in this blog towards the end.

On Friday before I left for Chennai in the evening, I enquired about the availablity of budget hotels near Chennai Central as Hema doesn't know much about the Chennai city, as she has recently moved to the city two months ago. On searching I found that there are many budget hotels near Egmore station, which is around 2.1 Kms away from Chennai central (auto fare: Rs 15/- approximately - source: maps.yahoo.com). When I called up and enquired, there was no availability in the hotels near Egmore station. I enquired about the hotels with the co-passengers and one person told me that there are few, once we get out of the station and walk towards your right. Luckily on Saturday (18 Oct) morning when I landed at the Chennai station, after coming out, one auto-driver told me that he would take me to a hotel. I told him that my budget would be around Rs 300. He said fine and asked for Rs 25 to drop me there. He then took me to Hotel Geethalayam (Ph: 25612151/52/53), which is just 5 minutes walking distance and less than half a km from the Chennai Central. I got a single room with double cot, the fare was Rs 325 for one day.

I slept for an hour and then got refreshed, took bath and then left for meeting Hema, who stays in Perungudi. I took a bus from the bus-stop close to the hotel and got down at Broadway (Rs 2/Rs 3). From Broadway there is a direct bus (route: 21H) which directly goes to Perungudi (Rs 11). You don't get direct bus from Chennai Central - you have to goto Thiruvanmiyur (Route: A1 or 1A) and from there take a shared-auto (Rs 10) or bus route # T51 (Rs 4.5). You have to get down near the Ambedkar statue, that stop name is "Perungudi first source" (landmark: it's after the Cognizant Office/Lifeline Hospital). During the journey from Broadway to Perungudi I could get to see the following places/buildings: "Madras Dental College, Chennai Fort, University of Madras, Presidency College, Cheupak Railway station, Marina Beach, Tiruvallankeni Railway station, Central Institute of Classical Tamil, Tamil Nadu State Council for Higher Education, Queen Mary's College, Police Head Quarters, Forensic Science Department (Education Center), Prasar Bharati (AIR) Marketing Division, Children Film's Society of India, Zoological Survey of India, Marine Aquarium, Lattice Bridge Road (aka LB Road) in Adayar."

Hema came to pick me up at the bus-stop and we sat in a temple near her house till 11:30am and talked to each other. In the afternoon I had a good chat with Hema and her friends, who were also her roommates/batchmates/colleagues, knowing more about them and more about Hema. I had lunch at her place. Then in the evening I and Hema decided to go for a movie. On looking in the newspaper we found that Telugu movies are played in only one multiplex: Mayajaal, on East Coast Road (ECR). Mayajaal is around 15Kms from Perungudi. There are two ways to reach this place. You can either goto Thiruvanmiyur and from there catch any local bus going to Kovalam (route: PP19, 19G) (NOTE: Please don't board the district bus going to Mahabalipuram or Pondicherry as these buses don't stop at Mayajaal multiplex) OR take an auto to Shollinganallur and from there a shared-auto to Mayajaal. This link shows the route and the places location ;-) (Thanks again to maps.yahoo.com, which not only shows the route, but also gives the directions and even the approximate auto-fares and travel time). We reached Thiruvanmiyur at 5pm but couldn't get any local bus. The auto-wala's were demanding Rs 150 for one way, while the bus fare from Thiruvanmiyur to Mayajaal multiplex was just Rs 11. We decided to ditch the movie plans and instead goto Beasant Nagar beach. We took an auto (Rs 50) and went to the beach from the Thiruvanmiyur bus station. We spent around 1.5 hrs at the beach, had a good talk - about our plans, feelings, what we expect from each other. We felt very happy after talking to each other in person, earlier it was only through phone. We returned back, I dropped at her place and I left back for my hotel. I slept the night in the hotel, got up early morning and checked out by 6am as we planned to go for the movie the next day morning for the 08:30am show. I was at her place the next day morning (19 Oct, sunday) by 7:05am. We then took a bus to Thiruvanmiyur and from there took another bus (route # PP19) to Mayajaal. On reaching there we found that due to strike in TamilNadu the morning shows were cancelled. The next show for the movie which we wanted to see was only at 03:30pm. So we had our breakfast in a small hotel, near Mayajaal and then left for Crocodile Park. (Bus fare from Mayajaal to Crocodile park was Rs 9). Since we had plenty of time, we went to the beach behind the crocodile park, we walked for few minutes. There were hardly any people on the beach, it was almost isolated. I wished to walk along the beach from one end to the other end, but Hema was not used to walking in the hot sun. So we just spent half an hour or so, at the beach and returned back to the Crocodile park. The entry ticket to the park was Rs 30 per head for adults and another ticket of Rs 10 for entry to the snakes section. The park is opened from 08:30am onwards till 05:00pm. The park is closed on Mondays. I learnt the following things about crocodiles in this park:
1) crocodiles can jump
2) small crocodiles can gallop @ 38kmph for small distances
3) the care-takers feed the small crocodiles with fish and bigger crocodiles beef once in 15/20 days. For around 450 crocodiles they give around 500/600 kgs of meat.
4) the small crocodiles when in danger emit some sort of sound, to which all adult (including the parents of the small crocodile) crocodiles come for help. Nice helping nature which is rarely found in human-beings in the current times :-(
TIP: If you are not able to see the crocodile in the enclosure when you visit this park, then make sounds like 'beck beck' as if you are feeding something to them, then they will come out ;-)
5) the average life of a crocodile is around 75 years of age
6) they lay eggs and depending on the temperature during the incubation period the sex of the new born is decided. If it is around 21-24 celcius, then it would be female else if the temperature is around 33-34 celicus then it would be male. Strange phenomenon na... Thank God that this was not the case with human beings else imagine what would have been done to pregnant women for having babies of required sex.

I notice some of the advantages of crocodiles, that were listed in the crocodile park, which are as follows:
1) they eat the dead carcass in the water bodies, thus cleaning the water
2) they eat the fish predators thus saving fish for us ;-)
3) it's eggs are food for some of the birds
4) the crocodiles are resistant to disease. So there is reasearch going on as to what is that makes them resistance to disease(s).

We were out of the park by 12 noon. We then had lunch in a small road-side stall as there were no good hotels near the Park. After lunch, we came back to Mayajaal to buy the tickets. We reached the multiplex at around 1:45pm. When I went to buy the tickets, there were only 6 seats available and all were scatttered :-( So we ditched the movie plans and returned back to the city. During the bus journey from Mayajaal to Thiruvanmiyur, Hema asked me if she could rest her head on my shoulders as she was feeling very sleepy because of tiredness and also the bus seat was not of good height and it was little behind. She asked me if she could rest on my shoulders, that told me how innocent she was. While she rested on my shoulders, that moment made me realise that I have another responsibilty that I have to take care of her through out my life. This incident also gave me the first practical illustration that she hopes that I will be by her side always for the rest of her life both in good times and bad times, which I will try to be. Though it's an added responsibility, but I am sure that I will be able to fulfill it and enjoy that responsibility all throughout my life.

We reached her place and discussed how the past 1.5 days went by quickly. I realised that she was more comfortable with me in comparison to what she was when I met the day I reached Chennai. She too felt the same. To quote some figures, before engagement she was 20% comfortable with me, after engagement but before my visit she was 50%, after my visit she was 80% comfortable and post-visit, the % of comfortableness is increasing each day :)

We went for a dinner, close to her home. I then dropped her back at her place, picked up my luggage and started towards the bus-stop, she said that she would come till the bus-stand. That evening we both realised that the past 1.5 days have gone really fast and hoped that we had few more hours/days to spend time with each other. We were missing each other very much as the time had come for me to start for the station. Anyway we were very happy with this visit. We learned more about one another, were able to express our feelings more comfortably with each other, understood our weakness/interests. These two days are really memorable, lovely days for both of us. As my friend, Malde and Victor says, the days before engagement and marriage are really special. You have to take time from your busy schedule and get to meet each other. This doesn't mean that you can't enjoy your post-marriage days. I am hoping that we would be having very more memorable days even after marriage, when she will be in Chennai for the next 6 months and I will be in Bangalore.

The return journey was another learning experience for me. For a short summary of that journey read this blog. I boarded the train at Chennai with my e-ticket whose status was WL 41. I didn't know that e-ticket with WL status is invalid. The TT told me to pay the penalty (total amounted to Rs 520) as it was equivalent to travelling without ticket. I just had Rs 170 with me. The TT asked me to borrow money from any of the other passengers and later return the amount to them. As I was travelling alone, I didn't knew anyone in the train. Later an RPF policeman, who understood my situation, helped me by taking from S1 coach to S13 coach and told me to get down at Jolarpettai (where he would be getting down too), from there catch a passenger train at 4:30am to Bangalore. He inturn asked me to give him some amount for his help. I opted for paying some amount to the RPF policeman and get down at Jolarpetti and catch the passenger train from there after buying a general ticket. Luckily I met another Yahoo colleague, from whom I borrowed some amount. The S13 TT told me to get down at next station, Katpadi and didn't permit me to travel till Jolarpettai. So I had to get down at Katpadi station at 01:15hrs. As I came out of the railway station, luckily one passenger who stays in Vellore, offered me a lift till the bus-stand. It was risky, to take a lift from a stranger. He himself offered me the lift at such an odd hour. He soon brought his bike from the stand and we started towards the bus-stand. I was mentally prepared to jump off the bike if I later felt suspicious about him. The bus-stand was around 5Kms away from the railway station. During the ride I immediately started a converstaion with him. He was working for Kingfisher airlines in Chennai airport and he was travelling by the same train (Bangalore Mail). He was talking very nicely and I felt at ease, comfortable, and worth trustful. He dropped me at bus-stop. I got a bus from there to Hosur (Rs 57) and I sat beside the engine as all other seats were occupied. I kept my bag on the engine and slept - sometimes on the bag, sometimes sitting on the steps resting my head on the engine and sometimes with my back against the front mirror of the bus. I reached Hosur and from there I immediately got a bus to Bangalore (Rs 22) which dropped me at Silkboard. I was at home by 07:15am. It was a new lesson for me: to keep enough cash during the journeys and also taught about the e-ticket with WL status being invalid.

PS: If you are reaching Chennai by bus then mostly you would be getting down at CMBT (Chennai Mofussil Bus Terminus). From there you can catch a direct bus (route # 570, fare: Rs 33) to Perungudi OR route D70 to reach Velachery and from there any bus to Perungudi OR M70 to reach Thiruvanmiyur and from there route T51 to reach Perungudi. It would take around 1hr 15 minutes by direct bus. The route # 570 bus starts from CMBT at 07:30am daily.

Few more lessons I learnt from my frequent trips to Hyderabad

2008-10-13T10:11:00.001+05:30

I am happy and sad at writing this blog: happy because I have been travelling to and fro between Hyderabad and Bangalore almost on all weekends for the past 1.5 months (and will be doing so for the next 1.5 months), spending time with my family members. During my trips I am more bounded to my parents, sisters, brother-in-laws and above all to my nephews: Mayukh and Veda Chandra with each trip. These trips also made me understand/realise how much each one loves one another.

My elder nephew Mayukh is very naughty. I envy the enthusiasm of these small kids. They are full of energy. One more thing I like about Mayukh is his ability to forget small mistakes in life that happen to him. For example: Sometimes I loose my patience and I beat him up for his mischief...but he still doesn't blame me, he just forgives me with his smile and comes and hugs me immediately. It's then you realise that the mistake is not his but it's our acts, our loss of patience. May God always bless him.

Another incident that I will never forget that happened on 28 Sep 2008 (Sunday afternoon) when he fell from the top of the main gate because of me :( Just few minutes before he fell, I took him out of the house and left him outside after locking the gate as he was doing lots of mischief. He climbed the gate from outside while I was still standing there and got inside. I was happy that he got my climbing skills...also felt sad that his grandfather and mother didn't see it, as they had gone for some shopping. When they came back I took Mayukh outside the gate and asked him to do the same thing. While I was waiting inside, he climbed till the top and lost his balance and fell on the ramp on the outer side and I couldn't catch him. Luckily by the grace of GOD, nothing serious happened, just an injury on his nose. This incident shaked me a lot. Inspite of all this he is still close to me and comes closer to me as compared to other family members.

Even yesterday (11 Oct 2008, on my engagement day) I spent a lot of time with my nephew, Mayukh, more than with Hema. But at few times I became very angry with his behaviour, I scolded him thrice, beaten him twice :( even though I knew that he would be going to his paternal grandparents in Vishakapatnam the same evening and that he would not be coming with us back to Hyderabad and that I would be seeing him only after many days :( Later in the train when I thought about my behaviour I felt very ashamed :-( Today morning when we reached home, we missed him a lot. The first thing I could see as I entered the house were his toys on the floor, which I picked up and keep it aside. Absence of him brought only sadness in everyone of us (my parents and sisters). Its like the main member of each of our lives is missing... :-(

These few recent trips made me understand what LOVE means, what it means to be hurt. Why parents love their kids so much? I need to also learn a great lesson that my nephew has taught me: "To enjoy each moment wholely, forget others mistakes and go ahead in life and above all to ALWAYS keep smiling."

Even my younger nephew, Veda Chandra, is very cute...he sleeps very nicely in my hands. He smiles looking at me, propably because he is looking at a new face (?). He has also given me 2 gifts: the first gift was that he excreted on my enagement dress (just after few minutes I and Hema exchanged the rings), the second gift was that he urinated on my dress twice :-) I am sure that he is gonna grow into another naughty boy just like Mayukh ;-) BTW, the to-and-fro train trip from Hyderabad to Vishakapatnam was Veda's first train journey. He slept nicely in a cradle made from the saree by tying them to the rods of the upper berth. Neither he nor Mayukh troubled us a lot as we had expected in the train journey....It was a plesant train journey.

Sudden trip to Hyderabad (06-07 Sep 2008)

2008-09-07T22:50:00.003+05:30

Today (05 Sep, Friday) I had to go to home (Hyderabad) for the weekend, as my nephew was not well. I thought of going by bus as I thought that it's not possible to get a confirmed train ticket for the same day. I tried searching for bus travel agents - either the fare was high (Rs 450 for non-AC semi-sleeper and 750 for Volvo/AC sleeper) or the departure timing of the bus was little early in the evening (around 5:30/7:00pm). As I had work to do complete by the EOD (for it was a code-complete for 2.2 release), I wanted to catch a late train (say around 9pm). I thought of giving a search for a train. Luckily I got a confirmed seat in Chair Car (CC) in the Garib Rath Express. There were 5 seats available then.. I booked both the upward and downward journey in the same train in the same class (Garib Rath Express in the CC class).

Because of the sudden need to complete the work by EOD, I finished my job almost completely, with the help of my teammates. The rest of the work I can do at home during the weekend ;-) (which I didn't as I didn't get time to do as I spent the whole time with my elder nephew, Mayukh). I caught the office shuttle at 5:30pm that leaves for Yeshwantpur station and I reached the station by 6:45pm. Had I left the office at 6:30pm/7:00pm I wouldn't have reached the station on time because of the heavy traffic and also because it was Friday evening...

I roamed around the station for few minutes and then went to a small hotel, near the station. Had a normal thali (Rs 17), one plain dosa (Rs 10) and a coffee (Rs 3) for dinner. Came to the platform no. 2 where the train was already present and started my work after getting inside the train. The good thing about this CC is that there would be no bumpy ride as in the case of bus and moreover this would be reach the destination place almost on time :) Also there is an electric socket in the train, so you can work in the train on your laptop without the worry of your laptop battery getting dead. (FYI: It's in the train that I wrote this blog :-)) Another point I noted is that almost 50% of the CC bogie is empty :) Currently the two adjacent seats beside me are empty. (No one came, so I slept nicely on all the three seats :))

Few things I learnt from today's experience:
1) Always search for the availability in this Garib Rath train. Even if it's waiting list book it, kya pata tumhe confirm bhi ho jaye? Make the bus journey as the last option....
2) You can work all night in this train without any worry :)
3) Never ever postpone the work till the last day (which I have the habit of doing so), because we don't know what happens next? Luckily I almost completed my job before the EOD. What if I didn't? What if my teammates didn't help me?
4) Always have some dresses at home, so that you don't have to worry about clothes during your stay at home on such sudden short trips like the one that I had to make today. I left for Hyderabad directly from the office with my laptop.

[PS: The CC bogie was almost more than 50% empty, so I slept nicely on the three empty seats :) I checked emails, read news, saw a movie before I slept at 2:00am.]

I spent the whole Saturday and Sunday morning with my nephew in the hospital. He got discharged from the hospital on Sunday (07 Sep) morning. He is now doing fine. Doctor has advised him some course, according to which he has to come to the hospital to take some anti-biotic injections: one in the morning and one in the evening for the next 7 days.

The return journey was also really good. My mother packed dinner for me and also breakfast for the next day. In the train I had a conversation with my co-passengers. We discussed about the booking of train/bus tickets from Bangalore to Hyderabad and vice-versa, in case of sudden trips, which I thought of sharing with you all too here:
1) If you don't get a confirmed ticket from Bangalore to Hyderabad, then try in the quota from Hindupur station to Hyderabad. Hindupur station is around 3 hrs from Bangalore...(In short, if you don't get it from your source place then try from nearby stations close to your source place.
2) If you don't get the train tickets then you can hardly get a bus ticket in the peak season. But do you know that every driver/conductor of the Govt bus services has some around 4 seats with him for VIP people. You can pay him some money unofficially and get a seat booked for you ;-)
3) In the long trains like Sampark Kranti Express (from Bangalore to NewDelhi via Hyderabad) the general bogies are almost empty it seems. Usually such super-fast trains halt at only few stations so there would be not many people in the general bogie. So you can even try that too as a last option.

[PS: Saw "C Company" hindi movie, which was there in one of the co-passengers pendrive, wrote this later part of the blog and slept at 12:00 midnight...This time during the return journey, the CC class was fully packed so I sat and slept in the train, unlike the onward journey from Bangalore to Hyderabad.]

Trip to Hyderabad (29-31 Aug 2008)

2008-09-02T09:16:00.007+05:30

I booked the tickets to home (Hyderabad) on alternate weekends so that I can spend some time with my nephews (Mayukh and Veda Chandra) and also help parents a little bit. I will be at home for the following weekends: 29-31 August 2008, 12-14 September 2008 and 26-28 September 2008, 09-12 October 2008 and 28 Oct-02 November 2008 (and some more trips (propably a long trip) planned in December ;-))

This weekend (29-31 Aug) I played with my nephew Mayukh. He has been weak since the past few days because of the light fever that he gets during the nights. But during the day, he plays well. As always, the only problem with him is he doesn't eat well. Baakhi sab tikh hai... his activities, energy levels, enthusiasm etc. My younger nephew, Veda Chandra, has grown a little. Sister told me that the growth of children during the early months is fast. Everyone is having a good time at home. Mayukh spent the two days with me most of the time when I was there. He doesn't leave me at all -- be it tying his shoes, for eating, for cycling trips, even for going to the loo and also for cleaning his leaking nose... He is very adorable and I really miss him a lot.

On saturday (30 Aug) I met my friend (Suman and Rapa) at Suman's house in Banjara hills. Also met Suman's parents and his wife Suteja. Last time I met him was in his marriage 2.5 years back. Rapa, who stays in Bangalore, came to Hyderabad. I thought as I couldn't meet Rapa in Bangalore, I better meet him there in Hyderabad, which would also solve the dual purpose of meeting Suman & his family. It was good to catch them after a long gap.

On sunday (31 Aug) was my younger sister's wedding anniversary. My brother-in-law gave a treat. We all went to Parivaar hotel, near our house, for lunch. We also took my younger nephew, Veda Chandra, to the hotel. I think that this is his first time that he has come out for a party :)

On Monday (01 Sep) I was having tea with my colleague, Santosh M and Ganesh P. Sanotsh received an appreciation award on Friday evening (29 Aug). He told me that he has sent a mail to his team-mates that he doesn't believe in the awards and that the credit of the award goes to all his team-mates. He even told them that he would distribute the money (cash award) either by distributing to each of the members or go together for a party. (They decided to go for a party/outing) This is the first time I am seeing a person, who is so humble and self-less. I am really lucky to be his friend. I will never forget this day, 01 Sep 2008 monday and my friend Santosh Mandi !!

Trip to Dharwad (24 Aug 2008)

2008-08-25T18:27:00.007+05:30

On 24 Aug 2008 (Sunday) was my friend Dhwani's wedding reception in Dharwad. I booked the train ticket from Bangalore to Dharwad on 20 Aug 2008 (3 days before the start of the journey) and the ticket status was WL20. I couldn't book the return train ticket as I had already booked 10 tickets in a single month at irctc. For more information on my recent experiences on booking the train tickets online refer to my other blog. Till 5:30pm of 24 Aug, my ticket status was WL14 and just before the chart was prepared, which is usually 4 hrs before the departure of the train, it got confirmed :)

As the ticket got confirmed, the train journey was good as I slept nicely on the upper berth. I wanted to share a good experience with you all during this train journey. The train starts from Bangalore City (SBC) and passes through Yeshvantpur station (YPR). (For people who don't know much about Bangalore, there are three main stations in the Bangalore city - Bangalore City (SBC), Bangalore Cantontment (BNC) and Yeshvantpur (YPR)). Since YPR is also a big station I thought that the train would halt there. As I was feeling thirsty I decided to get down and drink water on the platform. My coach was the fourth one from the last. While entering the YPR station the train reduced speed and it continued, while I stood waiting at the door-entrance for the train to halt. I was waiting for the train to stop. It didn't stop, but slowly picked up speed, after crossing half the length of the platform. Had I got down at the station while the train slowed down, I would have missed the train definitely as it was traveling at a good speed and the platform was on the right side of the train -- a very inconvenient position to catch a running locomotive with your left-hand. Luckily I was destined to visit Dharwad and enjoy it's natural beauty ;-)

I liked this Dharwad town because of it's less pollution and broad roads and lots of greenery around. People say that Dharwad is very hot especially during the summer season and there is a water-scarcity at this place. But I didn't find so. Propably I might have visited this place during the monsoon season or there might have been rainfall in the past few days. Because everywhere all around me I could greenery both in the town and in the fields outside the town limits. This place reminded me of my village - warangal, where one can see small houses with big gardens, big trees - tamarind, cheeku, mango and other fruits and lots of fresh air...

One needn't go hungry at this place. You can climb any tree, pluck fruits and run after plucking the fruits if the owner gives a big shout or follows you ;-). I saw many buffaloes - 80% of these buffaloes have big curvy horns (almost symmetrical) and very pointed !! I went for a stroll in the morning after having breakfast and found that this place is not plain, there are many ups and downs just like Goa and I was lucky to reach a point from where I could get a good view of the town below. During many of the streets I walked down, at few places I saw that people buy milk from the milkman not in litres or 1/2 litre or 1/4 litre but in terms of glasses/chambu's (a big glass) -- the practice which can still be found in the villages. Another thing I liked about this place is the beautiful girls :) All the girls that I have seen in this town are really beautiful. Only minus point is that they were of a very younger age, probably going to Xth or intermediate classes.

My friend's wedding reception went well. It was really a good and simple function and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Both of them are really naughty and they make a lovely couple. I would remember this visit forever in life. Hope that this place retains it's beauty and charm.

I made my reservations for the return journey by the KSRTC bus service. Since I made the reservations I could use that ticket in boarding the local buses free of cost, to reach the bus-stop to board the bus. The same ticket cannot be used after reaching the destination to travel to your home from the bus-stop in your arrived city.

The images that you see are the certificates that are been bestowed on the makers of the famous Dharwad pedas. You should buy them only from the original makers: "Babusingh's Thakur Peda". You can find also the map of the shop here.

Jo bhi hota hai ache ke liye hota hai

2008-08-04T12:33:00.003+05:30

Yesterday evening my youngest sister (Avanthy) was discharged from hospital. She gave birth to a baby boy on 29 July 2008 at 07:39am IST. In the evening, Anitha came along with her son Mayukh. So from yesterday evening onwards there will be two small kids at home. I was worried that how parents would manage two kids. But when I called parents in the night, I was pleased to hear that Mayukh is very fond of his brother. He listens to his grand parents, keeps calm when told and is very caring about his brother. It's nice to hear that thing....I felt very happy. Earlier I was worried that it would be strain for my parents to manage both Mayukh and the youngest one at home. But yesterday when I talked to my nephew I could see that he talks about his brother. He even kept his new elephant soft toy (which he likes a lot) near his brother. I was really happy to hear that. By GOD's grace hope that they too would stay good brothers throughout life and take care of each other.

Another good news is that Hema got a good apartment near her office in chennai, which she was looking since the past few days.

As I was happy I that I would share it with my good friends. But it was already 10pm. I called up Hema and shared my happiness with her. I called another close friend, but she was tired. I was so happy that I decided that I would goto Lord Shiv temple (in front of my home) in the morning. But today morning I was late, as the bulb in the bathroom burst while I was taking bath, which left the glass pieces of the bulb scattered on the bathroom floor. So that took a lot of time, else I would be on time. By the time I got ready it was already 8:28pm and so I had to skip the visit to the temple. I hurried to the stop to catch the office cab. But it was late and it has already left by then. So I came back home and then went to temple. I found peace of mind after visiting the temple. Moreover I got a cab which dropped me at office (I didn't have to travel in the crowded bus either). Moreover the route that the cab took was totally different from the normal route. To avoid the traffice he took me through small lanes, thus I got to learn about a new route to reach office avoiding all the traffic :) These small incidents in the past few hrs, made me believe more strongly that "Jo bhi hota hai ache ke liye hota hai" and hamesha "achche logon ke saath hamesha acha hi hota hai". So one needs to be always good. Do good to others and don't expect much - the secret to my happiness.

PS: Please don't be under the illusion that I am a good person...mein thoda kamina aur selfish aadmi hoon...I just wrote this blog as I want to share my happiness...

Trip to Mumbai and trek to Chanderi (25-27 July 2008)

2008-08-04T12:29:00.003+05:30

This Friday, I went to Mumbai to see my friend. As I was having only a weekend I went by the flight (from B'lore to Mumbai) and planned for the return journey by the train (Udyan Express that leaves from Mumbai CST at 8:05am). The flight journey from Bangalore to Mumbai was my 2nd flight journey in life, first flight which I paid with my own money :) [The first flight journey was from Pune to Bangalore, which my company paid when I joined the company]. I took the 3:45pm Volvo bus from Leela palace and reached the airport by 05:05pm. The flight which was supposed to depart at 06:40pm was delayed by an hour. So I had the whole time to roam around the new Bangalore airport :-) During the first flight journey I landed in the old airport. During my first visit to the new airport, when I went to receive my sister, brother-in-law and nephew, there was no visitor pass at the airport, so couldn't go inside to see the airport. But this time when I reached the airport I roamed for few minutes outside the airport to notice if any new outlets have come up since my last visit? I found that now there is a visitor pass (Rs 80 per head). Anyway as I had the ticket I went inside without the visitor pass, roamed the whole airport as far as I can and then checked in to the few shops there. For the first time I saw a diamond in one of the jewellery shops. For the first time, I saw how they shine so beautifully and then I realized why they are valued so much? As there was around 2hrs I went into a bookshop and read a photo book which contained the pictures of Mumbai taken from the sky. I saw the whole book. I saved Rs 3000 (the price of the book) by reading it completely ;-) I still had 30 minutes left so I came and sat at the boarding point. While I sat there, I saw a beautiful girl - the one thing that attracted me towards her is her dress. She was wearing formal office attire - green shirt and a grey color matched blazer. She was fair, simple and she got back to her work...I kept looking at her. She ignored the rest of the world and was involved in her work, which she did on her laptop.

The flight was smooth. I got down at the Mumbai airport and came out, took an auto from there to the IIT campus. Went to my friend Sobhan's room, kept my luggage over there and went to the Staff Canteen (StaffC) to have Chicken Triple Rice. The StaffC is almost deserted these days, with the new Gulmohar in the campus and lots of eatable joints inside and outside the campus (also money is another factor, these younger generations now a days have lots of money). After having dinner I went to the CSE Dept and spent some time there. The old CSE building is deserted with hardly few people. I slept early as I have to wake up the next day morning at 03:30am for I have to catch the 4:15am local train. We have decided to go for Chanderi trek. By the time my friend and her colleagues came, it was already 05:10am at the Kanjur Marg station itself. We got down at Vangani station. Luckily this time we got an auto from Vangani station to Hotel Chanderi. BTW there are always 2-3 autos in queue at the station, which was not the situation the last time I went for a trek to Chanderi, which if I recall correctly is around 2-3 years back. From Hotel Chanderi we started our trek. By the time we reached the top it was 01:30 pm. All the way up the trek it rained so we were totally drenched. I enjoyed a lot trekking in the rain with all the green vegetation around you. Earlier the Chanderi trek was considered to be a little hard, as there were no marks and people would easily get lost among the green vegetation on the huge plateau and also because the route criss-crossed a huge stream many times. But now the white arrow marks are all placed at important points, so it should now be considered an easy trek. Warning: Please be careful especially in the rains, if you are amateur trekker. The route passes at few places up the stream and you need to be very careful. A small mistake and you could come down along the stream, breaking your neck/spinalcord/head and if you are lucky alive with minor injuries.

We started our descent at 02:15pm. My friend colleagues, many of them were coming for the first time for trek, faced little fear especially during the stretch of the descent from the cave to the col. Once they reached the col, they were now confident that they would easily do the remaining trek too. We cautiously crossed the stream and reached the village by 06:10pm. We, then took an auto from the village to Badlapur (Rs 15 per head, but we were charged Rs 20 per head). We caught the 07:15pm slow train from Badlapur. By the time we reached the campus it was 08:45pm. I had bath and then had dinner with my friend. I hope that trek would have taught my friend and her colleagues some important lessons in life:
1) enjoy the path that you take , feel confident, overcome fear
2) look ahead and keep walking enjoying yourselves...
3) face the difficulties and you will enjoy the fruits of your efforts later

I started my return journey to Bangalore by catching the Udyan express at Kalyan. I had one chikki (Rs 5) + puri (Rs 10) for lunch at Solapur, masala dosa (Rs 10) + butter milk (Rs 5) for dinner at Yadgiri station. The masala dosa at Yadgiri station was the best dosa that I ever had during my whole life on any rail platform that I have come across. I reached Majestic by 7:15am, took a bus and was at home by 08:45am. Washed clothes, cleaned the room, took bath and reached office at 11:05am.

This trip was good for I was able to visit my almamater and secondly for the fond memories that I have with Chanderi hill. This is one place where I would visit anytime in my good/bad times. It gives me a lot of solace, I don't know why? – But there are some things that just happen.

Luckily after I reached Bangalore, I read that there was heavy rainfall in Mumbai on Sunday (the day I started from there). Another good point about this trip was that I was able to run very smoothly for 5kms the next to next day after I reached Bangalore.

Running in the heavy rain (02 July 2008)

2008-07-03T22:16:00.003+05:30

Today evening when the cab dropped me near my home at 7:05pm (little bit early as compared to the usual timings of 7:20/7:25pm), I was walking towards my home and I saw few people standing outside Coffee Day. That drew my attention and I too joined them as they were all watching the Ind vs Pak cricket match (Asia Cup). There were only 3 overs left and I decided to stay there on the roadside and watch the total score of India team. After the 48th over, when an ad was coming I looked at people inside the Coffee day...and right below the TV, there was a beautiful girl - perfect figure - neither slim nor fat, very simple, good looking. Later when she came out of the Coffee day, learnt that she was married after looking at ther legs... After she left and before the final over could be bowled it started raining. I ran to my house, kept my bag and wore my old running shoes. When I came out it was raining very heavily...It was the first time that I ran in a heavy rainfall in Bangalore.

Whenever it rains and I feel like running. When I run in the heavy rainfall it always reminds me of just two things:
1) my good old IIT days and
2) Trisha in the telugu movie "Varsham".
It was a good run of 4kms near my home in that heavy rainfall !!

My Nephew's Mundan Sanskar (22 June 2008)

2008-06-30T02:34:00.006+05:30

On Sunday, 22 June 2008 was my nephew's mundan sanskar (called as "Javala" ceremony in Marathi, "Puttentukalu tiyyadam" in telugu), which was done in Arasavalli's Sri Suryanarayana Swamy Temple, near Srikakulam. To attend this function I left for Hyderabad on Thursday (19 Jun 2008) evening from Bangalore. On Friday, my father and I went to Ameerpet for I wanted to buy some trousers as I was getting many t-shirts from my company and I was not having enough trousers. But my father took advantage of this occassion and bought me 4 dresses. The quality was really good and they were at cheaper rates (Rs 399 or Rs 699 per trouser and Rs 299 for shirt). Shirt size 40 exactly suited me but in case of trousers, 32 size fitted exactly but I felt uncomfortable, so I went for size 34. By the time we returned home from shopping it was around 2pm. Before shopping we went to see my sister's flat which they booked. It was really nice. After having lunch at home my parents did the rest of the house work, packing and other stuff while I played with my nephew. In the evening we caught the train. I took him all along to the end of the platform and showed him the engine, how the train comes onto the tracks. He was having great time at the railway station, seeing the trains coming and going. In the train Mayukh showed me his climbing skills. Earlier he used to climb the swining chair upto the chain in the house, now in the train he displayed his skills again by climbing upto the upper berth. He was unaware that if he falls he would get hurt, but he was sure that someone would be there to hold him, which is me. My parents and sisters are scared but I don't want to restrict him. I enjoy watching his skills :) (touchwood). Mayukh didn't sleep till 10:30pm and he wanted to play. So he and I played cards till 10:30pm. I used to remove the visiting cards from my purse and he would put them in right order. He later went and slept near his mom.

My father says, that after the above ceremony, it's assumed that the boy has grown a little and that it's time that he needs to be taught, to be disciplined. I didn't know the significant of this ceremony till then. On saturday morning we reached Vishakapatnam. The same day evening (20 June), my parents, Anitha and her spouse and in-laws along with my nephew, went to see a girl. That was my first formal "pelli-chupulu". We first met at the temple and then later went to the girl's relative place. They requested that we first meet in the temple because it was her first "pelli-chupulu" too :) She is simple and innocent, so innocent that she asked me the question "Did I like her?" directly after we talked to each other for around 30 minutes.

The next day, we all started for the Sri Suryanarayana Swamy Temple early morning. The temple is around 125 Kms away from Vishakapatnam. We already explained to Mayukh that we would be removing his hair at the temple and he was comfortable in that. When anyone asks Mayukh what would they to his hair, he would tell the whole process that the barber would lower his head and remove all his hair and then he would have a bath, followed by sandal paste applied on his head etc... But when the time has come to remove the hair, he was really afraid. He cried a lot, it took 4 people to hold him - one was holding his head, other his hands, other his legs. He cried so heavily that my mother too cried seeing him cry. After his hair was cut, he was back to normal that too after tipping him with ice-cream and Lays chips. Then we all went for the Lord's dharshanam and started for the return journey back to Vishakapatnam.

I and Anitha left for Hyderabad the same sunday (22 June 2008) evening as we have offices to attend. My parents stayed back so that my nephew would get a break from continuous travel and my brother-in-law had some passport related work. During the train journey from Vishakapatnam to Hyderabad, two interesting things happened:
1) As the train moved, someone pulled the chain at the train halted at the station itself. I thought that it would take atleast another 5 minutes for the train to start as TT has to go to that compartment, enquire why the chain was pulled and if need be, put a fine on that respective person. In this 5 minutes I thought of buying some sweets from Vishaka dairy (on the same platform) for my sister. For the first 1-2 minutes, she said that she doesn't want anything. When I got down and asked her how many boxes she want? She replied that she wants an ice-cream (and not sweets). Both my sisters like ice-cream a lot. I went to the counter and the person was refusing to sell the ice-cream as he doesn't have a stick. While I was arguing with him that I dont mind if he doesn't give the stick with the ice-cream and that I would manage myselves, the train has started. I quickly paid him Rs 10 and took the ice-cream and ran to my place in the bogie, gave the ice-cream through the window and then got in to the compartment, for I feared that she might stop the train by pulling the chain.
2) During the train my sister asked me my opinion about the girl we all had seen in "pelli-chupulu" on saturday, what all questions I asked and what's my opinion. That discussion went on and it led to the discussion of our childhood days. It was very nostalgic. We had our dinner and slept off early.

On Monday morning (23 June 2008), the train reached Sec-bad station at right time (05:30am). I sent Anitha to home (A S Rao Nagar) with all the luggage in an auto, while I went for seeing my younger sister, Avanthy as that was the only time I could meet her before she leaves for office. She didn't come with us for the ceremony as she was carrying and was in her 8th month. I took the bike that my brother-in-law (Anitha's husband - Hari) has parked. The parking charges were Rs 16 per day. The total came out to be Rs 44 (for 2.5 days + 4 hrs). I then realised that I didn't have license with me (as it was in my bag, which I sent with Anitha) and there was no helmet (which was a compulsory in Hyderabad). As it was early morning going to my younger sister's place (Kukatpally) would be no problem as there would be no traffic policeman at such an early hour. The problem would come only during the return journey from Kukatpally to A S Rao Nagar. I had a good time with my sister, had breakfast at her place, talked with my younger brother-in-law and then left for home at 10:15am. From Kukatpally to AS Rao Nagar, there were 4-5 main junctions where there is 100% of traffic policeman being found. I escaped at all those junctions: once by keeping myselves behind the APSRTC bus in the middle of the road, at other point by going by the side of a military vehicle. At Tirumalagiri junction, there was a red signal and I was in the front. Across the road, I could see 4 traffic policemen waiting to catch people like me who travel without helmet/license. I immediately took a left turn and went by a longer route. Luckily on that day no one caught me (touchwood). I kept the bike at my sisters place. Then I caught a running APSRTC bus to home. It reminded me of my college days, when we regularly used to board the running buses :) It also reminded me that I am still young :) I then did my bank work, after dropping Anitha at Radhika theatre from where her office cab would be picking her up. She has prepared lunch for me and also puligore rice for the evening journey (from Hyd to Blr). I saw a telugu movie after having lunch, then swept the whole house, took a bath and then did lit diyas in the pooja room. After a long long time I lit diyas in the pooja room. Daily my parents do it both in the morning and evening...I too used to do it earlier when I was in my +2 college days. It was a good pleasant trip and hopefully would bring a good news too....Lets wait and see ;-)

Mistakes lead to new Discoveries (15 June 2008)

2008-06-15T18:30:00.000+05:30

Today afternoon for lunch, I cooked rice in cooker and was making egg-curry. The curry was almost ready, in a minute or so I was supposed to remove it from the gas-stove. I opened the pressure-cooker and found that rice was cooked but there was still water in the container (jyada paani dal diya :( ). Suddenly I got an idea, I removed the excess water from rice and poured the boiled rice into the curry. Dono ko milake fried rice bana diya :) It turned out really good..better than the egg-fried rice that you get in hotels :)

Another movie weekend (13-14 June 2008)

2008-06-14T15:25:00.006+05:30

I stayed back in the office on Friday (13 June 2008) evening to watch the Euro 2008 football matches in Group C (second round) matches: Italy vs Romania (1-1) and Netherlands vs France (4-1). The matches were really a treat to watch, especially the Dutch team really played well. In between these two matches i.e. from 11pm to 01:00am I saw the "Ultraviolet" english movie on HBO. After then second match I saw the following telugu movies: Vasu, Aata, Rakta sinduram. I didn't leave for home on saturday morning though I was feeling very asleep after the nightout. During the whole day on Saturday, I also saw the following Hindi movies: "Jab We Met", "Sarkar" and "Hey Baby". Though it was a strain on my eyes and body for sitting continuously and watching TV/computer screen for 36hrs...but mein ghar par jaake bhi kya karta ? Had a great time. Saturday night will be complete rest and Sunday study time !! ---- This was I thought on Saturday evening....But sunday turned out to be totally different !!

"I slept till 10:10am...had breakfast, then prepared lunch and slept from 2pm to 4:40pm. Then in the evening came to office, read some mails/news, then went to see Ro-Jaggi's daughter. Had dinner at their place, met one of my wingmate and close friend Rapa (for the first time in 6 months after coming to B'lore). Then came back to office, saw the Czech-Turkey Euro 2008 football match. It was really interesting, till 75 minutes, Czech was leading 2-0 and in the last 10 minutes Turkey scored 3 goals to win the match...what a comeback !! After the match watched the telugu movie "Dee" and left office at 7:10am...to get refreshed at home and catch the 8:15am shuttle back to office :)"

Hope that from next week onwards I would not be watching so many movies (as the past two weeks) as I would be busy with work (atleast hope so). Take care. Have a nice week ahead and the frequency of the blog would reduce too...

My sisters stay in Bangalore (09-12 June 2008)

2008-06-12T08:37:00.004+05:30

My sister, brother-in-law and nephew came to Bangalore on 09 June afternoon. I went to the airport to pick them up. That was my first visit to the new Bangaluru International airport. I booked KSRTC Volvo bus (Vayu-Vajra) from viaworld.in (which doesn't require a userid/password). WhenI asked my nephew how he came, he tells the whole thing -- how the flight took off, how it turned and how it landed-- with his small hands. Then how the bus came to pick them up, the escalator thing. It was fun watching him explaining things with live display through his hands.

The next 2 days evenings were really wonderful as I spent the whole time with him. It was a great fun. He starts making his own sentences. He is smart enough (touchwood!) and he finds other alternate means to finish off his job. For example: he can't reach the wash-basin tap. So he goes to the drinking water-bottle (whcih is reachable) and washes his hands using the drinking water. He meticulously follows the things that he has been taught. For example, when he goes to toilet, he pours water, then cleans his legs, then his hands, then he asks the person who took him to the toilet to spread his legs and hands, pours water on them so that they too get cleaned; then dries his wet feet on the mat.

The only problem with him is that he doesn't eat well. There should be someone in competition to him to eat his food, then only he chews his food fast and takes another bite of his food. He also doesn't allow any other person to eat his food...He enjoys playing a lot especially games like hiding ourselves/things and asking him to find out where we/they are? We should have a look at his face, his happiness when he finds things...it's awesome. They are free of tension, always smiling and always pure at heart. Propably that is why someone said "Kids are next to God".

The great gift that these small kids have is their "enthusiasm and cheerfulness". They never get tired doing all the stuff they do... Sometimes we get very much tired and get angry on them for their acts which never ends. But you know when they smile, that cute look removes all the tiredness in us and we just keep loving them. I raelly had a great time with my nephew during those two days. And as expected I had home-made food during those 2 days as my sister is there :-)

Movie weekend (07-08 June 2008)

2008-06-09T06:54:00.003+05:30

One of my friend told me a URL where I can watch telugu movies online, so this entire weekend was spent in watching movies. I sat in the office and watched the following movies over Saturday and Sunday for around 20hrs in total. The movies list is as follows: Krishna, Tulasi, Bommana Brothers Chandana Sisters, KrishnaArjuna, Parugu, Maisamma IPS. Apart from the movies, I also watched the French Open final match between Nadal and Federer, Euro 2008 match between Germany and Poland. So in all I strained my eyes for around 25days the past 2 days and I could see the effect yesterday night when I slept...

Really had a great weekend :) Hope that the coming week would also be of great fun. My sister, brother-in-law and nephew are coming to Bangalore today morning and will be here till 12 June early morning :-) Gonna have a good time with him. More details about it later...

Keeping a Customer happy (08 June 2008)

2008-06-08T09:48:00.003+05:30

Today I went along with my cab-driver for having tea in SLV hotel, which is a big chain of hotels, well-known popular in Bangalore. The total cost for 2 coffee + 1 tea was Rs 21. I gave Rs 50. The person at the counter asked for Rs 1, I said that I don't have any change and I am having only 0.50 paise. By this he has already printed out the bill. He gave back me my Rs 50 and told me to bring change. I felt very irritated that for Rs 0.50 paise he is not giving me the tea :( I then checked with my driver, he gave me Rs 5, I gave it to him, he then returned Rs 30 + Rs 4 + bill.

While having coffee I realised that there was some mistake that has happened. I then realised that the person had given me back my Rs 50 (asking to bring change) and then while giving the bill gave me Rs 30 + Rs 4 (after deduction of Rs 1 from Rs 5). I felt like teaching him a lesson. So that's why I didn't tell him his mistake. I just had my coffee and came back. He today made a lost of Rs 50 !!!

I hope that he realise his mistake and learn a lesson that to do business, you should always aim for customer satisfaction and not look for petty costs :( like he behaved today. I was little unclear whether I did a right thing or not? I called up my father and told him the whole thing. He said that I had done a right thing. I was happy afterwards. Thought of sharing with you all.

Sudoku Puzzles in early morning dreams :( (06 June 2008)

2008-06-06T12:25:00.005+05:30

After coming to Bangalore I sleep off early by 10/11pm and daily morning at 5:30/6:00am, I wake up from the deep sleep. Afterwards, till yesterday I used to dream about girls ;-) but today morning how hard I tried I was only getting sudoku puzzles in my dream at such an early hour :( Thats really sad, ok I accept that I solve the Sudoku puzzles regularly but yaar dreams mein bhi.... :(

If I open a book and read it, I fall asleep very quickly and then 90% of the times I end up getting up lately at around 8am and then I had to rush myselves to catch the 8:15am cab. So studying in the morning is not a feasible solution. Stop solving sudoku puzzles is not a solution, which I can't !! I now have firmly decided that I will be going to GYM early in the morning from 6:00am to 7:15am, instead of getting those sudoku dreams :(

Current Target: To get back the 3 aps in 3 months...Lets wait and see !!

Childrens in Yahoo! (30 May 2008)

2008-06-01T11:39:00.003+05:30

Last Friday (30 May 2008) Yahoo! organised an event of allowing the employees to bring theirs kids to office for that day. So Friday morning when I went to the Cafeteria, it was very lively...there were balloons all around and during the lunch time it was a live environment with lots of kids all around you. It was differnet from the normal routine of seeing the same old people and friends. The next day (Saturday) when I went to the same cafeteria it was back to normal old walls and chairs - no balloons, silent environment :(

And today (01 June 2008) is my batchmate (Vinod Ganapathy's) wedding. So going there in the evening and hoping to meet atleast few of my batchmates. Yesterday I and Sanket went to his engagement ceremony. It was nice. This was the first marriage that I am attending in Karnataka. At the engagement ceremony I saw some items being displayed. Some of them were made entirely from coconut, and some from wicks only. For photos, visit my friend's photo album.

My first cinema in theatre in Bangalore (25 May 2008)

2008-05-26T10:08:00.003+05:30

I was quite bored over the weekend. I went for a long walk on Sunday evening, talking all the lanes that I feel like, roaming here and there. I just go like that till I get tired so that I can come home and fall asleep soon, dead-tired. While doing so I came across the "Renuka Prasanna Theatre" in JP Nagar 3rd phase, which is 15 minutes walking distance from my home. There was this telugu movie "Bujjigadu" being shown. As I was bored I thought that I would see the movie as there was Trisha in it. Hoped that she would be as good as she was in "Athadu" movie. But as luck was to go...she is not at all beautiful in that movie, nor the story was good either :( The balcony ticket was Rs 50 (Rs 45 for tax-free) and for Second class it was Rs 40 (Rs 35 for tax-free). Little expensive in comparison to the prices of the tickets in Movie theatres (Radhika, Sharada and Shiv-Shakti near my home in Hyderabad). I bought the balcony ticket for the 2nd show (which was supposed to start at 8:45pm but it started at 9pm). There was no AC. But that was not an important criteria for me. The story was little below average. I expected that Trisha would be atleast good-looking in this film, but she was not :( Overall the first experience turned out to be bad :(, the only good thing was that I watched a movie on a big screen.

The past few days have been really good (17-21May2008)

2008-05-22T10:29:00.003+05:30

The past few days have been really good for me. I had a task to complete. So I came to the office on Saturday (17 May 2008) morning at 8am and was working continuously till Sunday (18 May 2008) evening 8pm, with a 4hrs sleeping break from 6:30am to 10:30am on Sunday morning. The task got over :) Felt really happy that Sunday night.

The next 2 days I was busy in revising the work done and discussing the impact of it on other teams, lots of meetings attended during those two days :) And finally yesterday (21 May, Wednesday) evening, it rained a little. I just dropped my bag at home and wore my shoes and just ran around 3-4Kms in the rain !! It was a really nice feeling running in the rain again. I really miss the IIT days. And the past 3-4 days I was having a really good sleep...no dreams, just dead tired fast asleep !!

Talking to a girl for 2 hrs for the first time in a public place (01 May 2008)

2008-05-02T11:03:00.003+05:30

Today, I got a call from the girl, whom we (I and my parents) met last to last Sunday. She wanted to talk to me for she now wants to ask some questions/clarify some things. So we (I and the girl) met in the same Total shopping mall and we talked for around 2hrs. She initially was little uncomfortable in asking the questions or propably my answers to her first few questions might have scared her. But afterwards, say 30 or 40 minutes later, she was friendly and openly expressed her feelings. Boss, time ka pata hi nahi chala.. 2 hrs baatein karte rahe...Anyway it was sort of good meeting that I learnt more about her as compared to the first meeting when I met her along with my parents.

My parents visit to Bangalore (20-28 April 2008)

2008-04-29T10:22:00.000+05:30

My parents arrived in Bangalore on Sunday (20 April) morning by the Bangalore express. I went to the station to pick them up. The train which was supposed to reach Bangalore at 06:30am arrived at 07:30am. We caught a bus from there to home and were at home by 08:30am. Father and I then went to buy some bowls (as mother felt that the three bowls at home were not sufficient). We also bought some vegetables and necessary items. We had our breakfast by 11:00am and then slept for a while. After lunch, I and my father went for purchasing a mattress. I should appreciate my father's bargaining skills and his patience to roam many shops. We bought a Kurlon mattress (4ft x 6.5ft) for Rs 4024/- with two free pillows and a bedsheet. No other shop were giving Kurlon mattress alone with the above dimensions for less than 4200/-. My father with this bargaining skills got all the three at a lesser price with free home-delivery :) In the evening at 5pm we all went to see a girl. She is working in Wipro. We met her at the Total shopping mall, in Madivala. Then after talking to each other we returned back home and had dinner. This was the first girl that I met in person, as part of the marriage process.

The next day (Monday, 21 Apr), parents went for a Bangalore tour (Rs 160 per head) while I went to the office. As part of the tour they were shown ISKCON temple, Lalbagh Botanical Garden, Tipu's palace, Bull temple, Cubbon Park, Vidhan Soudha, Venkatappa Art Gallery, Vishweshwariah Technology Museum, Ulsoor lake and Banerghatta National park. They liked the ISKCON temple and the safari tour in the Banerghatta National park, where they got to see the lions, tigers, bear and few other animals from very close to the vehicle. They were also lucky to see a peacock with its wings spread wide and dancing in the evening. For dinner I and father went to Kabab Magic and bought 1 full chicken kabab and 3 chicken biryani parcels.

The next day (Tuesday, 22 Apr), I asked parents to come to the office. We first went to see the Shiv temple, behind Kemp Fort on Airport Road. From there I took them to my office and showed them around the office. Introduced them to my friends and teammates. Then after having lunch in the office, I sent them home by an auto. In the afternoon they took rest and in the evening they went to Ragigudda temple, near home. They liked the temple.

The next day (Wednesday, 23 Apr), I went to office and parents took the local bus and went to Majestic to buy some telugu movies. They bought 9 movies (Rs 35 each) and returned back. In the morning, father has the habit of visiting temple before having anything. So he went to the Shiv temple which is in front of the house and which I had never visited.

The next day (Thursday, 24 Apr), father took mother too along with him as he liked the Shiv temple. Parents liked the cool Bangalore weather. After having breakfast, father went to Commercial street because he has heard a lot about it. He bought few dresses for his grandson, Mayukh. I taught my father how to play movies on my laptop with Linux OS. I left the laptop at homeso that my parents can see movies in the afternoons. One thing that I wanted to mention that happened on this day: parents do fasting on Thursday. There was some rice left yesterday night and since parents are fasting I can only eat that rice :) I (and my father) like previous day cooked rice with mirchi + oil + masala powder. I purposely got up late at 07:45am, while my cab was at 08:20am. While I was getting ready my father prepared the above thing and fed me. I cribbed a lot that the salt/mirchi was less...and so on. And many of my friends know that when it comes to eating I never crib about salt/mirchi/regarding taste. My father kept running between me and kitchen and feeding me. It was a pleasant start of the day.

The next day (Friday, 25 Apr) is my mother's b'day. Parents again went to Shiv temple in the morning. Had breakfast and then took some rest while I went for office as the next day (Saturday, 26 Apr) was a hectic day as we planned for a Mysore one day tour. My parents saw a movie today after lunch. In the evening after having dinner, they slept early while I watched a movie and slept at 01:30am.

The next day (Saturday, 26 Apr) we got ready by 06:15am and went to catch the bus for the Mysore darshan tour (Rs 260 per head). The bus came at 07:00am at East end. It was in the city picking up people till 08:30am...It stopped at a hotel on the Mysore highway for breakfast at around 09:00am. That was the only place where we had a good meals during the whole day. The stops for lunch and dinner was pathetic :( As part of the tour, we saw Sri Ranganatha Swamy temple, Tippu's fort, Tipu Sultan's samadhi, Mysore Philomina's church, Mysore palace, Chamundi hill and Chamundeshwari temple, the 2nd largest bull on that hill (the first largest Bull is the one at Lepakshi in Andhra Pradesh). The Mysore palace is awesome. One needs to take one whole day to see the whole palace to apprecaite it's beauty: beautiful walls, roofs, paintings, photos of the Maharaja's, their daily used items etc. For the first time I could see the lavish lifestyle of how maharaja's lived then? The view of the Mysore city from the Chamundi hill is breath-taking. As compared to Bangalore the Mysore place is very cool, less populated and calm. Finally we went for the Brindavan gardens. We didn't like the garden (propably because we were not kids ;-)) much as compared to the musical colorful fountain, which is played between 07:00pm to 07:30pm. From there we returned back to Bangalore. The bus dropped us at East end back at 01:00am. We reached home and slept off till 09:00am next day as we were all tired at the end of the day.
TIP: In Mysore there were many people who were selling items like Ganesh idol, other Goddess/God idols made of sandalwood. Don't get fooled by them. Sandalwood is the property of the Govt of India and no one can sell them. The items that these people sell are just sprayed with scent, they are not made from Sandalwood.

The sunday (27 Apr) was a total rest as it was a hectic trip the previous day as part of the Mysore trip. We saw a movie in the morning before lunch and another movie after lunch. Slept for a while in the afternoon. Then in the evening we all went to Majestic to exchange some of the CD's which were not playing. The shop owner didn't take them back. We just roamed around the Majestic for a while and then returned back home. Had dinner and slept.

On monday (28 Apr) we had breakfast early. I didn't go to the office. After having lunch, my parents packed their luggage and we all started for the Yeshwantpur station at 01:45pm. We took an auto (Rs 140 from East end to Yeshwantpur station). The auto driver was really good and he told us all the important place enroute :) He dropped us at the station by 02:30pm. The train was at 04:10pm. So after keeping the luggage in the train (which was already there on the platform) I and my father went for a walk just outside the station. Because the atmosphere, the near by houses, lanes, market etc...resembled my father's birthplace Warangal (which is also my birthplace too), we walked for 30 minutes or so and returned back to the train. The train departed at 04:18pm. At that moment I felt alone...The past one week my house was full with parents. The hall which was totally empty was alive then...now it's back to square one :( I immediately got the bus from Yeshwantpur railways station back to Majestic (Rs 7) and from there to East End (Rs 9). I just watched some movies after having dinner to change my mood, but it didn't help. Watching movies I slept off just like that.

The next day (29 Apr, Tuesday) I was still feeling alone and I didn't like going to office. So took a leave again and stayed at home. In the evening I went for a walk as my mood was off. Usually I used to look at people when I used to go around for a walk, but today evening I just kept walking and I was more attracted towards the elements of nature - the cold air, the lightning above and the cool breeze which made the flowers fall from the trees above. I walked for around 45 mintues and reached home. Just then the rain started heavily. It was so intense that the water started seeping inside underneath the balcony door and from the windows on the walls. I kept some cloth at those places and moved my stuff from under the windows to the hall, so that they don't get wet due to seeped in rainwater. My parents were always thinking of seeing the rainfall while they were in Bangalore. But it didn't rain while they were here :( Anyway next time when they are here in Bangalore, I will make sure that they are at the right time when the weather in Bangalore is very pleasant !!

After this parents visit to Bangalore and after seeing them here, I now understand how much they are missing me and how much they need me. I too miss them along with my sisters and my nephew a lot...

First few days at the flat all alone

2008-04-15T09:47:00.003+05:30

As per in the previous blog, I am sort of settled in the same house, now staying all alone. Now the house is totally clean and well arranged. The hall is totally empty. Earlier I wanted to convert it into a indoor-football ground, but it's little short and mein akhela kya kheloonga? So decided to convert into a mini-GYM, where I can do my minimum stretching exercises. Last weekend (12-13 Apr) on Saturday, I prepared upma in the morning for breakfast and then left for office where I stayed overnight. Had dinner at a place close to the office and slept in the office dormitory itself. I left for home on Sunday morning, cleaned the one bedroom which was left out earlier as it had my bed and trunks/cartons filled with my stuff. I moved them into the hall and cleaned the bedroom + balcony attached to it with water. I cooked tomato curry for lunch, it turned out to be great. Only thing that was missing was the kothimira and dhaniyal powder (which I didn't have it then at home). I had my lunch and slept for more than 5 hrs :( In the evening I got so bored and felt alone that I went for a long walk, taking any road which ever I felt like going...walked for around 2hrs till I got tired. Then came home and slept after having dinner.

Yesterday (Monday) evening after coming from the office I directly went to the market and bought dhaniyal powder + mirchi + eggs. I made tomato+egg curry. I made a mistake of breaking the eggs after putting the tomatoes, while it would have been better the other way. First break the eggs and then put the tomatoes :) Anyway I enjoyed my dinner as I prepared it myselves :)) More vegetable curries next in queue, one each per day. And when I am ready and am good at cooking I plan to invite friends to my home.

One tip: Whenever you cook an egg, you usually throw the egg shells in a dustbin or waste plastic cover. Please don't do so...throw these egg shells outside immediately. If you don't do so they attract lizards and you don't want lizards in your home right? ~~This I remember being told to me by someone long back ago...~~ Actually it's the other way round i.e. keeping egg shells inside the house keeps lizards away. This I learned from my parents when they were in Bangalore.

Myself alone in 1BHK, JPNagar 3rd Phase, Bangalore

2008-04-10T23:40:00.004+05:30

On 10 April early morning my room-mate left for Eindhoven (Netherlands) for PhD. I and his brother (Srikanth) went to the airport to drop him off. In the morning I came to office and his brother went to meet his Prof who was in B'lore. I returned early in the evening at 4pm (on the way I paid my Mobile bill and the Home Loan EMI amount). I then left for Majestic to drop Srikanth. As I was alone and it was 6pm, I thought of buying some utensils for home, may be I could cheaper there in Majestic. Luckily I found a shop near Annamma temple, few minutes walking distance from Majestic bus-stand. I bought the following items:
- Hawkins 5ltr Cooker + 2 steel utensils inside : Rs 1280
- 1 Aluminium kadai : Rs 200 + 6 table spoons: Rs 20 + 2 big spoons: Rs 60 + 1 pakad: Rs 30
- 3 plain cover plates: Rs 100 + 1 knife: Rs 20 + 1 Wooden board for cutting: Rs 100 + 3 glasses: Rs 60 + 3 tea glasses: Rs 0 :)

With sufficient items for a bachelor person to survive, I returned home by 9:15pm. I then decided to clean all the stuff lying over there.. It took 7 big BigBazaar covers to empty the unnecessary and left over items of my roommate. After cleaning the house, I found the hall very big and all my luggage were in just 2 cartons + 1 trunk, which were in one of the bed room. I decided to keep it as it is and convert the big hall in to a football field. I slept at 3am and got up at 6:15am. Then cleaned the kitchen and hall with water...kept newspapers in the cupboards and arranged the items. Now the 2 kitchen shelves contains the utensils + coooker. Another shelve contains the food items. I plan to start cooking each evening at home from this weekend onwards. Lets see, how my single stay goes on. I will then get to have some interesting cooking experiences to share with you all ;-)

FYI: Though the flat was 10Kms away from office and the entire room-rent has to be paid by me (which is on a expensive side compared to earlier), I didn't move out of the place for:
1) it's in a good residential area
2) it's 5 minutes walking distance from Ragigudda temple/JP Nagar East End/Shoppers stop, Banerghatta Road
3) the landlord was good - no tensions
4) there is a big 3km perimeter park 5 minutes walking from my home - I can go for a jog/walk whenever I feel like...
5) the houses/flats near by office are costly: the house/flat has to be shared and per head it also comes to the same amount that I will be paying now. So better to stay alone in the 1BHK till I get a good room-partner/life-partner ;-)
OT: Life-partner bole tho yaad aaya...I proposed to a girl recently and got rejected :-)
6) i don't have the money for giving the deposit amount to the new landlord incase if I shift. Currently I can pay my friend in installments of the deposit amount that he paid initially to the landlord, which I now owe him.

My first visit to IISc (01 March 2008)

2008-03-01T16:04:00.004+05:30

Today some of my schoolmates (Ramesh, Rukku and Sahu) came to Bangalore from Hyderabad to attend one of my schoolmate (Md.Rafi's) 1st wedding anniversary. I went to Majestic to see them. Had breakfast with them and then I sent off them to Tumkur by rail, while I left for office as I had work to do. As I took a one-day bus-pass (Rs 30) I thought of visiting Meghana and Rupesh as it's been already 3 months since I have been in B'lore. So I called up them and found that they both are free and don't have any assignment deadlines or exams. I took a bus from Majestic (Route no: 252) and got down at "Tata Institute", which is most people know IISc as :) As they have started from home and I reached early I had time to take a walk around the campus.

The walk was really good -- the campus is huge, with lots of greenery all around. I saw the Aerospace, Chemical, Mechanical, Computer Science, Advanced Super Computing, Organic Physical Chemistry and many other departments apart from the beautiful faculty houses, the womens/mens hostel. The important thing that I liked about this campus is the thick vegetation it has. There are lots of trees and some of the buildings is totally covered by trees all around. Luckily I happened to pass through the Jubilee park, which is full of trees and that reminded me of the hill adjacent to the Vihar lake in IIT Bombay, the base of which I used to go for jogging - a very nice thick cover like a small jungle which is quite and not often visited by people (I guess) :-) In this park I saw a 6-7ft high ant-hill, which I was seeing it for the first time in my life. We had coffee at Indian Coffe House and then went to have lunch outside. After lunch, we came back to the campus and we went to see the Main building. The main building was decorated with flowers as 03 March was the Institute's foundation day. It's worth visiting the main building on or before 03 March to see the flora decorating the main building-- there are many beautiful flowers of different colors. Meghana told me that all these flowers were brought from the IISc nursery. We sat there for a while. Sitting there and seeing all the greenery around I felt very happy, brought memories of my early BTech days in IIT. I can say that IISc is the best place to stay in B'lore (if given an opportunity). Also while returning got a chance to see the Shivajinagar bus-stop too :)

I shall remember this trip for two reasons:
1) for the beautiful IISc campus and
2) for meeting a very simple, hard-working girl who did her BTech from Sri Nidhi college and then scoring 13 rank in GATE.

One day in Pune (26 Feb 2008)

2008-02-28T10:00:00.002+05:30

I booked a train ticket for Friday (22 Feb 2008) evening from Bangalore to Pune to attend my friend Nachiket Bapat's wedding, which was on Tuesday (26 Feb 2008) and also to meet my old friends, some of them who are very close to me. The return journey was on 27 Feb, Wednesday @ 02:00hrs i.e Tuesday late night by the Coimbatore Express. The day I booked the train tickets I applied for a leave and my manager approved it the next day after I applied. On Thursday (21 Feb 2008), my manager called me to his desk and told me that the task which was assigned to me has a deadline for tomorrow (i.e. Friday, 22 Feb), which he got to know that day itself. I started working on it at faster pace but the job didn't get completed by Friday evening. So I had to cancel the journey as mentioned in my previous blog. Moreover there was a cab-strike in Bangalore city from Friday midnight onwards. I made a night out on Thursday but couldn't make another night out on Friday as I had to leave the office on Friday early by the last 9pm shuttle, since there was a cab-strike from Friday midnight onwards.

I came to the office on Saturday morning and luckily by evening my task got completed :-) I called up manager and told him about it and he then gave me the permission to go ahead with my travel plans and asked me to come back on Wednesday morning. So I booked a bus ticket (as getting a train ticket was impossible and flight ticket was expensive for me) online by the Raj National Express. The fare from Bangalore to Pune in the Volvo bus was Rs 892 (inclusive of taxes + service charges). I couldn't get the return bus-ticket for reasons which I don't know, may be because of the cab-strike or because the booking was completed for that day. I told my situation to him and he said that it's fine and that I can come to office on Thursday morning. So with my bus ticket on Monday afternoon and return train ticket on Tuesday late night, I started off to Pune.

I left the office at 01:00pm on Monday, took the office shuttle till MG Road and from there an auto to the Seagull Travels, Gandhinagar (Rs 40). I was there by 01:35pm. I had lunch in a small hotel adjacent to the Raj travels (one plate of parathas (Rs 10) + 1/2 plate mirchi buzzi (Rs 3) and then fundoo tea (Rs 5)). The journey in the bus was good - watched two movies: Dhamaal and Apna Sapna money money. The latter was painful but the first movie was good - enjoyful worth watching once. The bus dropped me at Swargate at 04:15am (45 minutes before the scheduled arrival time i.e. 05:00am).

I took an auto from there to Aniruddha-Vadke's place (Quarter circle, Rasthapeth, near YMCA) which is less than 4Kms from Swargate. The normal fare at night would have costed at max Rs 30-35. I took an auto after agreeing that it would be as per the meter. I realised in the middle that the meter was running fast and the final distance it showed was 7.6 Kms. I couldn't help but argue with him. I called up Aniruddha and he told me to just give the money as there is no point in arguing with him any further :-( I learnt a lesson. From next time onwards when you know the distance and the fare how much it costs, it's always better to make a deal in exact amount at first instead of depending on the meter. I slept till 07:20am. I was feeling very sleepy and didn't feel like getting up at all but I had to. And from here my day started...

I spent some with Ojas and Tejas. Initially they both didn't come to me. But after half an hour or so they slowly didn't hesistate to come near me. Finally before leaving their place at 08:45am, they both came to me :-). I took Vadke's bike and went to Mandi, bought some fruits for Aru's parents and Sirji (my previous landlord). After spending some time at Aru's place I left for the Kohinoor functional hall (which was opposite to the Garware College on Karve Road) after keeping my luggage at Aru's place itself. There I met Aditya, his wife and Chau. After the marriage I went to Persisent Towers (PT) and met some of my friends: Tony, Saket, Dhwani, Deepti, Muley, CP, Kapil and few others. Later went to Aru's place took my luggage, and then went to Shrinivas uncle's place. Met aunty and Supriya. Spent some 10 minutes with them and came back to PT, gave the bike keys to Vadke and then took the office shuttle to Bhageerath. At Bhageerath I met Sachin and Priti. From Bhageerath I took the same office shuttle which was going to Hinjewadi office via Baner. I got down at Anandi's place in Baner. Took Anandi's bike and then went to Hinjewadi office to meet my teammates. Met them and spent around an hour or so with them. From there I went to Sus Road to meet my friend Shirish Gosavi at his home. It was the second time that I visited his place, the first time was during his house-warming ceremony. He neatly arranged all his stuff in the whole house, which mostly consists of lots and lots of books. Now he has a very good library of books all arranged in cupboards :-) From there I dropped him at Hotel Rajwada (where he has a B'day party to attend) and then I left for Pune Mandi, to meet Jyothi didi. Jyothi didi's house was very close to the Mandi Ganapati mandir. Facing the mandir, take the left road adjacent to the temple, take another left and another left. The apartment is on the left hand side. It's easy to remember. If you are confused then asked for anyone where Riya stays and anyone would tell you the directions to their house. It was the first time that I was meeting Jyothi didi's daughter Riya. She is now studying in LKG and is very smart. From there I left for Senapati Bapat Road to meet my landlord. Spent sometime at this place. Then left for Anandi's place as it was 8:50pm and Udayan would be asleep by 09:00pm. I spent some time with Udayan. He now bowls a tennis ball with spin and he enjoys throwing the ball on the wall. He has decorated all the walls of his house with his handwriting and drawings ;-) After he has slept I went to Sneha-Sreekanth's house to meet Samrudhi. She has become pale. She doesn't eat much but is very active...always in a playful mood. After spending some time at their place I returned to Anu's place and had dinner. Anu packed few methi parathas for the train journey. After having dinner and spending some time at their place I then left for station at 11:00pm. I didn't feel like taking an auto and moreover I had 3 hrs with me as the train was at 01:55am. So I decided to walk all the way from Hotel Rajwada (Baner) to Pune station. There was another reason why I decided to walk all the way -- one reason was that I was feeling sad to leave this place where I am having many good friends. I reached Pune university circle in 30 minutes. Went to Chaturshrungi temple and prayed from outside itself. Then started walking towards the station. From Pune University circle to Station it took me around 52 minutes. I arrived Station at 00:40am and I was feeling very sleepy. Tried keeping myselves awake so that I don't miss the train. Finally the train arrived on time and I immediately went off to sleep after getting in to the train. So that was my one day stay in Pune - very hectic. I enjoyed the one day stay for the following reasons:
1) I was able to meet all the people I wished/planned to meet.
2) I enjoyed riding the bike at a good speed of 60-80 Kms :) Imagine reaching Pune Mandi from Sus Road in the evening hrs (around 7pm) in 20 minutes :)
3) I visited most of the places I knew in Pune, while visiting people.
4) It brought me back my sweet memories :)

The walk from Baner to Station was a memorable one - it both contained sweet and sad memories. I was happy and sad both at the same time...But life has to go on. The return train journey was very normal. Had breakfast at Wadi station, then had the packed lunch given to me by Anandi at Dharmavaram station. The train reached Bangalore city on time at 10:00pm. I stood at the door itself from B'lore Cantontment station so that I can get out of the station immediately and don't myselves packed in that jam which occurs after the passengers alight from the train. Luckily every thing went as I expected: I got down close to the staircase from the running train, got out of the station and quickly went to BMTC stand. Luckily I got the last direct bus (@ 10:15pm) 25E from platform 12, that goes to East End. I got down at East End, went to Kabab Magic and had dinner. I think that I was the last customer at Kabab Magic, because it was about to close at 10:45pm....After having dinner came home and slept at 02:00am after watching some movies.

Cancellation of a planned trip for the first time

2008-02-23T12:33:00.003+05:30

Last week on 08 Feb 2008 (Friday) I left for home for Hyderabad for my house-warming ceremony which was on 11 Feb 2008 late night (i.e. 12 Feb 2008 early morning). The ceremony went well and I had a great time with parents, friends, near and dear. My health deteriorated while I was at home due to cough, which I incurred because the Bangalore weather was not suiting me :-( I reached B'lore on 14 Feb morning but my health was really worse by then. I went to the doctor in the evening and was taking medicines. I took 3 days sick-leave (i.e. 14-16 Feb). I was allotted a task to complete, which I thought would be over before 22 Feb, so that I can leave for Pune and have a nice time meeting my best friends and also attend my friend Bapat's wedding on 26 Feb (Tuesday). But fate has other plans :(

I was called by manager on Thursday (21 Feb) morning and told me that the task assigned to me needs to be completed by this Friday (as instructed by the higher level ppl). So my manager rejected the already approved leave that morning due to the task that needs to be finished. This was the first time that my leave got rejected due to work reasons :( I hope that by Monday evening I would complete my job and then leave for Pune. Lets wait and see.

On the positive side, the last week was very hectic and I learnt a lot of stuff while working on the task allotted to me. It also gave me a feeling of insecurity as I am having very little knowledge in the domain that I am working on. Need to work hard.

First Doctor visit for illness after I have come to B'lore (29 Jan 2008)

2008-01-29T11:01:00.000+05:30

Since the past 10 days I have been having severe cough. I thought that it's a small thing. I tried gargling and even took dry cough syrup (Bro-Zedex), but it didn't help :( Even when I went for the health-checkup on Saturday, the Doctor said that it's an allergy as I am new to this city, I didn't believe him -- allergy for me, no way! Yesterday night I felt really worried as I was coughing continuously with 5 minutes breaks for almost an hour. Due to continuous cough I was having a severe headache and backpain. It's then I decided to make a visit the next day.

I went to this physician Dr. Suresh (M.B.B.S) who has a clinic opposite Food World in Jayanagar 9th phase, near Amjed corner. He told me that it's an allergy caused by viral infection. He gave me anti-biotics and told me to avoid curd, buttermilk, fruits, fruitjuices, cucumber, cold items like icecream etc... for the next 5-10 days. The anti-biotics that he gave me were very costly and of high-dose :( Lets see what happens?

Treat in Hotel Nagarjuna, Residency Road (28 Jan 2008)

2008-01-29T00:13:00.000+05:30

Today evening I went for a treat given by Sobhan in Hotel Nagarjuna, as he was leaving B'lore. We had a good dinner and had a great time sharing jokes + recollecting the good old days of IIT. The dinner was over by 9:45pm. We had a chat session afterwards and then they left for home at 10:15pm and I went to the bus-stop to board a bus either going towards my office side (Domlur flyover) or towards my home i.e. to JPNagar. As Residency road is much closer to my office, I was waiting for 201 bus which would take me to my office. After waiting for 15 minutes when I realised that no route 201 bus is coming, I called up Sobhan and he advised me to goto Trinity circle, from where I would get plenty of buses. I went there and when asked where the 201 route buses would stop, I got two different answers. I tried both by waiting at each bus stand for 15 minutes each. Finally it was 11pm and I lost hope.

I didn't want to take an auto as they would charge very highly, and I didn't want to take a lift from the tax/cabs as I have heard many cases of people getting abducted in cabs and later robbed of money. I felt bad and pity at this city? No proper bus transport after 11pm :( Hyderabad is very much better in comparison to this city. Finally I decided to walk all the way from Trinity circle to Domlur flyover and from there to office, which took me around 40 minutes. I was back in the office by 11:45pm.

My Health Checkup (26 Jan 2008)

2008-01-27T16:26:00.000+05:30

As part of the Annual Health checkup program provided by the company, I did my health checkup yesterday and here are the results:
Height: 175cms (5ft 7 inches), Weight: 66Kgs
Heart Beat: 57 per minute, ECG: Normal
Haemoglobin: 15.6 gm/dl; RBC 5.06 m/cmm; Platet Count: 3.27 lakh/cmm
Blood sugar: 90mg/dl; Cholestrol: 168 mg/dl
Chest X-Ray: Bilateral lung fields appear normal, Cardiac size is within normal limits, Bilateral hilar regions appear normal. Bilateral domes of diaphragm and costophrenic angles are normal. Visualised bones and soft tissues are normal.

Remarks: Everything is normal. The cholestorl is also normal but if it can be reduced to 150 then it's perfect! Advised to do lots of physical activity and control diet, which I listed below.
1) Choose to:
a) Eat variety of foods. Combine cereals (eg: rice, jowar, wheat, ragi etc.) with pulses or whole grams
b) Consume larger portion of cooked vegetables and raw vegetables in the form of salads, with each meal
c) Consume fruits in the most natural form (with the edible skin) wherever possible. FYI: 30-40% of the nutrients like on the inner side of the skin.
d) Consume low fat milk and curds made of low fat or skimmed milk
e) Limit the us of oil in cooking - use rice bran oil/sunflower oil/groundnut oil -- use REFINED OILS only
f) Consume lean meat only if desired, compleltely avoid organ meat like brain, kidney, liver, egg yolk etc. And also avoid the skin part too.

2) Restrict or try to avoid as much as possible the following:
a) Refined food like : bread, pizzas, burgers, cream, biscuits, sweets, cakes, candies, pastries, chocolates, ice-creams
b) fruit juices, thick milk shake preparations etc.
c) carbonated beverages/soft drinks like: cola, pepsi, fanta and alcohol
d) dry fruits - almonds, dates, cashewnuts etc.
e) snacks, fried foods, butter, ghee etc.
f) avoid thick milk, curds, paneer, cheese spreads etc.

3) Foods that can be used freely (without any restriction):
a) clear soups
b) skimmed butter milk
c) raw vegetables salad with sprouted grams
d) sprouted grams cooked
e) sugarless lemon or tomato juice
f) tender coconut water

PS: On Sunday (27 Jan 2008), I felt bored. So I left my bicycle in the office itself and walked from office to home (12Kms) in 1.5 hrs :)

Mumbai Marathon (20 Jan 2008)

2008-01-22T19:11:00.000+05:30

Now lets move to the day of the Mumbai Marathon, the pre and post journey details are blogged in my previous post. I reached IIT campus by 8:30pm. Stayed at my coach's place in IIT. After having aloo parathas for dinner, we had a long chat session till 12 midnight and I sleptat 01:00am (as I couldn't get sleep). Woke up at 03:30am and got ready for taking the bus from IIT maingate for the marathon. In the bus met Amey Karkare, Sobhan, Hrishi and few other friends. We reached CST by 5:40am. After getting ourselves refreshed once again in the Sulabh blocks, we left for the Azad Maidan from where the race starts. I started on a slow pace and didn't stop till 10Kms. It was a good feeling as I completed 10Kms without any breaks, inspite of almost no practise. The only practise that I did was 5Kms run on 09 Jan. Afterwards, I went for 30 minutes walk on almost alternate days till 20 Jan. After 10Kms, my total energy was spent and I recharged myselves by drinking glucose water and plain water. It worked for another 2-3 Kms. From 13Kms onwards the pain started below the kidney region. All the carbohydrates stored in my body were depleted and my body was trying to extract it from liver, thats why the pain. I couldn't continue non-stop running further. I walked for 30sec-1minute to get back my breathing rhtym and then jogged again. Till 17Kms, I continuted this way taking around 4 breaks (in which I walked). Just after I crossed the 17Km mark, an old man gave me few orange toffies, I took two, kept one in my mouth and it gave me a lot of relief. From there on till the finish line I didn't stop again. Felt happy on completing it. I completed the 21 Kms in 2hrs 04 minutes 30.54 seconds and was the 469th men to cross the finish line in the Half Marathon race.

My leg muscles were totally strained. After standing for 1.5 hrs in the queue to get the timing certificate, I left for the campus along with my friends: Hrishi (1:51:51.03), Sobhan (1:54:14.66) and his few friends. BTW you can view the results at the following link: http://www.sport-timing.at/results/results_overview.php?Event_ID=1040. Got into the local train, reached campus, had a bath. I then left for H1 for lunch, then roamed around the campus on foot. There are many changes that are happening or happened in the campus:
1) the football ground got flood lights of foreign made
2) the NCC ground was prepared by the side of the hockey field
3) a 50m indoor swimming pool is constructed near the old Chinks in between H1-H2, by the side of SAC
4) H7 mess got demolished
5) The whole campus is surrounded by fences - now we can't goto the Vihar lake or the hill adjacent to it nor to the pipeline
6) Computer Center (CC) is demolished
7) the ared between the Aero Space dept and chemical seminar halls were cleared off trees and it seems a new bio-medical dept is coming in that place
8) the sameer hill is fenced at the top, steps are constructed and even a concrete road is being laid by cutting the hill side
Outside the campus too, the shops adjacent to the main road were demolished -- which means Sujata Palace (aka SP) is no more infront of the campus :( I don't know about the current batches, but the old batch people would definitely miss the Daaru and incase of me - it's Chicken Biryani that I would miss a lot!!
9) The staff quarters behind H10 were demolished and H10 is being extended it seems.
10) And lots of academic changes from next year onwards in terms of reducing of course load etc...

It was a good experience back to be in the campus. But didn't get time to meet my faculty members and few of my friends. Hope that the next trip I would be able to make it up.

My journey from Bangalore to Mumbai for the Mumbai Marathon

2008-01-18T17:16:00.001+05:30

I don't know if it's good luck or bad luck, but the journey and the pre+post events of the journey started interestingly :)

Let me begin with today (i.e. 18 Jan 2008, the day I was leaving for Mumbai in the evening)
0) Yesterday (17 Jan 2008) while going home, I left my purse in the office and today (18 Jan) morning I was late for the office shuttle. I was lucky that they waited for me, else I would have to go office on bicycle with that luggage as I had no money with me then.
1) Today my manager called up all the teammates and distributed work for all of us with deadlines to meet. So after returning from Mumbai on Tuesday (22 jan 2008) I would have to get back to work immediately. Also this would be my first job in the new company with deadlines to meet.
2) 16 Jan 2008, was the last day for submitting my IT-proofs in the company. I submitted all the documents except three:
a) House loan provisional certificate (which mentions the breakup of principal + interest component of the total house loan EMI amount paid for that FY)
b) House registration fees (which can be claimed under Section 80C, along with the House loan principal component)
c) Medical Insurance, which is a part of the Home safe Insurance that I took in addition to the Home loan, which can be claimed under Section 80D (upto a maximum limit of Rs 15,000).
I applied for the (2a) document a long time back ago by calling the customer care (as it's free through customer care else would have to shed some money if I want to get it from bank in person) but still didn't get a hard copy of it :( I then called up today morning and they finally agreed to send me a soft copy of it by 5pm, i.e. one hr before I leave from my office to catch the train :-( I received the (2b) copy sent by my father through courier on 17 Jan evening. For the (2c) copy I was behind the ICICI people since the past 3 days and finally I got a soft copy of it too after numerous mails/phone calls :-( I received the (2a) copy in mail at 4:00pm i.e. 2hrs before my departure. I submitted these documents in the company atlast :) before leaving for Mumbai as the company has given me a courtesy deadline of 20 Jan 2008.
3) The above being done, I left the office for Majestic by the office shuttle. Just before the office shuttle started, I realised that I forgot my purse in the office -- Just imagine what my situation would be if I realised this after reaching Majestic or on the way?? I left my luggage in the shuttle and went up, after reaching my desk I realised that my keys are in the luggage :( Ufff !! I had to come back to the shuttle, take my drawer keys and went up, took my purse and then settled in the shuttle. The shuttle dropped me at Natraj theatre (which is few mts away from Majestic bus stop) at 7:05pm. I took a bus from the theatre to Majestic bus stop and was there by 7:15pm. I was thinking of having dinner packed and was looking for a hotel just like Alpha hotel oustide Secunderabad station in Andhra Pradesh. Luckily while getting down from the bus I could see few hotels opposite Majestic bus stand, on the opposite side of the Bangalore Central railway station. As I had 45 minutes, I stopped going towards the railway station and walked in the opposite direction towards the hotels that I saw while getting down from the bus. There were few hotels side by side and this "Hotel Majestic" drew my attention. I directly went inside. The waiter there told me that only Chicken Biryani (Rs 50) and Mutton Biryani (Rs 60) could be served faster (Rs 2 extra for parcelling i.e. Rs 52 for Chicken Biryani parcel and Rs 62: Mutton Biryani parcel), other dishes would take time. He grabbed my words from my mouth. I immediately ordered Chicken biryani and had it there itself. The biryani was good, both in terms of quality and quantity, as it was above my expectations which I imagined in this costly Bangalore city. But, haan, the Biryani in Alpha hotel (in Hyderabad) is no comparison with this Biryani that I had in Hotel majestic - Alpha hotel Biryani is Alpha Hotel Biryani, no comparison at all !!
4) Ok !! After dinner, I reached the railway station by 8:05pm. Kept my luggage and locked it. The train departure time was 8:10pm. It was 8:16pm and the train was still not moving. I decided that it might take some more time. I thought that I would buy some medicines for the cold and dry cough that I am having, as I didn't want to take risk for I have a Half-Marathon to run on Sunday (20 Jan) in Mumbai for which I am making this journey. I found from the police guard that there is a medical shop just outside the platform 1 (where my train was halted) and adjacent to the railway station entrance. I ran to the medical shop and bought medicines. I thought of walking back as I didn't hear any siren of the train, but I don't know what prompted me, but I ran while returning to the platform. And to my astonishment what I saw was more interesting -- the train has already picked up speed and there was only 2 bogies in front of me from the tail end. I ran in the direction of the train and managed to get in to an AC compartment, thanks to my running skills of the past I could get in, else it would have been a full stop for my trip and marathon plans :( I got down at the next station (B'lore cantonment) and got into my bogie.

All these four events made me feel that this journey is going to be an interesting one and indeed it turned out to be an interesting...Read futher to know more about it.

The next day (19 Jan 2008) in the train
1) I got up at 7:30am, had breakfast (2 idlis + 2 wadas) at Wadi station, then 10 puris for lunch at Solapur station and then took a 2.5 hrs nice nap. I woke up at 3pm, for the train would be arriving at Pune around 3:30pm and I didn't want to miss my old city. I went to the toilet to get myselves refreshed. I was washing my face at the wash basin when the toilet door automatically opened :( I found that the edge of the knob got smoothened. I pushed the knob inside a little bit and pulled the door to check if it gets opened. When made sure that it doesn't open I sat in the bathroom for the nature call. Suddenly the door re-opened again :( I immediately got up and closed it. It was an embarrassing moment, luckily the side berth side was on the same side of the toilet in whcih I was in, so no one was a spectator to that scene. This time I totally pushed the knob completely inside and pulled the door harder and harder, then waited for few seconds to see if it opens automatically. When confirmed that it doesn't, I completed my nature call and then washed my hands. Now it's time for me to open the door and it wasn't :-( What luck is this? The knob was loose and I was afraid that it might come out if I try hitting it very hard. After 3 minutes of constant efforts on the knob, I somehow managed to open it and came out of the bathroom. Hmmm...a great lesson learnt from this experience -- Always enter a bathroom only after confirming that it's knob is easy to operate in opening and closing and also check that the door is properly locked. Hope that people would not fall in to a similar situation like I did.
2) I got down at kalyan station and was waiting for a local train, when a person asked if a just-arrived local would goto Kurla? I said yes and behind that person was a girl (mostly might be his girl friend) and one thing about this girl that drew my attention was her lips. They were cute, small, soft and of perfect shape. I just followed them in to the train and after they chose their seats I sat in front of that girl. We were sitting face to face, both sitting by the side the window. Her boyfriend was sitting beside her. During the journey from Kalyan to KanjurMarg, I could just dare to see her lips only 8-10 times. I was very afraid. Those lips were of the perfect shape that I had ever seen till now :)

The return journey (20-21 Jan 2008)
1) After the marathon race, it became very difficult for me to walk. After having dinner at coach's house I took an auto from IIT Maingate (at 9:35pm) and went to KJMarg. From there I took a local train from KJMarg to Kalyan. The local train was dead packed (even on sunday night) and somehow I managed to get in. Got down at Kalyan on 2nd platform. My train (Coimbatore Express) would be arriving on 4th platform. It took me 15 minutes to travel from 2nd platform to 4th platform. Got in to the train and after locking my luggage, I went off to sleep. I was lucky here again as the local train stopped near the steps of the over-bridge and both on the 2nd and 4th platform, there was a ramp instead of steps.
2) Next day (21 jan 2008) morning, the TC woke me up at 7:15am asking for the ticket. As the ticket was in my bag down locked beneath the lower berth, I tried getting up and I could immediately feel the severe pain in my shoulders, back, knees and legs. After 2 minutes I finally came down and gave the ticket for verification. Later I slept most of the day. In the day time, I wrote this blog on the plain side of my e-tickets, including the current ticket (Mum-->B'lore), but only on the non-printed area. The TC, who came for checking at Guntakal station asked me for my ticket and I showed him my e-ticket, which has my blog contents alongside. He said that it's invalid as I had written on it and that I had to pay a penalty. I objected, that he could see all the matter of the ticket and that it had already been verified in the morning. He didn't listen and he took me to the railway police. Finally I had to shed Rs 50 (without bill, with bill it would have been more than Rs 500) from my pocket to bribe him. Learnt a lesson from this experience that I should not write anything on the ticket, until the journey is completed.
3) The train which was supposed to reach Bangalore railway station at 10:10pm, was 30 minutes late. Luckily I got the last 11pm bus towards Jayanagar and I had to walk for 15 minutes towards home - another painful walk. But I got habituated over the past 48 hrs (both on 20 Jan in the IIT campus and on 21 Jan in the train). Had I missed that bus or if the train was a little late then I would have to stay at the Majestic station till morning 4:30am to catch the morning bus. Anyway I was at home by midnight. My roommate had already cooked dinner for me and I ate it and slept off.

The next day (22 Jan 2007), I learnt that the cabs are on an indefinite strike, hence I had to come to the office on my bicycle. While coming to the office I wore my goggles, which my Pune friends gifted me before I left for B'lore in late November 2007. Morning I was feeling less pain. I enjoyed my cycling and I got down a lot of work done (both personal and office work). That was my journey details. Hope you had enjoyed reading it ;-)

Cycle timings from home to office (15 Jan 2008)

2008-01-15T10:19:00.000+05:30

Today was a holiday for the company as it was Sankranti festival. I decided to spend the day in the office. I started from home on my bicycle early morning at 8:30am. The time taken by me on the bicycle on a non-traffic day is as follows:
1) From home to Silk Board flyover: 8 minutes 29 secs
2) From Silk Board flyover to Sony World junction (Koramanagala): 7 minutes
3) From Sony world junction to office: 9 minutes
Total 24 minutes in covering the distance from JP Nagar, East End to my office in EGL, near Domlur flyover. The return journey in the night took around 27 minutes (almost the same time as in the morning).

Had Chicken Biryani (Rs 80, very costly) in one of the cafeteria mess in the EGL campus :-( It was not good and neither did it fill my stomach :( Later in the evening had a dinner near my home in a hotel. Here in B'lore most of the hotels get closed by 9:30pm. Some snacks corner do remain open till 10:00pm. I studied a lot during the whole day, thus had a good satisfaction in the night before I went to sleep. Didn't feel sleepy, so went for a late night walk all alone on the main road towards Baneshankari End junction, from 10:45pm to 11:20pm.

My first jogging in the new year (09 Jan 2008)

2008-01-10T11:24:00.000+05:30

In yesterday's (08 Jan 2008) lunch, there was a special counter of veg+non-veg rolls in the office. I had a chicken roll apart from the normal dishes. The same evening I started having loose motions :-( Today I found it from my friends that many people in the company who had chicken rolls suffered from loose motions. It was very cold in Bangalore since the past 3 days during the night. So I caught fever + cold too in addition to the loose motions :-( Because of which I took a sick leave and didn't go to the office. Slept till 11am, got up and had some rice in lunch. Then studied till evening.

As I was having fever + cold (which is a signal given to me by my body saying "Boss you need to exercise...My anti-germs inside me are loosing my fighting capacity against the germs"), and moreover since I am taking part in the Half-marathon race in Mumbai (on 20 Jan), I thought of going for a jog in the evening. So I went jogging in the Anand Vihar park, near my home. This park has boards with distance mentioned every 100mts apart. So today I did 5 rounds of 1km each (600mts running + last 300mts of the 1Km route walking). I could feel how dull I had become, my heart couldn't catch with my running speed :( The whole race I was breathing through my mouth :(( I am really in poor form. I decided to go each day (atleast till 18 Jan 2008) in the evening for half an hour jogging, similar to the one that I did today and get back in shape. Let's see how it goes on..Keep coming back to this page for more updates.

My New Year celebrations (01 Jan 2008)

2008-01-02T11:56:00.001+05:30

Everyone asks me how I celebrated my New year 2008? So instead of answering each of them, I thought of updating it here.

The previous day (31 Dec 2007) I left home early, had a dinner at a place called Khabab Magic near my house in J P Nagar, 4th Phase, East End (see these comments of this place). I slept early and got up next day (01 Jan'08) at 8:00am. Got ready and then came to the office on my bicycle (12 Kms in 35 minutes) and spent the rest of the day till 7pm there. Chatted with few friends for around 2hrs, slept for half an hour, did IT calculations for 1 hr and studied project related stuff for 4 hrs in the office. Later went home in the evening, had dinner by 10:30pm and slept by midnight after watching a movie 'Final Move' on the laptop. So that's it was. And coming to my New year resolution? -- It's to earn lots of money by the end of this year, atleast 60% more than what I am earning today.

How was your New year celebrations? Do leave the description of your celebrations in the comments section.

My last blog of 2007 (30 Dec 2007)

2007-12-30T02:04:00.000+05:30

These days I am enjoying my work in the new company as there are lots of things to learn. First 20 days, the whole thing was vast and pretty confusing, sometimes at the end of the day, you feel that there has been little progress on what you learned that day. But now its over a month has passed and my role has been little bit of clear defined now. I can understand what I would be working on. And learning new things gives a really good feeling.

On personal end, I have not met any of my friends here - except J C Bose (my roommate), Sumanth (who works in Yahoo), Padmashree (my friend, whose office was close to my office) and Latif Ameer Babu (my wingmate, a stud chap in Electronics) and his wife Rizwana. Till now, I don't have any regrets with life. Thanks to GOD that he has given me a lot more than what I expected or imagined. Hope that I will make the best use of the opportunities that he has given me.

This 2007 year happens to be a lucky year for me (touchwood) :- many of my friends and sisters got married, few of my friends had kids, few did their house-warming ceremony, I registered a flat in Hyderabad, I & few of my friends got new jobs. Hope that the next year too brings in lots of joy, happiness, good health and wealth to all my friends and sisters and their families.

Lagta hai ki is 2007 year ka ending bhi acha hi hoga...There is this lady who used to board the office shuttle, when I used to travel from the company provided accomodation. She is a beautiful looking girl (that's all I know about her because I never talked with her). Now I moved to my friends place, I come by a different shuttle... Aaj woh office ke lift mein mili...She was in a black saree and was looking really gorgeous and very very sexy. That saree along with the blouse and the way she draped that saree around her body was stunning. I still have a picture of that in front of my eyes. Very cute and mesmerizing !!

To all my blog readers, Wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New year from me, my sisters and friends. May the new year , 2008, fulfill all your wishes.

First nightout in the new company (25 Dec 2007)

2007-12-26T09:15:00.001+05:30

As it was a Christmas holiday in the company, I came to the office at 03:00pm. Instead of taking bus no. 22G, which drops me at office, I took the bus no. 201 because of which I had to get down at CMH road, Indiranagar. From there I walked towards office, which is around 3Kms. The journey which was supposed to take around 15-30 minutes (on a non-traffic hour) took 1.5 hrs (including my walk on foot). I reached the office at 5pm.

The view of the EGL business park in the evening was beautiful. There was no crowd/people and the weather was cool and calm. I studied till 03:00am, with two breaks: one for dinner (Egg fried rice: Rs 20) + Tea (Rs 3) at 08:00pm and another was a double-tea break (Rs 5) @ 10:30pm. As it was christmas, almost all the buildings in the EGL were decorated with lights. The Christmas tree + decoration in the main entrance foyer of the company was beautiful :-) Also the view of the decorated buildings in the EGL from the cafeteria on the 5th Floor was beautiful. After 3am, I went to the rest room (not the definition of US lingo which means toilet), where there are 6 beds for people to take rest. I slept on one of the bed till 06:45am. I don't have to use the mats as I used to do earlier :-) Later got refreshed and took the state transport bus at 07:10am to home. I was in the home by 07:35am. Had a bath, finished the rice+sabzi+dal+curd that was left yesterday as breakfast and came to office by catching the 08:20am shuttle from home.

The changes in me after coming to Bangalore :-)

2007-12-18T15:21:00.000+05:30

This blog contains the changes that happened in me after coming to Bangalore:

1) The first thing that I bought after reaching B'lore (the same evening I landed in B'lore and settled in the guest house) was the new sandals (Rs 137) and 4 pairs of white socks (Rs 99) :-) So I wear these sandals and white socks daily to the office.

2) Since I have to catch the company bus, I am punctual...sort of getting ready by 8am, having breakfast and then catch the 8:30am bus which drops me at office by 9am. In the evening I catch the same bus at 6:30pm from office to home. So by 7:10pm I am at home. Not staying at night in the office. Since I have to learn many things (Java, Junit, SVN, Ant apart from the project docs) I asked for a laptop for 1 month, which I got till 10 Jan 2008. In the evening my TV session goes from 7pm to 12 midnight -- I watch the Discovery Channel/Animal Planet/History channel/Movies channels/Sports channels :))
I Have been given a 30 days accomodation in a room in an apartment, which has a TV, AC (I dont use it), a double cot bed with mattress (which caused me a back pain). Each day I am provided breakfast. There is also a washing machine, but I dont use it as I wash my clothes myselves.

3) I wear a shirt for only 2 days, afterwards I wash it. Earlier it used to be for 3-4 days continuously. But now I take 2-3 shirts per week and wear it alternatively. So any day you can see with neat clothes. And one more thing, I am using all the dresses that I have, around 7 pairs of clothes (t-shirts not included)

4) Daily washing of handkerchief as I sweat a lot here in B'lore...Earlier it was an handkerchief for 3-4 days...as I rarely used it there in Pune.

5) The lunch is really good. But I restrict myselves and eat only a little rice + 1 roti + lots of sabzi...Still have lunch with my hands and don't use spoons. BTW, every alternate day i.e. Tuesday and Thursdays in lunch we have non-veg :-). Daily sweet+papad+sambhar+curd+buttermilk in the lunch apart from the other dishes. Snacks is not provided by the company nor do I feel hungry. Infact time ka pata hi nahi chal raha hai..bahooth kaam aur padai karni hai yahan par.. One more thing is that there is a counter where you get home made tea/coffee right from morning 7am to evening 7pm free of cost. As you all know I stopped having coffee from vending machine, this is a plus point to me :-) But I have only one tea in the evening while having sandwich.

6) Company provides Rs 330 coupons which we can use. So every evening before I board the 6:30pm bus I go and have some sandwiches/fruits/juices etc and then go home (as there are no good messes around the house where I am currently staying). The cafeteria on each floor in the company has coffee/tea/horlicks/milk/boost etc + potato chips + namkeen + cream biscuits + apples + pears + bananas each day. So I have an apple/pear in the evening. And you know after you eat an apple/pear your tummy gets full !! So here again, I am using company resources completely :))

7) I started using "Fair and handsome" cream, earlier I never used any cream. And instead of parachute oil I am using Parachute after-shower cream for my hair. It's non-sticky and your hair feels really good !!

8) I have registered for Mumbai Half Marathon, which is going to be held on 20 Jan (Sunday) in mumbai. So need to start practising for it. Have started crunches in the morning and evening walk of around 1-2Kms !!

9) The company gives lots of t-shirts :-) I got one on the joining day and another one on the Yearly party day (which was on 08 Dec). So abhi dressses karidne ki kohi jaroorath hi nahi hai :))

Bus abhi ke liye itna hi...Baakhi badh mein update karta rahoonga ;-)

Trip to Hyderabad for registration of flat (14-16 Dec 2007)

2007-12-18T12:46:00.000+05:30

Few weeks back I asked father if we could buy a flat in Hyderabad, instead of putting the amount in the chits. The reason was that the flats rates were increasing and it would be better if we buy one now, so that we can have a property in our name. We can invest the money in chits/investments later too and buying a flat in the future would be costly. When I put in my thoughts he too agreed with me and he started looking for a flat in and around my current home. Finally after looking at many flats, with the help of an uncle (who was ex-municipal officer) we liked a flat in RKPuram, just 5-6Kms away from the current home. Father gave an initial amount for booking that flat to the house-builder on 12 Dec 2007 (Wednesday). Father told me to come to Hyderabad the coming weekend (15-16 Dec 2007) for registration.

So i booked the bus ticket from Bangalore to Hyderabad for 14 Dec (Friday evening). It was a sleeper bus from Omer travels. The fare was Rs 450. This was my first trip from Bangalore to Hyderabad. The ride was ok -- except the bus shock absorbers, they were not nice so I didn't have a pleasant journey but you as all know I sleep like a pig when I am sleepy. So I had a bouncy good sleep ;-) which caused few back aches. I started from Bangalore at 8:15pm (actual reporting time was 7:45pm and the right departure time of the bus was 8:00pm). I got up at 6:30am in the bus, and started reading the docs on the laptop that I got from the company for 30 days :) The docs contined information that I collected from rediff.com regarding the points that one needs to be aware of while registering a flat and before taking a home loan from the bank. I reached Hyderabad (Afzalgunj) at 8:45am. From there I took a bus to home and was in home by 10am.

After having breakfast, I and father went to see the flat. It's a good flat -- a 2BHK flat with 1150 sq.ft super-build area (with a carpet area of 80% of 1150ft). I liked the flat. Everyone in the family -- sisters, my brother-in-law's and my mother liked the flat. It's facing east and is on the 2nd floor. The apartment is located in a posh locality, 50mts away from the bus stop and 100mts away from the RKpuram railway station. This apartment is also located 5 minutes walking distance from my sister Anitha's place, 5-6 Kms away from my parents home and 4-5 Kms away from Secunderabad station. After looking at the flat, I and father went to the registration office in Malkajgiri for the registration. After the registration we returned home. The ICICI bank person came home in the evening and I asked him few questions about the home loan from him, which I will be posting as a seperate link on my other blog page.

The next day (16 Dec 2007, Sunday) parents arranged a pooja at home as father is following the 41 days Ayappa swamy diksha. So from morning onwards everyone was busy in it's preparations. Around 14-15 swami's came home. The pooja went well, followed by lunch. It was a good time. Evening came and I had to start for my return journey as I was having a bus to catch at 6:50pm from ASRao nagar, which is around 750mts away from home. Mother packed dinner for me, which I had at MG Bus stand as the bus made a halt there for 15 minutes. The return ticket was made in Govt run APSRTC "Garuda" Volvo bus (Rs 625/-). It's a semi-sleeper. Though I got the last row-seat, because of the good shock absorbers, I didn't find any trouble at all. Moreover the service in the Garuda bus was really good. They provided blankets, water bottle and toffies free of cost to each of the passengers. There was a telugu movie shown in the bus: "Adavaru Matalaki Ardhale Verule". I enjoyed the movie though I had seen that movie 3 times earlier.

It was also a good point that I took the laptop with me -- first, I took notes of the ban-loan points directly in the laptop. Second, I could complete this blog during the journey while watching the movie :) thereby not wasting time on weekdays.

My first few days in my new company

2007-11-30T12:01:00.000+05:30

The starting experience in the new company is really good. The company has provided an accomodation in an psued-apartment on the Old Madras Road. It's a flat with 3-bedrooms, 1 hall and a kitchen. Each bedroom is given to single person (like me - new joinees or guests). Each bedroom has a big cupboard, a TV with cable connection, an attached toilet+bathroom and a double-cot bed with good mattresses. I am being provided free breakfast and unlimited number of tea throughout the day.

My day starts at 6:30/7:45am, i.e my wake-up time, though I keep the alarm on my mobile at 6am. Get ready by 8:15am, have breakfast and then catch the office shuttle at 8:30am which drops me at office by 9am. From 9am to 6pm I work -- seriously kaam karna padta hai. Lunch is provided to us by the company for which it deducts Rs 10 per each day. There are two counters - north indian and south-indian. The food is really good, every day you have got sweet, curd, buttermilk, sambhar, papad, rice etc. And everything is unlimited. After the lunch, you can have coffee/tea (not the machine tea/coffee) free of cost. You can also go for a fruit-juice/omlet/sandwich etc for which you need to pay. Yahoo gives Rs 330 coupons each month which you can use at these counters. Every alternate day we have non-veg in lunch :) The cafeteria on each floor contains potato chips, namkeen, cream biscuits, toffees, apples, bananas, pears, cappuccino, coffee, milk, horlicks, boost etc. There is no snacks time as such. Though we have lots of things at our hands to eat, I can't each much as I might feel drowsy, so I control myselves. I leave for the shuttle to catch in the evening at 6:30pm and reach home by 7pm. The distance from the current temporary accomodation to office is around 6Kms and yesterday I went on foot, which took me around 50 minutes. I will be enjoying my 30 days stay in that apartment before I move to my friends place.

The company's planning is also very good. The first day was the induction day - HR, Finance, Security, IT, Facilities dept gave a presentation on what all we need to know? The same day, we got a nice bag, a T-shirt, a leather-case for keeping visiting cards, our location and desktop details, the I-card+access card and even our visiting cards. The next day, our desktops were already set and all appropriate connections/softwares were installed. The second day I was going through the documents/process/internal tools that everyone in the company has to be aware of. The third day was an induction by my project teamleads which combinedly gave an overview of what my project is, the departments, the people, what technologies they use and the links for more information? The next two days (i.e. 4th and 5th days) I was going through the project-related documents. Everything is well-planned over here.

My first flight journey (24 Nov 2007)

2007-11-30T09:49:00.000+05:30

This blog is about my first flight journey, courtesy my new company, which sponsored the flight tickets :) My flight (Air -Deccan DN668) was scheduled at 2pm from Pune to Bangalore. Many people ask me, why I booked a low-cost flight carrier when the company is reimbursing my ticket? The answer is simple -- I would be getting the reimbursement amount later, but before that I have to pay my credit-card bill, as I booked the ticket through it, and I don't have enough cash to pay for the credit-bill before it's due date.

I met Ashok at the office and then took an auto to Bapat's parents house. Had breakfast and sweet, spent some time with them till 10:15am. Then I left for Swargate after paying my last mobile bill thereby closing my Idea mobile connection for permanently. From Swargate I took a shared auto (Rs 10) and from there a bus to Loghagaon (Rs 7). I reached the airport by 11:30am. As soon as I was inside the airport I received an SMS from cleartrip.com (the portal where I booked my ticket) that my flight has been delayed by 35 minutes. Anyway I just sat and looked around the airport - the beautiful 'looking' girls/ladies and shops inside the airport. I checked in at 01:30pm and then from there I could see the runway and the take-off and landing of the flights. The planes were smaller in size than I had imagined especially of the Kingfisher/AirDeccan/JetAirways airlines.

The things that impressed me during the flight journey was the starting pickup of the plane when it gains huge velocity and the take-off. As the plane gains height you could feel your breath stopping for a moment, but you will enjoy the sight as the objects becomes smaller and smaller as the plane gains height. When it turns sideways it's one of the best experiences. After the take-off when it was flying horizontally I could see the ground below moving at a very very slow pace -- like a slow motion picture, unlike the fast changes that happen in the surroundings when you ride your vehicle on the road. That disappointed me a little bit intially but later realised that the relative size of plane with respect to the massive ground surface below is the reason why you see the slow pace of the ground movement. Also at some points of the journey, you will see the plane shaking very lightly which is due to air turbulence because of the geographic landscape below and air flow. You can see the hills, rivers, fields, towns/cities, roads below. It's good to sit beside the wings so that you can get a good view of the wing blades movements especially during the take-off and landings. The view of the hills from the plane was like a blanket of earth surface folded at some places. You could also see the density of population too. I didn't realise how the one hour passed and I reached the Bangalore city. The population density of Bangalore is very huge, which is clearly visible from the top.

From the airport I was taken to an apartment, on the Old Madras Road, where I was provided accomodation by the company. It was a flat with 3-bedrooms, 1 hall and a kitchen. Each bedroom was given to single person (like me - new joinees or guests). Each bedroom has a big cupboard, a TV with cable connection, an attached toilet+bathroom and a double-cot bed with good mattresses. I will be enjoying my 30 days stay in that apartment before I move to my friends place.

Trip to Basmat and Hyderabad (02-11 Nov 2007)

2007-11-19T21:58:00.000+05:30

I got a job in B'lore and my last date in Persistent Systems Limited is 23 Nov 2007 and joining date in B'lore is 26 Nov 2007. I decided to take leave for the Diwali holidays and then join the new job so that I can spend sometime with near and dear as I was not sure if I could take leave after joining the new company immediately.

I went to Goa on 26 Nov, met Dhya parents and sisters. Had a great time with their kids: Sahas, Shravani and Dhanashree. It's really nice to have small kids at home, you will thoroughly enjoy the time with them. I then attended Maruska's brother Jose wedding with Luella on 29 Nov. I then left for Basmat on 02 Nov evening, after working for 3 days (31 Oct, 01 Nov and 02 Nov) in the company. Unlike last trip to Basmat, this time it was not boring at all - there were many students who were going home for the Diwali festival. There was someone to talk/chat with for the initial 2-3 hrs. The bus was almost full-packed. Every one were asleep soon after the tiring exams/work, including me. I woke up only at 6:15am. The bus reached Basmat at 07:30am. I enquired about the availability of bus from Basmat to Hyderabad. They said that there is one bus at 9:30am, which directly leaves for Hyderabad via Nanded and Nizamabad. They also told me that if I go to Nanded, there is a bus for Hyderabad every 1 hr/1.5hrs. After enquiring about the bus timings for Hyderabad, for my next day trip to home, I waited at that Hanuman chowk for 10 minutes looking for a shared auto to drop me at Kharkhana (sugar factory) as my luggage was very heavy and the distance from the chowk to Anu's parents house is around 4-5Kms. While I was waiting my eyes fell on a cycle-shop, which gives the cycle on rent basis. I took a cycle by paying him Rs 35 (till next day morning i.e. till 04 Nov morning) and rode the bicycle from chowk to uncle's home. [FYI: The rent of the bicycle was Rs 25 for 24 hrs]. As I had a bicycle, I visited a jain temple, which was 15Kms away from uncle's home, which has marble floor inside. Just outside this temple there is a Lord Ganesh idol which is worth mentioning over here. This idol has Lord Ganesh's face on all the four sides. So from any of the four sides you see at the idol, you get a front view of Lord Ganesh face. In the evening, I went to see the farm land recently bought by Anu.

Next day, after a heavy breakfast, I rode back on my bicycle and took a bus to Nanded from Basmat (Rs 23) and from Nanded another bus to Nizamabad (Rs 71). From Nizamabad I took a super luxury bus to Hyderabad (Rs 99) which is available every half an hour. By the time I reached Hyderabad it was 6:30pm. I called up father when I got down at the JBS. Luckily I got a direct bus from JBS to my Sri Ramnagar colony. My father was waiting with my nephew at the bus-stand, which is part of their evening walk. When my nephew saw me, he was thinking that I was an outside person. He was staring at me. We all walked towards home. When I entered home, he was surprised as how the stranger can enter the home? He then later realised that I was a family member. He didn't come to me for just 5-10 minutes only. But afterwards, he was with me always. I had a great time with my nephew during the next 7 days (04 Nov to 11 Nov).

One thing that I noticed is the energy level of these small kids. They never get tired of playing, running here and there. I sometimes get very tired and exhausted looking after my nephew. Sometimes angry and irritated when he doesn't eat or doesn't listen. When I scold him or beat him, he stares at me and gives a cute smile, which makes me immediately soft. I love all his acts, his cute smile, his quick running here and there, the evening walks with him. I just cherish those few days that I spent with him. Propably GOD might have thought of all this thoroughly. It's really nice to have small kids at home -- you will cherish those moments a lot. GOD bless every small kid. Let them bring peace and smile on each and everyone...

Tamhini Ghat (20 Oct 2007)

2007-10-20T18:38:00.000+05:30

I borrowed Honda Activa, from Anu to go to Tamhini ghat. The route is simple: reach Chandni Chowk and from there take the right road that goes to Mulshi backwaters or Paud village (left road goes to NDA). The distance from Chandni chowk to the point, where you are about to start descending the ghat to enter the Konkan plateau is 74Kms (one way), so that makes two and fro journey equal to 148 Kms.

I enjoyed this ride for few reasons:
1) the view of the Tamhini ghat is breath-taking. Will need to get into that valley once !!!
2) the road runs parallel to the backwaters of the Mulshi dam: one side backwaters of the Mulshi dam and on the other side the hills.
3) I got a chance to sit at the edge of the Mulshi lake and enjoy it's calmness. Wish I had a home adjacent to such a lake...
4) I spent around 30 minutes sitting on the edge of a cliff and just staring at the thick forest below, thinking of all what I have/gained and what all I miss(ed) in life? Sometimes I feel sad, sometimes lonely. But looking at people around you, sometimes that makes me happy that I have much more than what few others don't.

I would never forget this trip. Had it been done during the monsoon season then it would have been much more beautiful with lots and lots of waterfalls :) Anyway better luck next time... It would have been great if you are not making this trip alone. I did this trip alone, giving lift to 8-10 villagers in between at various points of the journey. Enjoyed my bike ride (varying from 5Kmph to 80Kmph), chasing cars and overtaking them :)

One thing you know, while riding the bike at 75-80Kmph at no point did I feel afraid, but after the trip, when I was sitting idle in the office, the thought of me riding the bike at 75-80Kmph on those curvy, up and down roads sent shivers down the spine. It's not that there was some girl behind me and I was riding to impress her, it's just that I felt at that instant and I went riding at such a speed, enjoying myselves. I badly missed someone special, just like Forrest Gump missed his Jenny where ever he went running (once continuously for three years, two months, fourteen days and sixteen hours).

If you are around Pune, then don't forget to make a visit to this place -- another heaven on earth.

Rock-climbing (06 Oct 2007)

2007-10-09T20:42:00.001+05:30

My company, Persistent Systems Limited, organized an intra fitness event, in which a team of 4 members have to be formed and they need to complete the following events: trekking, cycling and rock-climbing. It's a team event. Each event has time limits, the lesser the timings, the more points you get. The team which gets the highest cumulative points wins.

As part of this event, I got the opportunity to do rock-climbing. It was really fun. One point that always has to be kept in mind while rock-climbing is that you have to "Use thighs and hamstring muscles to push yourselves up and not to use hands to pull yourselves up." And most important above all is to have NO FEAR.

Ganesh Mandals in Pune

2007-09-30T11:29:00.000+05:30

I borrowed my friend, Dhiraj Torane's digital camera "Nikon Coolpix L10" for a week and roamed around the Pune city taking photographs of the Ganesh mandals. It took me around 17 hrs distributed over 5 week-days, to roam around the city. You can find the snaps of the Lord Ganesh in various mandals at this link. Hope that you would love some of those photos.

Zooming at 85Kmph...(24 Aug 2007)

2007-08-24T11:43:00.000+05:30

Last weekend (18-19 Aug), I went to Goa and Divya's husband Shailesh took me to all the temples which are located near by his place (Shiroda). He has lots of enthu. He gets only Saturdays and Sundays to take rest and to spend ample time with this son, Sahas. But inspite of that he showed me all the temples, various institutes and interesting places by taking me on his bike. Almost everyone in that locality knows him.

Our thoughts and ideologies matched with each other and we soon became good friends. He also took me to his old house on the hill. His house was very big and was constructed in the old-fashioned. I liked that house a lot. It reminded me of my grand-father's small home in Warangal... There were farms all around the house from the base of the hill to the top. It was very calm. I enjoyed walking against the stream up the hill. This was one interesting part.

Another reason that made the trip to Goa pleasant was that I could meet the three kids: Divya's son Sahas, Dhya's daughter Shravani and Sushma's daughter Dhanashree. All three were of the age 1-2 years and they were learning to talk, remember things. It was fun to spend time with them. And this time all three of them came to me, unlike my last visit. One needs a lot of patience to handle these small kids... Atleast I realise that I don't have such patience. I also met Dhya, Sushma, Divya and Maruska along with their family members. That was about my Goa trip.

And coming to the title of this blog "Zooming at 85Kmph...", yesterday night (23 Aug) a sudden thought of visiting Lord Balaji temple on Pune-Satara highway (NH 4) came to my mind. This temple is located 40Kms away from Pune. I took Kapil's bike (Bajaj Pulsar 150cc) and went to the temple early in the morning. While going I went at 65-70Kmph, as I was enjoying the cold air and cool morning climate. As it was Friday, there was Alankarana of the Balaji swamy after Abhishekam. So I couldn't get a darshan of the lord. I (along with other devotees) were asked to wait till 8:30am. I thought as I have got another 45 minutes till 8:30am, I would better go to Lord Narayaneshwar temple, which is 10Kms away from the Balaji temple towards Saswad. This is a Lord Shiv temple. There was no one in the temple and I went in to the Garbagriha and prayed for few minutes. Then came back to the Balaji temple and left for Pune after having darshan. While returning, I was traveling at 65-70Kmph, the same speed with which I travelled from Pune to temple. After 5 minutes or so, a bike sped by the side of me. I too increased my speed and I enjoyed riding the bike at 80+ Kmph. At one point I touched 97Kmph but didn't have the courage to go further ahead and cross the 100Kmph limit. But this was the first time I rode a bike at 80+Kmph continuously for almost half an hour.

Trip to Aurangabad and to Daulatabad fort (15 Aug 2007)

2007-08-15T23:35:00.001+05:30

On 14 Aug, I caught the 4pm Pune-Aurangabad bus (Asiad 2x2 seater) from Shivajinagar bus station. The bus started at 4:15pm and it crossed the city outskirts at around 5pm. It was an express bus and it made halts at only two places: Ahmednagar (alias Nagar) and Tarakpur. The halt at Nagar bus stand was for just 2-3 minutes. 5Kms from Nagar, lies this place called Tarakpur, where the bus halted for 10 minutes. The fare from Pune to Aurangabad by Asiad bus is Rs 170. If you were planning to travel by private bus-service, the fare would be around Rs 140 - Rs 150.

Two things that impressed me during this journey are:
1) I noticed that there is a One-rupee telephone box in each of the ST buses (which includes Express, Asiad and ordinary red color buses), so that passengers can make calls by dropping in new one rupee coin :) Airtel is the service provider for these telephone boxes. I heard about such a plan to be implemented in the newspaper and this is the first time that I am seeing in reality. I am quite impressed by Maharastra Govt and Maharastra Transport Department.
2) Another thing that caught my attention is the "Condom Vending Machine" at Bus-stations. When the bus halted at Tarakpur station, I bought a tea in the State Transport (ST) stall and was having it, when my eyes caught the attention of this Vending machine, just opposite to the stall. This Condom vending machine is arranged by the Department of Ministry Health, Govt of India. In that particular vending machine, which I saw, you get 3 types of condoms: a) Rs 5 - Ustad condoms (pack of 4), b) Rs 10 - Moods condoms (pack of 3) and c) Rs 15 - Moods condoms (pack of 3). The vending machine accepts only Rs 5 coins. So if you are going for Rs 10 or Rs 15 valued condoms then you need to insert two and three Rs 5 coins respectively. I see that this is a good measure taken by the GOI to check the spreading of AIDS disease.

TIP: Whenver you are at a bus-stop in Maharastra, always have a tea in an ST stall/canteen instead of private hotels/canteens as it tastes really good and is hygiene too. This is from my experience of having tea at these ST stalls at Shivajinagar bus station and Tarakpur bus station.

I got down at Baba petrol pump in Aurangabad, took a shared auto (Rs 5) and went to Aditya's house, where I stayed at night. Next day, along with Aditya and Aparna bhabhi, I went to Anoushka's (aka Guddu) school and saw their school Independence Day celebration program. It was nice to see nursery school children performing plays/dances to patriotic songs -- the children on the stage and the teacher in front of the stage showing the steps, the nursery kids looking at the teacher and copying what she does...It was really fun :) Later I went to Shirish's place, met his brother, sisters and mother. Then had sweets at his place and left for Daulatabad fort, which is 15 Kms away from Aurangabad. First I took a shared auto to Aurngabad bus-stand (Rs 5) and from there a shared jeep to Daulatabad (Rs 10).

The beauty of this Daulatabad fort are the following things:
1) You can see many cannons - some of them are in really very good condition.
2) There are steep hill sides (76mts in height) at the base of the fortress dropping to the moat (a ditch dug as a fortification and usually filled with water). The steep hill sides are so smooth that no hostile troops could scale the heights.
3) There are several inner walls with heavy iron gates fitted with spikes, to prevent the use of elephants to force the gates open.
4) There is only one narrow entrance over the moat. To reach this entrance you need to cross a iron bridge which is placed over the moat. From the narrow entrance, there is an upward climb that leads to a subterranean passage (i.e. a passage which is lying beyond what is openly revealed) of over 45.72mts. This passage is totally dark. This passage spirals darkly over the hewn steps (i.e. steps made by man using axe or heavy metal) shielded by the rock mass overhead. At the end of the passage towards the top, an obstacle was created by a kind of iron brazier (i.e. a large metal like container in which coal or charcoal is burned) . When a fire was lighted in the brazier the great heat blew into the dark passage - due to an effective device of suction - and the passage becomes altogether blocked.
5) All over the fortress there are strong ramparts. Cannons were placed at strategic points and the defences were so designed that a great concentration of fire could be obtained.

I just loved the beauty of this fort's architecutre especially from the security point of view :-)

I returned back to Aurangabad bus-stand by 3pm and took a private bus to Pune (by paying Rs 170 again :(, while it could have been cheaper say of about Rs 140 - RS 150). I reached Pune at 9:30pm, had dinner at Andhra mess - very hot rice, with dal, sabzi, sambar and curd rice. Then came to the office, wrote this blog and will now be leaving for home to take rest after a tireful journey.

You can find more information on Daulatabad (or Deogiri) fort from these URLs:
http://www.indiasite.com/maharashtra/aurangabad/daulatabadfort.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daulatabad
http://www.ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~islamarc/WebPage1/htm_eng/daulatab-eng.htm
http://carl.lindquist.googlepages.com/daulatabadfort

Two Happy Weeekends :)

2007-08-13T13:48:00.000+05:30

03-05 August 2007: I left for home on 02 August evening and reached home the next day morning. I had a personal work on 03 Aug, so finished it on that day. Later on 04 Aug (Saturday) I went with my parents, sisters and brother-in-law for shopping.

We started at around 1pm and finally the shopping was over by 08:00pm. My father and I took only 30 minutes to complete our selection of 3 new dresses (one for my father and two for me), while my sisters took around 5hrs to buy few sarees for the occasion of my youngest sister marriage on 31 Aug. I should really appreciate their patience. I am proud that they completed their shopping of buying clothes in few hrs ;-)

After the shopping we all had Chicken Biryani at home, which we ordered from Parivar restaurant near Radhika theatre. Next day, 05 Aug, Anitha invited all of us for lunch at her place. She is really good at cooking. I will learn a lot from her. BTW, Anitha moved into their new flat, which is 3-3.5Kms away from my place.

11-12 August 2007: I spent the entire weekend, watching movies, The Great Indian Laughter Challenge-III (12 Aug, 10am to 9pm) and EPL football matches at Aru's place. I shall try to avoid owning a TV because this weekend made me realise how addicted I am to TV.

These days....

2007-07-15T12:08:00.000+05:30

These days I feel that there is something missing in life, still not clear what it is – Is it money or peace of mind or job satisfaction or knee pain or me gaining weight or something else?

From 03 March onwards I was being regular to the GYM, during which I gained 2Kgs. Earlier I was 66-68Kgs, but during the time I was regular to the GYM, which was for one month or so, my weight increased to 69-70Kgs (never ever crossed 70Kgs). During this one-month period I used to cycle around 24Kms each day (home-to-GYM-to-home-to-office-to-home). I even used to play badminton in the evenings. I used to take 1000mg calcium tablets each morning for my knees used to ache a little. Gradually I was back to normal fitness and had a healthy life: no knee pain, no back pain, lots of stamina (which can be realized from the fact that sometimes used to play badminton for 2-3 hrs continuously). My appetite was also good then. I used to have 2-3 rotis in the lunch and 6-7 rotis+little rice for dinner. The rotis in the Suvarnarekha mess (on Prabhat Road) reminded me of the mess in the hostel during my B.Tech days. Then came a break from the normal office life, when I went home for my sister’s engagement with Ganesh, which took place on 04 April. I returned to Pune on the morning of 10 April. It’s since then I have not been to GYM again :-( due to reasons like heavy work load and my preparations in lieu of job-change which I am looking for.

I again went home and from there to Vishakapatnam to celebrate my nephew’s first B’day on 07 May 2007. It was a pleasant trip. You can have a look at the photos of that Birthday celebrations at this link. The next generation has started in my family and some of my friends too have children now :-)

As I stopped going to GYM, I started gaining weight. In a span of two months I gained 4Kgs and my weight oscillated between 71 and 72Kgs, sometimes close to 73Kgs. It is then that I decided to start dieting. Now I control my selves during lunch, limiting to one roti+little rice and 3-4 rotis+little rice for dinner. Sometimes I skip dinner and have a heavy breakfast the next day morning. My knees too started aching again. I stopped cycling much and I ride my bicycle only when it’s necessary like on Wednesday morning to reach office by 8:30am to attend the weekly meeting with the client and on weekends, when there is no office shuttle available. Three out of the 5 working days I walk to office from home or vice-versa either in the morning or in the evening, covering the distance of 4Kms in roughly 36minutes. As many of you might be aware that I was a good long distance runner, but I feel ashamed to share with you all that I cannot run 1Km continuously without a break – a sign of old age??

The rains have started here in Pune and many a times I feel like going for a trek on weekends, but I postpone it to the next week making my selves free for studying for the job-search during those holidays. But I am not able to do so :-( I am not able to concentrate on my studies, because of the different physical/emotional feelings that I get sometimes these days :( But anyway I am just working hard to overcome those feelings by keepign my selves busy.

One good thing that I feel is happening in my life is that I am becoming more matured in my words/actions in my daily life. By the grace of GOD and well-wishes from my near and dear, some good things are happening in my family too: my sister, Anitha, moved in to their new flat, which is 3-4 Kms away from my home; my youngest sister is getting married this 31 Aug in Hyderabad (I will be sending the invitation soon). And if destiny permits I shall be moving out of Persistent Systems Private Limited (the company where I am currently working since the past 3.5 years) soon.

Sometimes I think if I have made any mistake(s) in the past? Later I feel that though I might have made few mistakes, it was intended to be and I have no regrets for all that has happened in my life. I believe that everything that has happened in my life has a big plus point, which is "the friends that I made", some of them are very dearer to me. All that life has given me or taken from me taught me new things and I am happy that I am as I am because of all the things/events that happened to me during my life in the past 10 years. I am happy with my current lifestyle and I believe that everything that happens is for one’s own good. I believe in the idea: "Be humble, always spreading love and smile around you and not to expect much from others". This is what keeps me going.

That’s all from here and from my side. I will be writing my next blog after I switched to a new company (unless some very interesting thing happens in my life) and hope that it will be soon. Till then adieu, take care and do keep in touch.

Trek to Sinhagad and trip to Panshet Dam (09 June 2007)

2007-06-13T10:57:00.000+05:30

Since it rained for few hrs on 2-4 days in Pune over the last 2 weeks, I decided to plan for a trip to Sinhagad. Earlier there were 4 of us, but 2 people got dropped at the last minute. So that left us with 2 people: Megha (my project teammate) and myself. I borrowed Anandi-Atul's two-wheeler (Honda Activa) for the weekend for this trip. Initially I was uncomfortable in riding the Activa as it's a gear-less bike and there was no activity for my legs like changing gear or applying brakes, unlike riding a motor-bike like pulsar, which I am used to. But soon I got adjusted to it. Initially I was riding at 20-30 Kmph but after getting used to it, I rode it at 40-60Kmph.

We started early in the morning at 5:00am, reached the base village at Sinhagad by 5:45am, started climbing immediately and reached the top by 7:20am, seen all the places on the top. Of all the places worth visiting, the wind point is the one spot I like the most. At this point the force of the wind is so strong that it sometimes pushes the man backwards in the direction of the wind. I like sitting at this wind point a lot. I sat there for 5-10 minutes and just closed my eyes, feeling the cold air and nature around me, praying for things and for people whom I love the most. This reminds me of the Duke's Nose solo-trek, during which I got the opportunity to walk till the end of the Duchess peak and meditated there for sometime, with no noise and just the sounds of the waterfall below. It's a wonderful experience and one does need to feel it all by himself. Another good feature of this wind point is that you can get a feel of how you would look like when you grow old. This is more illustrative if you have beard and moustache. When you sit at this wind point for few minutes, the water in the fog gets settled on your hair, beard, moustache, and on the skin and it looks like as if you have white hair all on your body. If you look in the mirror then you can get to see yourselves with all white hair and I guess that would be how you would appear in the old age ;-)

One thing I noticed during this trip to Sinhagad is that on the top of Sinhagad there was a well-built path made from stones which one can see in this picture. We started descending at around 9:00am and reached the base village by 10:15am. Then we went for a ride to Panshet dam. The road from Sinhagad to Panshet dam runs almost parallel to the backwaters of the Khadakwasla dam. Thanks to Megha's Nokia 6681 mobile phone, we took few photos [1, 2, 3] of the backwaters of Khadakwasla dam, which runs parallel to the road and a good view [1, 2] of the Sinhagad hill. The photos of this trip can be seen at my photos link.

As you can see from this photo, the water in the dam is not full. If you take a closer look you can see the red color slopes on the hills towards the bottom, it was up to this level the water was there during my last visit in Sep 2006, when I went along with my father. Then the guard at the entrance of the dam didn't allow us to enter the dam, probably because the water level in the dam was high. This time no one stopped us from entering the dam and we could take few photos. When we were in the middle of the dam, I suddenly felt like getting down and touching the water in the dam. After a little hesitation, that someone might object me from doing so, I went ahead, walked over the rocks and touched the water in the lake. You might feel that the water level is very near to the road, but it's not. You can get a better idea and view of how far and bottom is the water level by looking at this photo. After touching the water, feeling happy for a moment, I climbed up to the road and we started for our return journey for home. There will be a special place for this Panshet lake in my life, as I got the opportunity to walk almost 3/4th of its circumference, as part of the Enduro3 race and it's preparations. I reached home at 01:30pm, washed clothes and went off to sleep after taking a cold bath. Got up at 5:00pm and had Chicken Biryani in the evening at 06:00pm.

Getting too tired?

2007-05-01T19:02:00.000+05:30

I started being regular to the GYM since the past 1 month or so and I observed that I was getting tired each day. During the weekends I sleep like a log. It so happened that last weekend, my room-mate asked me to lock the door as he was going out, I heard his words but I couldn't utter a single syllable nor open my eyes as both were tightly shut, such is the state of my weakness. I don't know the reason why it's so?

Is it because that I cycle 24kms each day? -- Home to GYM in Bhageerath is 8Kms one way and home to office (Persistent Towers) is 4Kms one way. I leave home early in the morning at 6am, cycle 8Kms to reach GYM in Bhageerath, get warmed up by playing badminton for few minutes and then do GYM till 8:30am/9:00am. Then start for home, on the way I have a half-glass milk (Rs 5) + breakfast (pova) at Sachin Tea stall near Kamla Nehru Park. I take bath, get ready and leave for office by 10:15am. Leave for home in the night, usually by 10pm from office after having dinner at Suvarnarekha mess.

OR

Is it because of the summer season? -- I drink at least 3lts of water each day? And I have breakfast + lunch + heavy dinner (7/8 rotis in Suvarnarekha mess). But I still feel tired?? Is it because of the 1000mg calcium tablets that I take each day early morning on empty stomach? Might be...

OR

Is it because of the "katmal" that I occasionally find it in my bed? -- "Katmal" are small insects usually found in old wooden cots, which suck blood. I don't have a cot as I sleep on the floor for health reasons. I think that these insects are sucking my blood a lot :( I dried all my bedsheets/covers under the sun today afternoon for 3 hrs. So hope that there are no more katmals.

OR

Is it that I need more food intake because of my heavy physical workload? -- I play badminton for 1/1.5 hrs in the evening, apart from going to GYM in the morning? Do I still need more nutrition?

Anyway, these days I have started making my body tough and have been more sort of punctual, especially in the nights, as I now no longer stay in the office in the nights.

Two new eating points I found recently

2007-03-11T22:50:00.000+05:30

On Prabhat road, there is a mess called "Suvarnarekha". The mess coupons say that it's for college students but lots of other people too come and have lunch/dinner over here. When I first visited this mess, I didn't like the aura of this mess as I was used to having dinner in Andhra mess, which is very clean and hygienic. Andhra mess is a small one, with 12-14 tables and here only rice is served with sambar, a curry, dal, pickle and curd. In "Suvarnarekha" mess you get both rice and roti's. This place is very big with around 35-50 tables. So the serving in Suvarnarekha mess is very fast and sometimes you have to wait for sabzi/roti's. So waiting for sabzi/roti's pissed me off initially as I was used to Andhra mess style of serving, which was fast. I decided not to go to this "Suvarnarekha" mess again. But fate decided the other way. In this mess, I liked the roti's a lot, which reminded me of the hostel roti's :-) I don't know if I really liked these roti's OR is it because I was having roti's after a long time in dinner? OR is it because my appetite returned back to it's peak form when I was in college? OR is it because of the recovery that my body is making up in the past few days? Anyway I have decided to go regularly to this place.

Recently I discovered a small "Tandoori point" which is 2 minutes walking distance away from my place (State Bank Nagar, Karvenagar, Pune). At this place, you get a plate of 6 chicken lollypops (dry) for Rs 35 and half plate (3 lollypops) for Rs 20. I like chicken lollypop's a lot and since the past 10 days I have been visiting this place twice a week just to have these lollypop's. Another good item available here is the "Chicken Biryani" for Rs 60. Today (11 Mar'07) I learnt a lesson that one should not order chinese items like schezwan rice/noodles triple rice etc at this place, not because they lack taste but because the quantity is more ;-) A person like me can have only half-plate of these chinese items over here. Another lesson I learnt is that it should not be visited on a weekend as there is heavy rush and the service is not good. Always prefer "Chicken Tandoori" or "Chicken Lollypop" or "Chicken Biryani" or "Manchow Soup" and nothing else !!!

As I ordered a full plate of Chicken triple rice, I had to get half of the rice packed as I couldn't complete it over there. I came home with the packed rice, thinking that I would have it later in the night, but then suddenly a street dog, came near my feet. This dog has recently given birth to few puppies. I hate dogs and animals, but then I don't know why I felt pity for this dog, I gave the rice to it. Gave a small handful of rice to check if it would eat it? It ate it completely. Then I took the plastic cover to the place where the puppies were present and poured the whole rice in the packet on the plastic cover. The mother ate it all, probably the puppies drink only mother's milk at their small age... Hope that from tomorrow onwards the dog or it's puppies don't come near me, because I still hate dogs and animals.

Trek to Dhak Bahiri (14 Jan 2007)

2007-01-18T14:54:00.000+05:30

It was a long time since I went for a trek. So my friends Trilok, Deepti and Saket planned for a trek to Dhak Bahiri on 14 Jan (the day of the Sankranti/Pongal festival). We all met at Shivajinagar station and caught the local train to Kamshet station. We were joined by Subha (aka The Captain, the name given to her by Trilok and Sarvanan team). Subha brought with her two kids: Neha and Dhruv. Dhruv was the youngest of our team but as you read further ahead you will realise that he is the bravest of all of us. Sarvanan came along with his friends Ashish and Parameshwar, who were working in Mumbai. We alighted at the kamshet station and started walking towards the bus stop. As we had plenty of time for the bus, we had breakfast and took a jeep for the village called "Jhambivali".

Enroute one can see the following dams: Uskan dam, Shiravata dam and Shomawadi dam. The latter two dams are owned by Tata, so to reach them one needs to have permission. The road from the bus-stop to the village is not good but you will enjoy the surroundings around you, as the road goes deeper into the valley and you can find lush greenery on all the hill tops around you, especially in the rainy season. There is an ST bus available from this village back to Kamshet station whose departure timings from the village are as follows: 08:00am, 10:00am, 12noon, 04:00pm and 06:00pm. Though the last bus is at 06:00pm it's better to be at the bus-stop in the village at 05:30pm as sometimes it leaves early. [I don't have the timings of the bus from Kamshet station to the Jhambivali village :( ]

Facing the village you will find a hill behind the village with cols on both the right-hand side and on the left-hand side. We need to walk towards the col on your right hand side as Dhak Bahiri is on that side. There is a path to this reach this col.

If you want to seek the blessings of the deity of the Kondeshwar temple you need to walk towards the left hand side col, again assuming that you are facing the village. This path is clearly seen even in the new moon night as villagers frequently visit this temple. There is also a path to reach the right col (which we were supposed to reach) from this temple. We hired a villager (Sitaram kadam guru) at this temple for showing us the path. Initially I felt that hiring the villager would spoil the whole fun of the trek, but later realised that without his help, the kids Neha and Dhruv would have not scaled the steep rocky climb (1,2,3) to reach the Dhak Bahiri cave.

One beautiful thing about this temple is it's location. It's located just adjacent to a small waterfall. A stream flows by the side of this temple and falls down some 15-20 ft below. You can reach the base of this waterfall by taking the path which goes down by the side of the temple. There is another beauty of this waterfall: It has a cave behind it -- Remeber how Phantom enters his secret hideout through the waterfall, it's just like that :)

Once you reached the right-hand side col, keep walking through the forest as the path takes. This stretch is also very beautiful as you can see from these photos in my album. The forest is thick green even during the summer season. While walking through this forest, say after 40 minutes or so you will find a path going on your right hand side, look for a direction board at this point. If you can see that there is a board with "Bhimashankar" written on it, then you can take that path if you wish to go to Bhimashankar, but let me tell you that this is a 12hrs journey on foot from this point to Bhimashankar :)) Anyway as we didn't have such plans, we went straight and kept walking until we reached a col, where you see that the path ends on either sides and the only path that takes you to is a steep downwards rocky path. Here is a photo of the rocky path at this point of the trek, taken during the return journey (1, 2, 3). Be careful and slow at this stretch, which is of only 10-15 feet. Because if you slip and tumble down then you will going straight down for another 200-400ft. Reach the base of this rocky patch, take the thin path which runs along the side of the vertical slopes of the hill (need not worry, there are properly cut such that one can easily walk, look here for photos: 1, 2, 3). Keep walking till you see a flag flapping above you. This flag is the indication of the location of the Dhak Bahiri cave. To reach this cave, you need to be climb using the rope (already present there) and the sticks hanging from the rope. This rope is very thick and has knots in between for grips. So take the help of these ropes by holding them and keep your feet on the sticks which are hanging by the rope. If you are afraid then don't look downwards, just keep climbing and take step by step. The length of this rope is around 25-35 ft. When you are close to the entrance of this cave, be careful as you will need to push yourselves up by holding the rope tightly. At this point, Dhruv just sat there as he couldn't pull himselves up and he was staring below. It's his courage that he didn't fell unconscious and held the rope tightly. The villageman later pulled him up. Had we not taken the villager then it would have been difficult for the kids to reach the cave. Thanks to the villageman, all of us, especially the kids were able to reach the cave safely. This is the second tough point of this whole trek as you can see it for yourselves from these photos: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Few weeks back before we left for this trek, a guy fell down while climbing this rope stretch and got killed. So please be careful.

This cave has water tanks, which you can drink. There are also utensils placed in this tank, which you can use for cooking purposes. Make sure that you don't spoil the water in the tanks by cleaning the utensils inside the tank. There is a bucket so make use of it. You might be guessing why there are utensils in the cave? The villagers (men, women and kids) climb up to this cave during a festival season and worship the deity in this cave. They cook food and have meals in this cave during a particular festival. This cave is divided in to three compartments, one which holds the deity and the water tanks. The other two (1, 2) are for resting purposes and the whole compartments can accomodate around 30-45 people easily.

After having lunch in the cave, we started our return jounrey and took the last bus which left the village at 5:30pm. We were back in the Pune city by 9pm. It was a memorable trek as it included two difficult parts, which are breath-taking. As someone said "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take; But by the moments that take our breath away."

You can have a look at the photos of the trek at this URL and then click on "Trek to Dhak Bahiri" folder or on this direct link.

My trip during New Year 2007

2007-01-07T15:45:00.000+05:30

This blog contains the details of my trip to Goa and from there to Hyderabad and back to Pune. It mostly contains the price details of the tickets, so that it can be useful to me for reference in the future, and some few memorable moments, which I shall cherish throughout my life and which I want to keep a record of it. If you are interested in sharing my memorable moments, then you can go ahead and read it, else you can ignore this blog :-)

I was supposed to catch the Goa Express (on 29 Dec, Fri), which was supposed to start from Pune station at 04:40pm. But as it's winter season and the train originates from H Nizamuddin (Delhi station), the train got delayed due to climatic conditions. My friend, Ashok Chaudhary, suggested me to find out how late the train is running, before leaving for Pune station. So I checked the train status at Indian railway site and found that it was late by 2hrs. So I started from office at 06:00pm instead of 04:00pm. The train came at 07:05pm; I boarded the train and went off to sleep. Few observations/experiences during this journey:
1) This was the most uncomfortable journey in my life in a reserved second class bogie :( The toilets were in a very pathetic condition. A civilized person can hardly enter in to it. It's not the case with my bogie only, but it was the same case with all the coaches. Luckily my berth was in the center of the bogie and I didn't have to suffer the stinking smell of the toilets. I don't understand if the people who come from North India are so uncivilized?
2) The canteen food that was provided was very insufficient and highly priced :-( They charged me Rs 38 for Egg-fried rice and I was given one egg + little rice and very little curry which was not at all sufficient even for 1/4th of the rice given :-(
3) It was suffocating, as the fans were switched off and all windows were closed, to escape from the cold wind.

Anyway as I was tired I slept most of the time. I decided never ever to travel by this train at least from Pune to Goa. I would always prefer a bus on this route (Pune to Goa), irrespective of how much the fare is? I did book a ticket in this train, just because it was Christmas/New Year season time and the bus prices were three times the normal rates (of Rs 180-200) , even though I tried 1.5 months earlier. (FYI: You cannot book the bus tickets more than 1.5 month earlier during peak season and 15 days in case of non-peak season). I guess that it's because of the above three reasons, one can find berths available in this train from Pune to Goa all throughout the year.

I reached Vasco on 30 Dec at 08:00am and walked towards Sushma didi's place. This is the first time that I was visiting their new house. Sushma didi's house is located very close to the Vasco railway station. Didi's daughter, Dhanashree has completed 1 year, but she still doesn't come to new persons. When you go near her, she starts crying. Strange thing is that you remain little away from her and she doesn't cry, but once you try to get close to her, her vocal powers come in to play. She is very chubby and one feels like pulling her cheeks, which I liked doing so whenever I see any small kids around. After getting refreshed, I took a walk to have a look at the near by locality. There were many banks around her house, as it's close to the Vasco station. I also saw a football stadium (Tilak stadium), which is hardly 3-5 minutes walking distance from her house. This is the first time I was seeing a football stadium, which is totally covered with green grass like the ones you see in Europe (atleast the ones on which the European League matches are played). I climbed to the top row and what caught my attention was the view of the sea from there. I found that the beach is very close to the stadium. I got out of the stadium and walked through the small lanes of the fishermen's hutments to the beach. I could get a view of the harbour and the sea from there.

I returned home, had lunch and took some rest after playing with two other kids, who are Dhanashree's cousins. At 03:00pm, I left for Ponda to Vidhya's (aka Dhya) parents house, as I wouldn't be getting time to meet them once I reach Maruska's place at Maina Curtorium. The bus fare from Vasco to Ponda is Rs 17. To my luck, Dhya's sister Divya was also there in Ponda. So I got the chance to meet Dhya's daughter Shravani and Divya's son Sahas. Like Dhanashree, Sahas doesn't come to me but Shravani does. Both are really cute. Sahas doesn't let Shravani have anything. If we give a toy to Shravani, Sahas drops all his toys and takes the one toy given to Shravani, plays for sometime and then drops it. Good thing is that Shravani doesn't make much fuss when Sahas takes the toy/thing from her. Later in the night, Dhya came home from office at 8pm. We chatted till 11pm and I left for Maina Curtorium via Madgaon, to Maruska's house the next day morning (31 Dec). Divya dropped me at Borim, which falls in between Ponda and Madgaon. At Borim, Divya's house was getting constructed and whose house warming ceremony happened on 09 Feb 2007. The bus fares from Borim to Madgaon is Rs 7 and from Madgaon to Maina its Rs 6. I reached Maina at around 11am. When I reached Maruska’s place I saw that everyone was busy in the preparations. I too helped a little and I don't know how the day passed, everyone was busy in doing something or the other. Next day (01 Jan 2007) was the wedding day. Everything happened smoothly, everything that was supposed to be made was already done, there was no hurry, no running here and there etc... The marriage went off smoothly and this was the second Christian wedding that I was attending, coincidentally both were from the same family. After the wedding ceremony in the Church, at the Dance floor, I met Maruska’s relatives whom I met them two years back in Maureen’s wedding. This time I was not a complete stranger as I could recognize many faces :)

I left for Titan (the IT-Hub center in Goa) to pay a visit to PSPL office in Goa. I took a bus from Maina to Madgaon (Rs 6) and from there to Verna/Titan (Rs 8). Luckily when I got down at Titan stop, there was a bus going inside the IT-hub, I thought that the driver might knew the location of all the companies in this small IT-hub, so I boarded it. But my luck ceased to exist for few minutes only :(, neither the driver nor the ticket-collector knew of my company’s name. And there was no board either along the road side :( It’s not my company’s fault too. The building in Goa was earlier called as “Control Net” which our company acquired and the board was taken to get it painted to Persistent Systems Private Limited. I called up Dhya and she told me the directions to reach to her office. After keeping my luggage at the security guard near main gate, I went inside and sat in the reception. The receptionist asked me whom do I want to meet? I mentioned Dhya’s name and that I had come from PSPL, Pune. She told me to wait for few minutes. As you know I can’t sit idle, I tried opening the door using my access card, thinking that it might work. The receptionist saw this and had a look at the photo on the card and then me. Her eyes balls were moving up and down looking at my face and the photo on the identity card. Both were not matching as the I-card photo was taken when I was in my BTech days (i.e. 7 years ago) and currently I was having a big beard and long hair. She asked me if I and the person in the photo were the same person, before I could reply luckily Dhya arrived and I went along with her. We all had a great laugh at what happened near the reception counter :)

Dhya was having a meeting, so I went and sat in front of a machine which has internet access, checked my mails and surfed the net. Later we both had lunch in the Goa’s office and went for a walk in the beautiful garden inside the campus. I planned to leave Goa office at 3:25pm thinking that it would not take more than 30 minutes for me to reach Panjim as I remember that Madgaon to Panjim used to take around 1hr and I had already traveled halfway by reaching Verna, so that remains half the distance still yet to cover. But I was wrong. From Verna to Panjim it takes around 45-50 minutes. Luckily I enquired this from the security guard before leaving the office. My bus was at 4pm from Panjim. I called them up and told them that I shall be reaching by 4:15pm at max. From Goa office to Titan gate, I went by the office shuttle as I was running short of time and from there I hired a pilot (two-wheeler drive) asking him to drop me at Panjim before 4pm so that I can catch my bus (the fare was Rs 150). I reached Panjim just in few minutes before the bus started. The VOLVO bus which was supposed to leave was replaced by another bus as it was in the garage undergoing major repairs. So the journey hours were extended by another 2-3 hrs (in comparison to the normal 14 hrs that it would have taken from Goa to Hyderabad) as we were told that we need to change another bus somewhere in Karnataka in the late night.

We reached Belgaum at around 9pm and the bus halted near “Hotel Ramdev International” for dinner. I checked my purse and found that I had only Rs 30 as Rs150 were spent for the pilot, who dropped me from Verna to Panjim in 35 minutes, which was supposed to be a bus journey worth Rs 6 only. I found an ICICI ATM near the hotel and went to withdraw cash and I learnt that my card expired on 31 Dec 2006. So I couldn’t withdraw cash using my debit card. I didn't want to make the same mistake of withdrawing cash using my credit card from the ATM as it would cost me Rs 300 for each transaction (irrespective of the amount that you withdraw) and interest rate per day on the amount withdrawn from that moment till I pay back. Apart from these two things I need to pay the service tax on the whole amount too :( I then got a idea. I went inside the hotel, told the head-waiter my situation. I told him that I don’t have cash and that I can pay the dinner bill through my credit card and also asked him if he could charge Rs 200 more than the bill amount, which I can collect it from him. He said that it would not be a problem, only thing is that he would be charging 3% on Rs 200 as service tax (which amounts to Rs 6) and I readily agreed as paying Rs 6 more was a much better option that paying (Rs 300 + interest)*service tax to the ICICI Bank by withdrawing cash using my credit card.

After dinner I couldn’t sleep as there were romantic and judai songs being played, which made me sad. So I was awake till 01:00am, when the bus halted at a stop. We were asked to get down, take our luggage and shifted to another bus. I don’t know the place name where we moved into a new bus but I was sure that it was in Karnataka. After getting in to the new bus I slept off immediately and woke up at 7am, when the bus halted at a place in Mahboobnagar district in Andhra Pradesh. I brushed my teeth, had tea. We reached Mehdipatnam at 08:30am. From Mehdipatnam I directly went to the temple near Secunderabad, where father would take the idumudi in the Sri Ayyappa Swamy temple before leaving for Sabarimala by the 12:30 noon train. I reached the temple at 09:35am. After sending off father I and mother reached home at 01:45pm, sisters went to their respective offices. I had little snacks in the afternoon, watched a movie and left for Begumpet to catch the Mumbai-Hyderabad express for Pune.

So this was the journey that started on 29 Dec 2006 evening and ended on 04 Jan 2007 morning - a wonderful journey with many sweet memories.

My Nephew's "Annaprasana" ceremony (28 Dec 2006)

2006-12-28T11:49:00.000+05:30

Today was Mayukh's "annaprasana". For the uniformed, "annaprasana"- literally it means 'putting solid food or rice into a child's mouth for the first time'. Anna means 'food', especially 'boiled rice'. Prasana means 'eating, feeding', and specifically 'the first feeding of a child'. The ceremony ritualizes the start of a nursing child's additional solid nourishment from the age of six or seven months.

The ceremony was held at sister-in-law's place (Vishakapatnam) at 08:30am. The following items were kept in a row: bananas, coconut, sweet, books, money and gold. The baby is left to his choice to choose what he likes among those items. He chose the items in this order: 1) bananas and coconut, 2) sweet dish, 3) books, 4) money and 5) gold.

So everyone says "that he will be going to temple with bananas, coconut, offer them to GOD, have prasadam (sweet dish), go to school with the books, study well. Earn money when he grows and then buy gold" :-) Hope that by all your blessings and GOD wishes, he does great in life.

Cycling trips to Nagar, Aurangabad (09,10 Dec 2006) and Balaji Temple (17 Dec 2006)

2006-12-13T21:24:00.000+05:30

For the past 2-3 months, I have been riding my bicycle very slowly as the front tyre was partly torn at one of its edges and the tube was sticking its body out. Finally in the last week of Nov, I changed the tyre and replaced it with a new one and got my bicycle serviced. Now it runs very smoothly and the breaks are really awesome - the cycle halts instantly as soon as the brakes are applied, earlier it was not so. Feeling proud of my current cycle condition, a thought came to my mind and I decided to make a cycling trip to Aurangabad (around 240Kms from Pune). BTW, for those who are unaware, I bought a cycle, which I named it as "Chetak", in April 2004 and which I lost on 07 September 2004 as it was stolen :( I purchased a second-hand cycle (Hero Hawk - 5x2 gear racking cycle) from Anurag Chakravarthy, ex-PSPL employee who left PSPL for pursuing MS. It's on this Hawk, that I made these trips.

Why Aurangabad? -- Apart from the long cycling trip, I have another reason behind it. In Aurangabad, Anandi's brother Aditya and Aparna bhabhi live with their daughter Anushka (guddu). It's been many days I have seen guddu. I decided to visit this place and both the purposes will be solved.

I started from home at around 12:00noon, and I had to wait for 30 minutes in a sweet shop as the stock of Bakarwadi's were over :-( Chitale Bandhu 's bakarwadi are famous and I decided to take them along with me. Finally I started from the sweet shop at 01:05 in the afternoon. Had my one-time meal (on Saturdays) in Andhra mess and left for my journey at 01:45pm.

My initial plan was to start from Pune by 01:00pm. Assuming that I still have the stamina to cycle at a speed of 20Kms per hour (and in worst case say 15Kms per hour), reach Ahmednagar (alias Nagar) by 9pm, which is pretty good. Stay the night at my friend, Abhishek Dnyate's place in Nagar and resume the journey from Nagar to Aurangabad early Sunday morning at around 04:00am and reach Aurangabad by 10:00/11:00am. Spend some time with the cute little girl "guddu" and start for the return journey by bus either in the night or on Monday early morning.

As I started 45 minutes late, I thought that I would cover the delayed timings during the journey. So there I was with my cycle with water bottle attached to it, my favourite cap (which you can see in these photos) and my bag (containing a dress, 3 packets of chikkis, 3 oranges, 1 glucose packet) tied to the bicycle stand using an old bicycle tube. FYI, the cycle tube provides a very good grip. The old bicycle tube served two purposes: First it was used to tie the bag to the cycle stand and second, in the return journey it was used to tie the bicycle to the bus top.

Enroute I saw the Agha Khan Palace, for the first time throughout my stay in Pune. After traveling for an hour or so, I passed by the side of a Lord Shiv temple, which has a very good pond adjacent to it. I visited this temple and seeked Lord's blessings. This was my first halt and I ate an orange there. After eating the orange, when I went to wash my hands, I asked a person, how far is Pune from this place? I was expecting an answer of around 20-25Kms, but he told me that it's hardly 15Kms :(( I felt disappointed. Till then I was thinking that I was traveling at a very good speed, but when I heard the answer I realised that I was wrong :( Anyway that reply made me realise my pace and I started off immediately without wasting any further time. During my next hour from the Lord Shiv temple, I came across few posters of political leaders in a small town and there were two points that drew my attention: 1) one of the leader in that poster was of very young age, he appeared to me as if he has just completed his 10+2 just recently; 2) one of the leaders was shown posing as a karate master, bare-chested. Is he standing to fight against the goons or the corrupt politics or to blackmail people to vote him? GOD only knows...but it brought a smile on me :)

After riding for another 30 minutes, I reached Koragaon town and in this town I could see that there was a cricket match being played by the local people and there was a live commentary going on. It was this commentary that grabbed my attention and I made a halt, watched the match for few minutes and resumed my journey. I later learnt that every weekend, the cricket matches are held in this small town. Going a little ahead, I came across many industries. A little ahead of these industries, in one plain ground, I could see a cricket-match being held between two different company employees and there were 2 umpires dressed in black-white shirt !! This reminded me of my childhood days, especially on weekends when we used to go and watch the cricket matches between the employees of different companies (Hindustan Cables Limited (HCL)) vs ECIL (Electronic Corporation of India Limited) or NFC (Nuclear Fuel Complex)) in our HCL colony. My father used to work in HCL.

Around 05:30pm, I made another halt at another place, where I had four boiled eggs with mirchi and salt spread over the eggs (Rs 3 per egg) and one small fish (Rs 5 per fish). After this snacks break, I started cycling a little faster than earlier, may be because it was evening time or may be I was little energized or may be I was afraid that I would be late...Anyway I reached Sirur (mid-way between Pune and Nagar) at around 7:30pm. As I was already late I planned to go to Aurangabad directly instead of making a halt at Abhishek's place in Nagar. I called up Abishek and told him about my current location and change in plans. He told me to make a halt at his place and leave for Aurangabad the next day early morning, as it's dangerous to ride a bicycle on a highway in the night. I was still unsure of making up my mind to make a halt or not? It was dark and I had no torch or light :-(

I rode my bicycle for a while and later realised that it's difficult to cycle in the night especially when the road from Sirur to Nagar is two-lane with no road-partition (unlike the four-lane with a road partition from Pune to Sirur) and of the cold weather outside :-(. I didn't have a jacket with me either :-(, thought that I could sustain the cold weather. I tied my handkerchief to my mouth and nose to avoid the dust and the infection that it would cause in addition to the light cold and cough that I already had. I just kept cycling in the night taking the help of the vehicles headlights coming from behind and the white line drawn in the middle of the road. Whenever a vehicle honks from behind, I used to move to the side of the road and sometimes off the road on to the small pebbles of kachcha path :( Luckily during this night journey, whenever I had to get down off the road on to the muddy path of pebbles, my cycle didn't get punctured. The reason behind this was that I didn't fill air to the maximum limit in my tyres and it helped me. Had I filled the air to the maximum limit, then it could have lead to the bursting of the tyres on getting sudden jolts when I had to get off the road onto the rocky pebbles path. I found that the truck drivers and ST buses rode their vehicles sensibly. It was these private vehicles who rode rashly at many a times.

In the night, me alone on my bicycle with total darkness all around, cold weather, vehicles passing by the side of you, body very tired, but hope still being alive, in all it was awesome. Every person should make such a trip atleast once. As I didn't have any light source, I was traveling very slowly along the side of the road. When there were no vehicles in my sight, I could get to the center of the road, increase my speed and just follow the white lines in the middle of the road. When any vehicle comes in either direction I used to slow down and get to the side of the road. At one place, while I was traveling along the side of the road, I suddenly skidded of the edge of the road, as the road edge abruptly ended there, due to which I fell down. My handle got rotated, my pant got torn at its knees and I was hurt in my right knees. Anyway as I believe, by all my well-wishers prayers/wishes, nothing severe happened. I got up and resumed my journey. I thought that I fell down, may be because GOD wanted to punish me for some of my mistakes that I did in the past. Anyway I was still alive then and I felt happy that I am not such a bad person and that I have still some more life to live... :) I resumed my journey after making a halt at a tea-stall and had a hot tea. I reached Nagar without any more eventualities by 10:30pm. Called up Abhishek who came and picked me up from Kinetic chowk to his home.

Abhishek and his father were very worried about me and they were eagerly waiting for me. You know in the past too, I have given lots of tension to many people with my impromptu dangerous hikes/trips. I went off to sleep immediately as I was very tired. I got up next day morning at 07:00am, got myselves refreshed and after having snacks I left for Aurangabad. I parked my cycle in Kohinoor institute adjacent to Old Bus stand. The fare was Rs 2 per day and you have to collect your bicycle before 09:00pm or the next day morning. I took a private bus (Dolphin Travels) from Nagar to Aurnagabad at 08:00am and I was given a side upper sleeping berth (Rs 80). I went off to sleep again. When I woke up I was already in Aurangabad and my stop "Baba petrol pump" just arrived. I got down from the bus, took an auto to Aditya's house. The fare from "Baba Petrol Pump" to Aditya's place is Rs 5 per head (incase of shared auto) or less than Rs 20 (if hire an auto all for yourselves).

Now let me tell about "guddu". Initially she hesitated to come near to me. But within 5 minutes, she recognised me that I was the same person, who had met her in Basmat, she became friendly and we had a great time. She showed me all the gardens in their society, and cautioned me not to venture in to these places in the night and the reasons behind them. One thing that I liked about "guddu" is her cheerfulness and energy level. She is so full of energy and excitement, which clearly reflects in her words. She doesn't feel tired or uninterested in everything she does, be it in explaining to me her hiding places, the gardens in the society, about her school aunty, or about her friends or people in the apartment. She is full of energy that radiates from her face. She showed me all her toys. She likes drawing a lot. She has painted the whole walls of the house with her artistic creativity, which you can notice as soon as you enter the house ;-) I bought her a small Barbie doll and she was immersed with it along with her friend. I still couldn't understand what is the thing in dolls that fascinates these girls. Anyway she was very happy and she showed me another barbie doll she has along with it's accessories like suitcase, makeup kit etc...

In the mean time, while she and her friend were having good time with the Barbie doll, I had a chance to see her photos. I saw all the album photos in the house and Aditya bhai and Aparna bhabhi told me where these photos were taken. It included many sweet memories for them, one of which I would like to share with you all: this is regarding the photo taken when guddu first had meals with her own hands. Aditya bhai and Aparna bhabhi left guddu all to herself to see how she would eat and decided not to interfere at all, lest what may happen. The photo explains the whole aftermath :). There was food on her feet, face, hands, clothes, floor and walls. It seems that it took 2 days for bhabhi to clean the whole mess, as it was spread across all over the house...

Another interesting thing that got my attention (and which impressed me) is guddu's observation skills. She could immediately recognise the things that are similar and point out their minute differences. For example, in the Barbie doll set I bought, there was a suitcase with wheels. She immediately pointed out that this small suitcase has got only one handle while the real suitcase in the home has got two. I was surprised at her memory power and her sharp observation skills.

As I said earlier, she is a good artist and she showed me her drawings. When we met last time in Basmat, I tried to teach her how to draw a house with hills, sun, birds and river in the background. She remembered that and told me to teach her, as she couldn't learn then. Then she taught me how to make a ladder by first drawing a series of dots, then told me to combine the dots. Now she would cover the dotted figure with her little hands and then ask me to now try drawing it without seeing the dotted figure. If there are any mistakes she would cancel it by putting a cross and try explaining it to me once again by drawing another dotted figure and ask me to connect them, then ask me to try drawing a fresh one with out seeing the dotted figure. I was really impressed by her keen observation skills and above all, her energy levels and enthusiasm (just like I have -- do I ??? :)). The only difference between both of us is that she loves animals, especially dogs, a lot and I don't.

In the evening, when I decided to return back to Nagar, guddu didn't allow me to go. Finally I had to cajole her by saying that I will take more holidays, the count of which went from 01 to 07), next time and would spend a lot of time with her. Eagerly waiting for such a long vacation. I caught a private bus from Aurangabad, which departed at 07:15pm and dropped me at Nagar at 09:35pm. As the Kohinoor institution, in which I kept the cycle will be open only till 09:00pm, I called up Abhishek and asked to collect the cycle from there and wait for me outside. He was waiting for me along with his father. Felt little bad about that for keeping them waiting :( I then took a 10:55pm bus to Pune, after boarding the cycle on it's top and tying it with the old bicycle tyre. Reached Pune by 02:00am (monday early morning). This was the first time that I loaded and unloaded any cycle on to the roof of the bus all myselves :) From bus station I went direclty to the office and slept till next day morning.

So that was the description of my 120Kms cycling trip from Pune to Nagar, which was supposed to be a 240Kms trip from Pune to Nagar to Aurangabad. Hope that the next try would be successful one :)

One week exactly after the above trip (i.e. on 17 Dec 2006), I planned to go to Balaji temple (on Satara road, NH4) to check my stamina. The distance from my Pune to Balaji temple is around 45Kms. My target was to complete one-way journey in 2hrs. On Sunday (17 Dec) morning I woke up at 05:56am. Actual plan was supposed to leave at 05:00am. But I put off the alarm and went off to sleep as I slept lately that saturday night at 01:00am. After putting off the alarm, while I was sleeping I got a very bad dream and I got up immediately. The bad dream was regarding me and few of the people who are very close to my heart. I immediately got up and got ready by 06:25am. Took my bicycle and went to Balaji temple. May be that bad dream was a signal to me to not become lazy...Anyway I started from home at 06:30am and reached Balaji temple at 08:25am. After having Lord's darshan I started my return journey at 09:15am, made a halt at a small hotel, had breakfast (10 minutes) listening to radio songs on Vividhbharati, and reached office at 11:25am. This whole up and down trip of 90Kms in 3hrs 55 minutes made me happy that I still have got the same stamina, which I thought that I didn't after my last week's trip. BTW, the temple darshan timings are from 05:00am to 08:00pm.

Shifted to new house (12 Nov 2006)

2006-11-16T23:48:00.000+05:30

I vacated the old house on 01 Nov and stayed in Shirish's house for the past 11 days. Everything got packed into a big trunk, one carton of books, one carton of daily used clothes and office dresses, a suitcase of new dresses, 1 bag of shoes/slippers, then my bed and finally a small untensil full of items like nail cutter, toothbrush, paste, boroline, powder, coconut oil etc...

On 12 Nov (sunday) I shifted the luggage from Shirish's house to the new flat in Karvenagar. The address of the flat is "Flat # 10, Aroma Towers, State Bank Nagar, Karve Nagar, Pune". This 1BHK flat is newly painted and I feel happy that I have shifted to this flat for many reasons of which few are mentioned below:
1) it's bigger than the one room-kitchen house in which I was staying earlier paying Rs 2K per month. In this new flat, total rent is Rs 6K and four of us have decided to stay in it...
2) as it's newly painted it looks that we have moved into a new house :)
3) I can bring my friends (both girl and boy friends) into this house. I can even cook non-veg in this house :)) (which I am not allowed in the previous house) and above all finally I am free from the previous landlord, who claims to be a social worker but the truth he extracts lots of work from people for him and pays very less :-( I never wanted to talk to that landlord again.
4) This new house is around 3.5kms from office, the same distance as the old house was. And the road to the house from office doesn't have a steep slope like the one in front of Symbiosis college. So I can ride my cycle with ease, without putting any extra effort. The only bad thing is that there is lots of traffic between the current house and flat. But anyway I can cover the 3.5Kms distance in 35 minutes on foot -- a sort of exercise for me. The time split is as follows: Home -> Dhanukar circle (07'), Dhanukar circle -> Karve statue (08'), Karve Statue -> office at Null stop (20').

One more thing I forgot to mention: adjacent to our flat is a small house which has many cocks. So early morning from 5am onwards the cocks start crowing, no need to put an alarm ;-)

Trekking weekend (04-05 Nov 2006)

2006-11-06T13:23:00.000+05:30

04 Nov 2006 (Saturday): Trek to Sinhagad
On Friday (03 Nov 2006) during lunch, my project mates decided to go for an outing and a trek to Sinhagad was finalised. I don't know if it's a coincidence or something else, I also received two SMS's, one each from Deepti Nayar and Karishma Solanki asking me if I am going for a trek this weekend (04, 05 Nov).

I called up Karishma and told that we (I and my project mates) planned to do Sinhagad trek on Saturday and if she is interested in joining. By the time I called her up, she has committed herself to another trek with her friends. And when I called Deepti, she told me that she is busy on Saturday and if Sunday is ok with me? I said YES!!

So on saturday, I and my project mates: Ashok Chaudhary, Rishi Singla, Srikanth Kapila and Mahantesh Hongal started for Sinhagad. As there were only 2 bikes with us I decided to catch the bus from Surya Hospital (Shaniwarwada). I enquired from Shivajinagar bus-stand and they told me that there are buses to Sinhagad every 30 minutes from Surya Hospital, the first bus was at 5:20am. I decided to catch the 6:00am bus from there. But on reaching there I learnt that the first bus to Sinhagad is at 6:45am :-( While I was waiting for the bus I received a call from my project mates that they had reached Khadakwasla !! Anyway they told me that they will wait for me. The bus came at 6:40am sharp and left at 6:45am. It reached the base village of Sinhagad at 7:30am. We all met there at the base and started on our trekking. During the bus journey I could see lots of orange and violet color flowers :)

The trek was simple and we had a great time. Thanks to Sirkanth and his digital camera, this time we captured some good snaps of Sinhagad and it's surroundings. You can have a look at the photos uploaded at community.webshots site. I met Abhijit Toley, while descending. He planned to climb Sinhagad because he has become self-conscious of his growing tummy ;-) (wanted to reduce it) and also to do some photography with his digital camera. It was nice meeting him after a long time.

05 Nov 2006 (Sunday): Trek to Sarasgad
After reaching home and getting refreshed, I had dinner at Andhra mess and slept in the office itself as I had to leave for another trek next day. I got up at 04:30am, and went to Deepti's house. Parked my bicycle at her place and we both left for Shivajinagar station. From my previous trip to Pali, I knew that the first bus is at 5:45am, which goes to Roha, via Pali. As I was sure enough, I didn't dial up the Shivajinagar bus-station and enquired about the timings :( But on reaching there we learnt that the 5:45am bus has been cancelled a long time ago and the first bus to Roha from Shivajinagar station is at 07:00am. The bus takes the following route: Lonavala, Khopoli, Pali, Roha. So if you reach shivajinagar station before 6:00am then you catch any bus going to Khopoli and from Khopoli, there are many buses to Pali. Also saw that the first bus to Bhimashankar is at 06:30am. It's better to reach the station 5-10 minutes before the scheduled time. As we had got one hour more, we had breakfast in the S.T. Canteen (Upma: Rs 8, Sira: Rs 10 and Tea: Rs 4) and I suggest that you have tea in this canteen, it's really really good !!! We ditched the idea of catching the 06:30am Alibagh bus which goes to Khopoli and from there catch a bus to Pali. The reason behind dropping this idea is that the journey is 4hrs (from Shivajinagar to Pali) and if we don't get seats in Khopoli then we had to travel till Pali for another 1.5hrs standing. So we decided to take the direct bus to Pali from Pune itself. The fare is Rs 79 per head. While we were sitting in the bus-stand waiting for the bus, I saw that there is a small kid ("Aadesh") with his parents. He was really cute and I picked him up in my lap and played with this cute little kid and towards the end he piddled in my pants :-( Anyway the 30 minutes went off smoothly with the cute little kid. It's great fun to spend time with little kids.

The Roha bus arrived and it started from Shivajinagar station at 6:55am (i.e. 5 minutes before the actual departure time). We reached Pali at around 10:30am. Pali is famous for one of theAshtavinayak's temple: "Ballaleshwar temple". [Don't forget to read the Legend behind this temple] We (myself and Deepti) planned to do Sudhagad trek. I thought that the hill adjacent to the temple is Sudhagad. Thats what I had written in my earlier blog trip to Pali, which I now corrected. The hill adjacent to the temple is not Sudhagad but Sarasgad. From Pali, there is a bus at 10:45am that leaves for "Pacchapure-Thakurwadi" (first bus from Pali to this place is at 07:15am). Get down at this place and you can do trekking for Sudhagad. We first visited the temple, seeked his blessings and planned to do Sarasgad trek first. Before trekking, I bought some pedas (Rs 105 per kg) to take back home. On asking the vendor who was selling pedas, how many kilos does he sell each day, he replied that it varies from 500-700Kgs per day. I was shocked to hear this. Later he told me that some people pray that they would offer 20/50/100 kilos of pedas if their wish gets fulfilled and so on...This reminds me of a place I recently visited: Rajarajeshwar temple in Vemulavada [1, 2], where devotees offer jaggery equal to a persons weight (or 100-150Kgs etc...) if their wish(es) gets fulfilled.

We started trekking at around 11am under the scorching sun. The path is simple and little steep with dry grass along the slopes. We were totally exhausted by the time we reached 1/4 of the distance uphill. I was exhausted as the previous day was a fasting for me and I had only dinner yesterday night and light breakfast today morning. Deepti was exhausted as she was feeling pain in her stomach. Unlike my last trip to this place, this time we had plenty of water. We drank water and took frequent breaks and reached the cleave between two rocks, over which is the fort constructed. There are steps in this cleave which will take you to the fort. Deepti was very tired and she decided to halt at the darwaja of the fort. There are two darwajas to this fort: one that we took and the other darwaja is from the diagonal opposite side of this cleave. Follow is the link to some photos I found on the net, which are taken from the second darwaja entrance. As you can see the shape of the hill, both the darwajas lead to the first flat level. To reach the summit, you have to climb few more steps. Also one can make a complete circumference around the big rock piece at the first flat level, during which you will find many drinkable water tanks, many caves carved into the rock - one cave was cut deep in to the ground with steps going downwards. When you reach the summit, you will find a Santhpeerji ki samadhi and a small rectangular water tank. There is a small Lord Shiv temple on one side of this tank. This temple is on the inside edge of the rectangular tank and the floor of the temple is slightly lower than the water level in the tank. It's a beauty to watch !! I refreshed myselves many atimes from the water in the numerous water tanks, while Deepti took rest at the Darwaja. The descend was simple and we reached the base in 30 minutes. I throwed my trekking shoes there, as it was damaged severly and it might become the cause for another corn in the leg. The shoes have given me a good company for the past 8.5 years, wearing which (along with my favourite cap) I have done numerous solo/non-solo treks.

We had lunch in "Ashirwaad hotel", where I had fish and Deepti veg thali and it costed us only Rs 35 per head. The fish tasted really good :-) Thought of packing one for the evening dinner ;-) but ditched it. On the top, I met few villagers who told me about a place called "Unhere" where there are tanks of "hot springs". After reaching the base, we took a tum-tum (alias six seater auto) and reached "Unhere" which is 2Kms from Pali. The auto driver charged Rs 5 per head. When we got down from the auto, we saw a small sheperd carrying a small lamb by its forelegs. I felt pity for that small creature and asked him what happened to it. He replied that this small lamb has just been born and I then realised that it was indeed true. It was not even washed after it was born. Following the man (carrying the small lamb) was the lamb's mother, which still had the sac containing blood and liquid (which is the protective gear for the small kid when it's inside the mother) hanging from it's rear. This was the first time I was seeing it in real life. I had seen in a telugu movie song where a goat gives birth to a small goat. Really GOD is great for creating such complicated, beautiful things/beings around us. We reached the hot springs and it is the first time in my life that I was seeing a real hot spring. There were small bubbles coming from inside the tank. I don't know how deep it is? There are bathrooms for taking bath near it. People who used to come to visit the temple, often come here, take bath with the water in the hot springs and visit the Ballaleshwar temple. People believe that taking bath with this water from the hot springs cures some of the skin diseases. I don't know if this is true or not?

While coming to Unhere in the auto, we crossed "Amba river" which flows through Pali. It was slightly raining too. I saw that the rice were cut and kept to dry in the fields. As it was raining they all got wet. I asked the auto driver what they would do with the rice heaps that were cut and which got wet in the evening rain? What if it's not hot the next day and they don't get dried? He then told me that in that case they sell that rice heaps (whcih have become wet) to the "pova rice mills" at a lesser price. In the "pova rice mills" (which is different from "ordinary rice mills") the rice heaps are drowned in water and then made in to "pova". We caught another auto and reached Pali bus-station. There was a bus to Pune at 04:00pm. We thought that we missed it, but luckily the bus was 15 minutes late and we could board it :-) This bus was coming from Roha, so we didn't get seats for the next 2hrs :( Finally we got a seat at around Lonavala. We reached Shivajinagar station at 08:00pm. BTW, the bus timings from Pali to Pune are 08:00am, 11:50am, 04:00pm and 07:00pm.

I took bath, washed the clothes, went and had a heavy dinner ("Mutton Masala" with 4 rotis :-)) in Hotel Rachana as I was very hungry and I didn't want to have meals at Andhra mess, where I eat regularly. So this weekend was a really good one - a sort of practise for the numerous treks that I plan to carry in the next 2-3 months.

Diwali vacation at home (21-29 Oct 2006)

2006-11-02T14:18:00.000+05:30

21 Oct (Sat): This time the train was totally packed as many people were going to their hometowns for Diwali festival. Seeing the train totally crowded reminded me of my first year graduation days, when all the gult members of my batch (which was around 40-60 in number) used to go home after the half-yearly exams or end of semester, some with confirmed tickets and some with WL tickets. In my compartment in one block there were 14-17 people sitting/sleeping among the 8 berths. Though I was alone from my company (PSPL) in that group, the rest were from MBT and Sybase, we had a great time and it was full time pass. The train started from Pune station lately so reached Begumpet station @6:15am instead of the correct time 5:15am. Father came to pick me up at the station. Saturday is a fasting day for me and I usually have only one meal. But at home, my parents and small sister (Avanthy) made me have seethaphals (sugar-apple) and "penilu" with milk for breakfast. It was a really heavy breakfast. Then father and I went to the vegetable market and returned around 1:30pm. Sister (Anitha) and brother-in-law have planned to buy a flat in Hyderabad, so father has been looking for it since the past few days. I sent a scanned image of flat plan in an apartment, close to home, to brother-in-law and sister through email as they were in Vishakapatnam for the weekend (21-22 Oct) so that they can be with their son, Mayukh for those 2 days. Mayukh is with his paternal grandparents in Vishakapatnam since the past few days. After having lunch I slept for 2 hrs in the evening.

22 Oct (Sun): Today we had pooja in the evening. So from morning onwards we (parents, myself and Avanthy) were busy in it's preparations. As I had a fast yesterday, I had a heavy breakfast. My parents and sister didn't have anything the whole day till the pooja got finished in the evening @6:45pm. Many relatives and friends have come for the pooja. We had a great time with them. By 9:30pm, dinner was served to all friends and relatives, and we were off to bed by 10:30pm. It is this one festival when most of my relatives and friends come home and we all have a great time.

23 Oct (Mon): Got up early in the morning at 6:30am, did pooja. Anitha and brother-in-law arrived from Vishakapatnam today morning. I took Anitha to her office near Secretariat/Tankbund for she had a training class for one hour. In this one hour, I visited Birla mandir (5 minutes walking distance from her office) and found that almost 15-20% of the people who visited the temple were from different states who settled in Hyderabad. It's been a long time I visited this temple. While praying in the Birla mandir temple, I couldn't see the Devi idols (located on either side of the gopuram) for more than 2 secs continuously as my eye-lids were closing. Since the past 2-3 days my eyes have become dry. I thought that I couldn't see the Devi idols propably because of the sunrays striking me from the sideways. But later when I went to the other side of the gopuram, where there was no sunrays striking me directly, I still faced the same problem. This led me to think that there is some problem with my eyes. After sister's class was over, we both reached home and had lunch. In the evening, few people have come to see Avanthy. After they left, we (parents, sisters: Anitha and Avanthy, and me) all went for the telugu movie "Bommarillu" in Radhika theatre. It's really a very nice movie. Sisters and parents have waited for me to come, so that we all could see this movie together in a theatre. It's a super-hit movie and has been running in many theatres since the past 90 days. If ever I wanted a life-partner then she should be like the heroine's character in this movie: always frank, pure at heart, open-hearted, very friendly and very simple-in-styling and beautiful.

24 Oct (Tue): Today brother-in-law (Hari) had come home in the morning after doing night duty. At 11am, father, I and brother-in-law went to see the flat, whose plan I have sent in email on Saturday. Talked with the builder and enquired about flat details. In lunch, we had chicken biryani :-) Watched "Pokiri" telugu movie in the night at home. After dinner, Anitha and Hari went to office for their night duty.

25 Oct (Wed): I got up at 5:15am as we (parents, me and Avanthy) decided to goto "Vemulavada" [1, 2] and from there to Karimnagar, where my grandmother lives. The bus fare from Hyderabad to Vemulavada is Rs 70 per head. It's more than 13 years and 9 years since I last visited "Vemulavada" and "Karimnagar" respectively. The Rajarajeshwar swamy temple in Vemulavada has many shivling's of different shapes and sizes. Adjacent to this temple is a "gundam" (a small water body) in which people take bath or wash their feet before entering the temple. The water in the "gundamu" is actually water from the lake adjacent to the gundamu. They built a wall which seperates the lake and gundamu, so that people don't go deep into the lake. After seeking blessings from Lord Shiva, we had lunch (full meals - Rs 22; half-meals Rs 18) in an hotel. Father really liked the rice in this hotel as it tasted just like his mother has cooked it. After lunch, we rested for a while by sitting in front of the temple and then started for Karimnagar, grand mother's place. As I had been to grand parents place some 9-10 years back, a lot of houses have come up now and the whole place has changed a lot. It also reminded me of the good times that we used to have when we (myself and sisters) used to stay at grand parents house for the entire summer holidays. Grandmother was really happy to see me especially after a long time. I couldn't even go for the last rites of my grandfather when he died on 25 Dec 2003. This time I went to his samadhi and paid my respects and asked his forgiveness. Apart from grandmother, also met Ramesh uncle-Ratnam aunty; Prabhakar uncle-Bhavani autny their children: Manasa (6th class) and Sai (4th class). Manasa is good at dancing. Both Manasa and Sai are learning breakdance. It was a really evening that I had with all of them.

26 Oct (Thu): Early morning we got up at 5:15am and caught the 5:30am bus for Hyderabad (fare: Rs 70 per head). We were at home by 10:30am. Today morning, father, brother-in-law and I went and talked to the builder and finalised the price - the initial rate was Rs 1400 sft and father after 2hrs bargaining brought it down to RS 1340 sft. Sunday (29 Oct) was the date finalised when we shall be paying him the advance as brother-in-law's father (Somesh) is coming to Hyderabad on Sunday morning. Somesh uncle is a civil engineer and has lots of experience in real estates, building/flats constructions. In the night, father and I went to Rajalingam uncle, who is an eye-specialist and checked my eyes. My sight has increased from "-0.25" to "-0.5", so had to change my glasses. This time I opted for antiglare glasses and the whole thing costed me Rs 350. I collected the spectacles next day evening.

27 Oct (Fri): Today I saw telugu movies "Andala Ramudu", "Happy" and hindi movie "Lage Raho Munnabhai". In the evening, father and I cleaned the surroundings at the entrance of the home, collected the fallen leaves, cocount tree branches, its leaves, cut the rose branches and burned them. Also cleaned the attic inside the house, throwing the unnecessary things present over there.

28 Oct (Sat): Today morning, it rained in Hyderabad. I felt happy that we cleaned the house surroundings yesterday itself, else the cleaning might have got postponed. Today father and I went to Bakaram where I spent my early childhood days (till UKG). Then we went to Parklane, near Sangeet theatre-where there are many computer shops, for buying hard-disk for the computer. Later we found that the computer (Mercury KOB 815e TFSX motherboard, Celeron processor) at home, supports hard disk only till 20GB. In the evening saw telugu movies "Super" and "Simhadri".

29 Oct (Sun): Today Somesh uncle reached Hyderabad early morning. At 9am, he, father and brother-in-law went and saw the flat. The plan was good and everything was ok except one flaw - the apartment was straight infront of a road, and which according to vastu shastra is not good. So we cancelled the plans of buying it. Also uncle told many facts from his experience. It was enlightening to know about such things, for an example: "the exterior walls in the south-west direction should be of 9 inches thick and not 4 inches thick as we usually get rains from the south west monsoon rains." In the night, father dropped me at Begumpet railway station and I reached Pune next day (30 Oct) at 9:20am.

This vacation was very long in terms of the numbers of the days, but I don't know how each day has passed. I felt that I had been at home for just 2-3 days. Anyway I am really happy with this trip.

How did you celebrate your Diwali festival? Do feel free to write.

Father trip to Pune (16-25 Sep 2006)

2006-09-24T11:58:00.000+05:30

Father wanted to come to Pune since a long time but it couldn't happen as he was busy at home during the past few months as Anitha delivered a small baby boy in May, then the next 3-4 months went in taking care of sister and Mayukh, then later he was busy with the Ganesh festival organisations (as he was the treasurer of the colony committee). Anyway finally he made the tickets for 15 Sep (Friday night) with the return journey on 25 Sep (Monday) evening. He reached Pune on 16 Sep (Saturday) morning at 9:15am. This blog is the description of my ten days stay with my father and how I cherish these moments forever. First of all I want to thank Anandi-Atul for lending me their bike on which my father and I commuted throughout the next ten days traveling around 595-600Kms. Thanks Atul and Anu :-) And not to forget Rishi Singla, who lent his helmet during our long trips, Thanks Singla :-)

16 Sep 2006 - Saturday: I reached station at 08:05am thinking that the arrival of the train was at 08:30am. But on reaching the platform I learnt that the train was on right time and would arrive on platform one at 09:10am. So please note that the arrival of the Hyerabad-Mumbai Express at Pune is 09:10am and not 08:30am. We then took an auto and reached home. Then father and I went to buy the groceries that were needed for the next 10 days. We then made "beerakaya + tomato" curry, had lunch and then chatted for the next 2 hrs. Left for office in the evening, showed him my new desk in the office at Persistent Towers, Nullstop. From there went to Parvati temple, and saw the museum on the top of the hill after seeing the temple and then returned home.

17 Sep 2006 - Sunday: We went to Lonavala to see the Bushy Dam and Tigers Leap point, which I visited along with my friends in June 2006. This time when we reached the dam, the water in the dam was up to 1ft-2ft below the top of the wall dam. Then we went straight ahead walking towards the waterfall. Father really liked the waterfall and the green scenery around it. We started climbing down, crossed the dam wall and were going towards the main road, when father slipped and fell down on the stomach with face down, due to scree on the slippery rocks. It was my mistake I should have taken him along the path that was taken by many people, but anyway thank GOD there was not much injury, only his lip was cut deep from inside to outside by the upper teeth. I shall never forgive myselves for this :-(. We applied haldi to stop bleeding and then proceeded ahead. Went towards "Tigers Leap" point. The ride from Bushy Dam to the above point was upwards, ascending a small hill and it was totally covered by fog and clouds. Though we couldn't see any of the valley below [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] or the waterfall from the lake due to thick clouds but father enjoyed it a lot as it was his first experience to be among and with in the clouds. We returned back to Pune by 4:30pm. Then we prepared lunch ("brinjal + tomato" curry), had it, then went to a hospital for checkup. The doctor gave him a TT injection and an anti-biotic tablet and some painkiller for 2 days. We went to Tulsibagh (near Laxmi Road) from the hospital for shopping, as he wanted to buy some bags for sisters. I showed him Pune Mandai, the sleeping Ganesh temple (what's it called?) near it, then the Dagdusheth Ganapati temple. We reached home at around 10pm and slept off.

18 Sep 2006 - Monday: Today we didn't do much traveling. Father might have really felt bored at home while I was in the office during the day. He read a telugu weekly (Swati) and didn't leave any page unread. In the evening we both went to "Good Luck cafe" and had "Chicken Tawa" with rotis and "Mutton Biryani" :-) I took him because father really likes Chicken Tandoori. He always had a dream of having a full tandoori chicken :-) I took him to this place thinking that we would have Chicken Tandoori, but learnt that this item is not available on their menu. Anyway decided to take him to "Blue Nile" on Sunday evening.

19 Sep 2006 - Tuesday: We planned to leave for Balaji temple, on the Satara road, which is 46.5Kms from Pune (S.B.Road). But as I came late (@ 03:00am) from office, father cancelled the plans and we postponed it by one day. Father was at home all day. He really felt bored as he already completed the one weekly present at home yesterday. In the evening, we went to see the Fergusson college campus. While returning back to home we forgot to buy the Swati weekly's, so we walked towards Deep Bangla chowk, and bought 2 Swati telugu weekly's. Father prepared "potlakaya" curry in the afternoon. We had it in the evening too and went off to sleep early.

20 Sep 2006 - Wednesday: We were supposed to leave from home to Balaji temple at 06:00am. Alarm was kept at 04:30am. But my mobile didn't ring, another problem in my mobile (Nokia 1110 - I need to give it for repair, luckily this happened within the warranty period of 1 year, which is due to expire this December). We got up at 05:30am and left home at 07:15am. The route which I knew, was home -to- Swargate -to- Katraj -to- Katraj ghat -to- NH4 Pune-Bangalore Highway. The road up the Katraj ghat was undergoing repair, and one of the new Katraj Ghat tunnel bypass was opened for traffic. I didn't know this. Anyway while going to the temple we took the ghat route and while returning the new tunnel by-pass. Both ways it was good --- while climbing the ghat: I showed father the Katraj lake, the old Katraj tunnel, the start point of the Katraj-Sinhagad trek --- and while returning we took the new tunnel bypass which takes you by the side of Jambhulwadi lake, on the Viaduct :-) We reached home by 02:15pm. I left for office directly without having lunch as I was already late and didn't feel like eating as we had a heavy breakfast after darshan of Lord Balaji. And father did the same thing he too didn't have lunch. In the evening he went to Chaturshrungi temple, had orange juice at Nagesh fruit stall and was back in the home by 07:00pm. We then prepared lots of "kichdi" and hogged it completely :-) Next day was father's fast. He and mother observe fast every Thursday - mother does for me and father does for Avanthy: they prayed that if we get a job then they would fast on Thursday.

21 Sep 2006 - Thursday: I was having a client-weekly meeting at 08:30am. I told father about this the previous night and told him that he had to prepare breakfast for me by 08:15am. I made a night out in the office worked for sometime then read an interesting article (don't ask me what it is ;-) so you guessed what it could be, if still interested to know do drop a mail) and reached home at 07:45am. Father was doing pooja and he completed his pooja at 08:05am. I told him that I was getting late and that I wouldn't have time to have breakfast. He cooked "upma" very quickly and I took my bath by 08:15am but I still didn't have time to eat breakfast. Then father told me to get ready while he will feed me "upma". It was a pleasant moment - father fed me "upma" all the way till I sat on my bike. This reminded me of my +2 days, when I didn't have time to have breakfast and mother used to feed me breakfast. My father later told me that he was really happy that I had breakfast in the morning. I couldn't understand his feelings. May be only a father can understand father's feelings. In the evening I took father to NDA via Chandni Chowk. He enjoyed the bike ride. Also showed him NCL, Pashan circle, Pashan Lake and DRDO. In the night we had dinner at Andhra mess, where I regularly have meals in the nights.

22 Sep 2006 - Friday: We went to Sinhagad on bike and then from there to Panshet dam. He enjoyed himselves again by being among the clouds on the top of the Sinhagad. Enroute to Sinhagad, we saw the Khadakwasla dam gates, the backwaters of Khadakwasla. On the top of Sinhagad we roamed all around and I showed him Tanaji Malusare samadi, the two wind-points, the fort, the big water tank, caves, MTDC guesthouses, one-point tree and the potato hill. We had "jhunka bhakri" in one of the hotels on the top of Sinhagad. Then got down, while descending we found many couples - an argument broke between me and my father. Father says that the culture in Pune has become westernised and these teenage boys and girls are spoiled, see how they flirt? I told them that they might be good friends, classmates...why do we always think of them as lovers? Just as I said this point, we saw a couple (unmarried) kissing each other...and what else..I just rode the bike calmly all the way to the base of the hill. From Sinhagad we went to Panshet dam riding along the road, which runs parallel to the backwaters of Khadakwasla dam. Father enjoyed this part of the ride. Even though it was getting late, I thought that he would be happier when I would show him the Panshet dam and it's backwaters. He saw the dam but didn't feel happy as he had already seen a bigger dam (Nagarjuna Sagar dam) than this. He says that this Panshet dam is around 1/16 of Nagarjuna Sagar dam. Anyway I felt happy as I could take father on a bike ride on the road which runs parallel to the backwaters of Khadakwasla dam. We returned home by 03:00pm. I went to office and returned home soon in the evening. Father prepared "aloo" sabzi for dinner. Had dinner and I went to office in the night to work.

23 Sep 2006 - Saturday: Reached home at 05:00am, woke up father and we were ready by 06:35am. We took an auto and went to Surya Hospital to catch the bus (@ 07:00am) to Shirdi. We booked the bus tickets by Prasanna travels. The fare from Pune to Shirdi is Rs 150 per head. The bus started at 07:05am and reached Shirdi @ 12:45 noon. While going to Shirdi we saw "Gangster" movie in the bus. We both really liked it especially the ending. Another thing that I personally liked in the movie was the love that the character "daya" has for "simran" in that movie. We went in and had darshan by 02:45 noon. Had lunch in one of the Guntur mess just outside the bus-stand. Year by year the taste of the mess is decreasing :-( It's no fun having food in the Guntur mess...the taste has depreciated a lot :-( Anyway after having lunch, we booked the return ticket from Shirdi to Pune by Prasanna travels again and this time we got the ticket in only Rs 130 per head. I remember that during my trip to Shirdi last time with family members, we booked a ticket in just Rs 110 per head. Anyway we had no qualms, we enjoyed the return trip in Prasanna travels bus, we had a comfortable journey and saw "36 China Town" in the return trip, which we both enjoyed :-) We reached Pune at around 09:45pm. We were very tired and slept off immediately after we reached home. Got up next day at around 09:00am.

24 Sep 2006 - Sunday: We prepared "upma" and hogged it. Then we came to the office. I showed father the videos (of the trip to Lonavala, Balaji temple, Sinhagad-Panshet dam) that we took and which I burned them into a CD. While father watched the video clips I wrote this blog and later we went to Ashok Chaudhary's house in the evening. From there we went to "Blue Nile" and had 1 Full chicken Tandoori and 2 chicken biryani in total :-) Our stomach was completely full, so we went for a walk around M.G.Road and had a natural flavoured ice cream, then took our bike from "Blue Nile" and returned home by 12 midnight.

25 Sep 2006 - Monday: Today I came to the office little early at 08:30am, worked till 01:00pm. Left for home, had lunch with father. Father prepared "tomato" curry. We chatted for a while, packed things by 04:00pm and then we both left for Pune station as the train to Hyderabad was at 04:40pm. Father prepared "Lemon rice" for the train journey and for my dinner too which I had it in the night. I returned from station, after dropping father, at 06:00pm. Cleaned my bicycle, which has lying idle for more than 10 days in the company parking lot. Took it to the cycle repair shop to get its rear wheel outing done. Went home, washed bike with water and then came to the office by catching the 07:00pm shuttle. I packed the "lemon rice" in tiffin box and brought it to the office so that I need not go home for having it and I can work till late night.

Trip to Basmat (18-20 Aug 2006, 01-04 Sep 2006)

2006-08-21T22:26:00.000+05:30

18-20 Aug 2006: I started off from my office at 8:25pm, had dinner and walked towards Khurana travels (opposite Police Ground, F.C. Road) to catch the bus to Parbhani (Fare: Rs 270; train fare is Rs 283). I was going to see Anandi-Atul's son, who is born on 16 July 2006. I started off from the Andhra mess at 9:05pm and reached Khurana travels (Opp: Police grounds, F.C.Road) at 9:38pm, while the bus was scheduled to leave at 9:45pm. The bus journey was boring...no good movie to watch and the helper of the bus was very rude. Felt like hitting him very hard !! He was behaving as if he was doing us (me and other passengers) a favour...but I was going to see "Udayan" (Anandi-Atul's son) for the first time and I didn't want to do any nuisance. As the movie was boring and I was tired I dozed off by midnight and woke up next morning at 6:30am. At around 8:15am the bus reached Parbhani. I refreshed myselves by washing face with cold water in a small tea stall just outside the Parbhani bus-stand and had one-cup tea. The full cup of tea costed me only Rs 2 and it was really good !! You don't get such a good tea and at such a price anywhere in Pune :-( I thought of having another tea but before I could place my order, I noted a jeep-wala shouting "Basmat, Basmat..." As I had to leave for that place and I was not sure when the next bus is available I took it as I learnt it that they charge the same fare as it would have been so if one travelled by the state bus. (When I reached home, uncle told me to always take the state transport bus and not the local jeeps as many accidents do occur along this route. BTW the road that runs between Parbhani and Basmat is NH-222). The fare was Rs 25 and the distance between Parbhani and Basmat is 47Kms. The jeep wala dropped me at Basmat in 1 hr (infact I should say it was less than 1hr). During this journey I started reading the book that I took along with me "One Night @ Call Center" by Chetan Bhagat (which I completed by Sunday (20 Aug) afternoon). As per the directions mentioned by Atul in his mail, I got down at Hanuman mandir chowk, which is 100-150mts before the Basmat bus-stop, took the road on the right hand side (if any doubt ask for the road leading to karkhana) and started walking. Initially this road goes through a small town, then later the number of houses decreases and you see fields/open grounds on either side of the road. In the far right, you can see the chimney of the karkhana. I took my own time, as I wanted to enjoy this natural beauty around me. One point worth mentioning over here is that you find no hill on any side. This is the first time that I am seeing such a flat level land all around me in Maharastra :-) Haan you find many fields all around you - most of them are sugar-cane fields :-) (other crops I don't remember much). Keep walking for an hour or so, until you come across a big hoarding over the road, on which it's written "Purna Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana, Zilla: Hingoli". This board comes on your right hand side. Take the road underneath this hoarding and it will take you straight to sakhar karkhana (i.e. sugar factory). You also get jeeps or seven seaters from Hanuman chowki to this karkhana. But as I said I had plenty of time and wanted to enjoy each moment.

Ask anyone for Herlekar sahab and everyone will guide you on how to reach his home. Anandi's father "Herlekar" has great respect in this region and everyone knows him and his family (which you will learn later). Just after the karkhana, you will see houses on either side of the road, which are the houses for the employees of the karkhana. You will also find a dispensary and a govt school for the employees children. From karkhana just follow the tar road, until you come across a point where you see a small iron-bridge across a canal. Don't go straight by crossing the bridge (unless you wanted to go to Lord Shiv temple) but look to your right, you will see an unguarded railway crossing. Walk towards this crossing, just follow the tar road (which goes to "Pimpalachaure" village) and you will reach a big white house "Purneya". This is Herlekar sahab's i.e. Anandi's parents house, located in a calm nice location with green fields all around you.

As I opened the gate and entered inside, I could see a car under the portico. I walked towards the car and saw the dog "Tiger" sitting in front of the car. Seeing the length of the chain tied to it I stood at safe distance and tried to call Anu/Anu's father inside. Before I could utter a word, Tiger woke up and leaped towards me. In reaction I stepped backwards and avoid falling down by catching hold of the fencing barbwire, luckily nothing happened :) By this time Anu's father had come from inside and he held Tiger in his hands, it's then I was able to enter the house. The house is really beautiful. It's like my dream-house only thing missing was the stream flowing adjacent to the house, but here you can find a canal few metres away on the other side of the road. The house is quite big, covered by fields on three sides. The backdoor and front door opens to fields. The fourth side has the road and the third side has open pit rain-harvesting water tank in one corner from which water is being drawn by a motor pump to water the fields using pipes with sprinklers. The house has good ventilation with many circular shaped holes both at the roof level and at the floor level. Also there are some circular holes on the roof, which act as ventilation for light and fresh air during the day and are covered by thick glass in the night. Propably these circular holes in the roof might function as chimneys too.

In the day, I watched Anandi-Atul's marriage CDs, then slept for few hours. Got up at 4:30pm and found that Anandi's son, Udayan, was playing in the kitchen. He is cute. When he cries his face becomes total red. He kicks his legs a lot, infact the whole lower part of his body below abdomen. He also folds himself inwards and then tries to stretch as far as he can. It's cute to see him when he does so. In the evening, I went to see the Lord Shiv temple. Adjacent to this temple is a well that has got some turtles in it. Also I tried to walk on the railway track (narrow gauge) towards the "Pimpalachaure" railway station. It's not easy to walk on the track using both feet. After spending some time on the tracks and at the temple, I walked towards Pimpalachaure village, crossing "Purneya". When I reached the village, everyone was staring at me. I was impressed by the small lanes and on its either sides were the houses. These lanes are clean unlike the lanes found in the city slums. While I was walking through the lanes, the children were running into their houses, I don't know why? I guess that villagers are thinking me of as someone who has come to take a survey or something like that. I felt embarassing, so I tried to return back and when I was returning I saw that all the children (around 25-40 in number) were following me. I didn't understand why? Some people commented me that I looked like Salman Khan (may be due to my hairstyle ;-)). When I walked for few mts, then an elder person who was going to the village, on seeing the huge crowd of children behind me, asked me from where I had come? I told him that I had come to Herlekar sahab's house. On hearing this, he shooed away all the children and told sorry. I couldn't understand anything but one thing I learnt is that "Herlekar sahab" has lots of respect here. Almost everyone in and nearby places knew Herlekar sahab and their family too.

The next day I went along with Herlekar uncle to see the sugar factory. For half of the year, the factory machinery parts are dismantled, repaired, applied grease and fixed back. During this period the factory works only during the day timings. For the other half, it produces sugar and during this period, the work is on full swing and there are night shifts too. I climbed 2 chimneys, the inverted funnel shaped container, the heaters, chemical section plant. I also had a look at the godown where there are many sugar bags stored. I learnt later that you couldn't sell all the sugar bags that you produce. Only some % is allowed to be sold, the rest has to be paid to the government as loan repayment. Each year, many machine parts are worn out or damaged and they need to be bought again, for which the company takes loan from bank. And they take loan for paying the wages of the employees during the non-production period, which is around 6 months per year.

It was a good time that I had for the two days that I stayed there. I had to catch a 10:35pm train (2730 - Nanded Pune Express) from Parbhani on Sunday. I had dinner by 8pm and left for Parbhani. It was pitch dark as there were no streetlights along the route. Everyone at home told me to catch an auto from karkhana as it would be safe and it would drop me at Hanuman chowki before 8:30pm so that I can get a bus to Parbhani. But I decided to walk all the way to Hanuman Chowki and started my stopwatch in the mobile. I knew the route and though I could just see only few mts of road ahead of me, I persisted to walk all the way and inbetween didn't take any lift, which was offered by the village people (who recognised me during my 2 days stay at Herlekar sahab's place). It was a good experience to walk in the night on a road almost in the pitch darkness. Following were the cumulative timings that I took from home: Railway crossing (07m54s), karkhana (16m22s), "Purna Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana, Zilla: Hingoli" board (24m44s), Hanuman chowki (01h04m00s). I was there by 09:05pm at Hanuman chowki but it was not untill 9:35pm that I got a taxi. The taxi dropped me at the railway station by 10:25pm. While I was enjoying my walk in the night, propably Anu and everyone at home might be tensed with the thought whether I had reached safely or not and if I have got a bus? They told me to call after reaching karkhana, Hanuman chowki and Parbhani railway station, which I did.

01-04 Sep 2006: In another 15 days, a trip to Basmat is planned, as there is the naming ceremony of Anandi-Atul's son on 04 Sep 2006 (Monday). This time I decided to opt for the govt bus service as I didn't want to take the Khurana travels bus. My manager, Baswaraj Kasture, told me about a 4 days bus-pass scheme, where in you need 2 photos and Rs 335 as fees. The day starts at midnight and you can buy a 4-day bus-pass well in advance. Say for example, as I had to catch a bus on 02 Sep evening, I bought the 4-day bus pass on 30 Aug with date effective from 02 Sep. So from 02 Sep to 05 Sep midnight, my pass is valid and the journey after 06 Sep 00:00hrs, will be charged. You can catch any ST bus of Maharastra transport (excluding Asiad buses for which there is a seperate bus pass which costs around Rs 100 more) and go anywhere within these 4 days. I liked this scheme.

As the function is on 04 Sep (Mon) and I need to start from Basmat on 05 Sep, I planned to leave from Pune on 02 Sep (saturday evening) instead of 01 Sep (Friday evening) so that I can do some work on Saturday and also I can use the pass for the return journey on 05 Sep. There are two direct buses to Basmat from Shivajinagar station each day, whose timings are 05:45am and 07:30pm. Similarly there are two direct buses from Basmat to Pune and whose timings are 05:00am and 06:00pm. The bus journey was simple. Before boarding the bus at Shivajinagar, I had 30 minutes more, so I had a chat with the driver and the conductor. Even these people knew Herlekar sahab. The conductor was from Basmat. Initially the bus was empty and gradually it was full and each passenger got seat to sit. There was no one standing at all. I sat just behind the driver seat, close to the window so that I can get a view from both the window and also the view of the road ahead from the glass in front of the driver. I felt like sitting on the seat adjacent to the driver, but since that seat is located close to the engine it becomes very warm, so I dropped off that idea. At around 3am, I could get a complete seat and I tried lying down on it. I had a good nap throughout the journey. When I got down at Hanuman Chowki in the morning, when I stretched myselves I could hear the bones crackling sound :) It's the first overnight journey in a Maharastra ST bus and I shall remember this one. As I knew the path I reached home and this time the walk was not much fun as I had been along this same route just 2 weeks back ago.

At home, Anandi's brother (Aditya) and bhabhi (Aparna) have come for the function along with their daughter, Anushka. I had a great time with Anushka (nickname: guddu). Initially I felt that guddu might not come near me as most small kids are, but she was cool. The way we came together was through the drawings. She drew some pictures of hills, houses on a paper and I too showed some new drawings and how to draw them. Soon we became good friends and from then onwards we spent a lot of time together: playing games like hide and seek, police and thief, money game with cards. When we were playing money game with cards, she was the person who was winning all the time, I tried many ways trying to cheat, but all the time she only won. I remember of the numerous games that we played she has lost only 2 games and when she lost she cried and became sad. When playing hide and seek, I used to hide at places where she couldn't find me. She used to search and then when couldn't find me, she used to sit silent and wait. I would loose my patience and make myselves appear before her. She would then jump with joy and sometimes with anger (for a short moment) if she learnt that I cheated by hiding at prohibited places, which we mutally decided earlier. After lunch, we both went for a walk towards the village. In between we stopped at a cow shed and she fed some grass to the cows in the shed. There was a calf too. She rolled her hands over the calf's head and she enjoyed a lot. In the evening I took Anushka to the roof and showed the moving train, which is partly seen inbetween the sugarcane fields which lie between the track and the home. At few places we used to get a glimpse of the coaches of the moving train. The smoke coming from the train gives an indication where it is and in which direction it's going. There is a train that goes to Purna both in the morning and evening. In the late night, Atul, his parents, brother and grandmother have come to Basmat in a vehicle. There was a pooja done in the morning. After which we all had lunch. During the lunch, I noticed that there is a rangoli drawn around each plate and then food is served. This method is followed during function times. In the evening, all the guests from villages and nearby places have come and they sang some songs and wished Udayan before they left back for their home before sunset. After the naming ceremony, in the evening I took Anushka for bird watching. There are many peacocks in the fields nearby. So we both went into the fields in search of a peacock.

During my last visit, one evening when I went for a walk, I saw a peacock on a tree, close to the canal. I carried guddu to the same place, crossing the sugarcane fields, but we didn't find any peacock. When asked a villager, he told us that one can find many peacocks on the other side of the canal. I lifted guddu and crossed the canal as it was dry (here in Parbhani it rains very less as compared to Pune). As soon as we reached the other side of the canal, we saw a peacock and on seeing the peacock, guddu felt very happy and she hugged me tightly (remember I was still carrying her in my hands). That was one of the happiest moment for me. She felt really happy on seeing the peacock and she recited a small poem on peacock !! I will cherish this moment forever. Really having small kids at home is great fun. They are really cute, innocent and pure at heart. I love children.

The next day morning I got up at 06:00am and left for Basmat. Reached Basmat bus stop at 07:15am. Took a bus to Parbhani. From there I caught the 08:15am bus to Barshi. Had lunch over there and took the 2pm direct bus from Barshi to Pune. The whole day was spent in bus journey. It was fun. Enroute I could see many dams, rivers and water bodies. It was a good trip !! Had a great time with Anu and her family members.