Abode of the Clouds: Day 2: 3600 Stairs & the Living root bridges of Meghalaya

Day 0: http://findvenu.blogspot.in/2017/04/abode-of-clouds-day-0-background.html

Day 1: http://findvenu.blogspot.in/2017/04/abode-of-clouds-day-1-kfc-dumb-charades.html

I was woken up by my Phone’s alarm at around 5:30 AM and it took me a couple of seconds to gather my whereabouts. Rarely do I wake up that early and this of course was a rare occasion. The chill in the morning air drove away the cobwebs of my sleep quickly and I got ready to head out on the Day 2 of our Meghalaya Trip. The plan was to hit the seven sisters falls first and then the Arwah caves before returning to the resort for breakfast. Gurjyot and Nikhil, 2 of my cottage mates opted to sleep in while the third one, Prathamesh joined me in heading out. Although the scheduled departure time was 6 AM, the resort grounds had a deserted look till around 6:30-6:45 when people started trickling in towards the bus. Once the bus was almost full, we started off and I breathed a sigh of relief – too soon. We had to stop again mid-way as two “Late Lateef”s decided to join us at the last minute. This unexpected break gave me a chance to click some macros while we waited. The latecomers were welcomed into the bus with a round of slow claps and the journey finally began in earnest.

First Stop – The Seven sisters falls. These are a group of seven streams of water falling off a cliff face into the valley. We had a great view of them from a nearby resort grounds. However, on that particular day, the sisters were feeling a bit shy and chose to hide themselves partially behind a veil of haze. Me and my ND filter felt let down and had to content with a few clicks of scenes around the resort grounds. The puzzling part is that, even with nothing much to see, it was a hell of a task to get people to board back into the bus to proceed to Arwah caves. Finally after much pleading and threatening, the group was back in the bus and we started moving again.

Arwah caves is a cave system featuring multiple tunnels, many passage ways and prehistoric fossils. One interesting feature about the way to Arwah caves was a choice – Relaxing walk vs Rigorous walk. As Robert Frost once put it,

“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could”

My choice here was not difficult though – I had in my mind a much rigorous walk which I would need to take later in the afternoon. So for now, I chose the relaxing walk. In the Arwah cave system, there is a stream of water flowing through it and the sound of the flowing water along with the acoustics of the cave adds up to an awesome experience. There were multiple passageways to be explored- most of them ending up as dead ends or no entry boards. Still, exploring them was fun and before we knew, it was time to head back.

On reaching back to the resort, the main activity was to streamline the luggages for the downhill trek. All unwanted weight had to be shed as 3600 stairs would make you pay for each gram of weight you decided to take along. My experience with the Chennai Trekking Club had helped me plan ahead and travel as light as I possibly could. There was nothing I could leave back so I just took the time to sit and enjoy the scenery. Once everyone was satisfied that they had gotten to their lightest backpacks, we set off. Destination – Tyrna village, the base point for the downhill trek. On reaching there, the group of 52 were split into 4 groups of 13 each with a guide assigned to each group to take us down. With a mixed feeling of excitement and horror in my heart and a silent prayer on my lips, I began the descent.

The steps that took us downhill were built as a part of the MNREGA scheme. Solid concrete steps, sometimes a bit narrow but still a solid foothold. Sometimes they looked a bit steep and people among us who had a fear of heights faced a bit of difficulty negotiating them. After a few hundred steps, the muscles in my legs started complaining. After a few hundred more, they started cursing me. Periodic sips of orange flavoured glucose – a throwback to the good old CTC trek days kept me going till our first real halt – The Long root bridge, the longest living root bridge in existence.

The first thing that strikes you when you see a living root bridge is how harmonious it is with nature. You cannot make out where the tree ends and the bridge begins. For those who are not aware of this wondrous creation, let me brief you. These bridges are made from the living roots of rubber trees. When the roots are still pliable, they are guided across a river/crevice using steel cables or betel tree trunks. When these roots strengthen and stabilize, it forms a bridge across the expanse. This process takes about 15-20 years before the bridge is usable. Once the bridge is operational, it will in principle, last for many hundred years as long as the trees they are made from remain healthy. No one actually knows when this practice began. The earliest known mention about a root bridge was in 1844.

We rested our sore legs for a few minutes at the long root bridge. But the sun was about to set and for safety purpose, we needed to reach out campsite before dark. We had to stoke the dying embers of our stamina and resume the trek again to the sleepy village of Nongriat – The home of the double decker root bridges. About an hour later, sweat dripping from each and every pore, able to count the muscles in my leg just by the way how they were paining, I heard the victorious whoops of people who had already reached their destination. Few moments later, it came into view – The Double Decker bridges. There are a few moments in life where words fail you and you just stare wide eyed and gape jawed at the awesomeness in front of you. This was one of them. Two living root bridges and a mini waterfall in the stream leading to them. To borrow the words of a fellow traveler- Nijaguna, “What a time to be alive...”.

I didn’t waste any time before taking a dip in the cool waters of the stream. You could literally feel all the pain and tiredness being washed away along with the sweat and grime accumulated on your body during the trek. For that moment, everything was at peace. Once the darkness started creeping in, we left the falls behind and made our way to the campsite. A mini village made of tents and a welcome sign that I will always remember “ ChaloHoppo village welcomes you”. Tents were assigned quickly. My tent mate was a fellow Malayali – Abhishek. 

Once the bags were deposited in the tent, we made our way towards the Bonfire which was being setup at one end of our camping site. The sky was clear and the stars were starting to make an appearance. This felt like the perfect night for some star trail photography. Let me get into my briefing mode again. Star Trail photography involves tracing the movement of the stars across the sky due to the rotation of the earth. Although we had tree cover on all our sides, above the tree cover, the sky was clear and the stars were in full attendance. Out came the tripod and my trusty Nikon. The arrangements were made, some of the other photographically inclined travelers joined me and soon we had a mini forest of tripods with cameras on them all pointing towards the stars. I had to content with taking 12 shots with 5 min shutter speed each as these long exposure shots suck the lifeblood of your camera battery like a thirsty vampire. 

While we photographers were tracing star movements and identifying constellations, another group went to war around the camp fire. A dance war between 2 kingdoms – Maurya and Shaurya. I don’t have much details about it because by the time I made my way to the campfire, one of kingdoms seem to have forfeited the gory battle pursuing the dinner bell and the others were in discussion about how to get their hands on the promised spoils of war. My stomach led me to the dinner table and once the call of hunger was sated, we were back around the campfire. Soon the rigors of the day came home to roost and it was time to call it a night. I slept as soon as my head hit the pillow – My first night in a tent – beneath the stars. Another trek awaited us on the next day – Towards the Rainbow falls and its unearthly beauty. 

Abode of the Clouds: Day 1 – KFC, Dumb charades and Sa-I-Mika

Day 0: http://findvenu.blogspot.in/2017/04/abode-of-clouds-day-0-background.html

For pics: follow me on instagram: @nimishaardham or check out my facebook page.

 Let’s fast forward a bit. Woke up at 4 AM, Freshened up, checked in, caught the flight, slept for a bit again, watched few episodes of Bleach, landed in Guwahati…Phew. Guwahati, the gateway to the North East has a small yet crowded airport where photography is a strict no-no. I was waiting to get my luggage when someone called me from behind. They were my fellow travelers from Bangalore. First round of introductions done, luggage collected and out we headed into the great state of Assam. Known for its tea and silk, our first stop was meeting point oft mentioned in the Backpackers Meghalaya whatsapp group – Anand Tiffins. It looked like the only place where we could grab a bit near the airport and they made sure we paid a pretty buck to take that bite. Looked like a tea stall, priced like a star hotel, we had to content ourselves with a coffee from there as there was hardly any place to sit.

We spent some time thinking about what to do next, as our bus was to arrive at 10 and the last person was expected to land at 12 noon, it left us around 3 hours to kill. Finally the general consensus was to start walking from the airport and see where it takes us. It took us around 200 m from the airport to a mini food court which loudly called out to us - “Vaango!” Vaango was a vegetarian South Indian restaurant and had a quintessentially American Non vegetarian restaurant to accompany it – Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC). When we entered the food court, we saw a pile of bags in one corner and a group of people sitting with bored faces. That clearly gave them away as being our fellow travelers. Another round of introductions went through and from whatever we got to hear, we were stuck in KFC for a pretty long haul. New faces kept joining us and we kept getting better acquainted. The group assembled in KFC was a pretty varied mix. Rather than the often seen, bored out of their skin IT guys going to North east to cool their heads, we had people from all walks of the life – Advocates, Architects, Doctors, Stylists, Technical Writers, Photography students, Chartered accountants and of course, IT professionals. Around 10:30 Am, we got to know that the girl who was supposed to land at 12 had missed her flight.  This got a mixed reception. We were sad for her but also relieved that we would finally get to see more of the North east apart from the Airport and the KFC joint. Then came the kick in the nuts – Couple more people were expected and they would land only at 12:30. This left us almost another 3 hours to negotiate. By the time the much expected flight nearly landed, people were sharing Instagram handles and making new BFFs. As someone in the group put it about the late comers, “The last time someone would have waited this anxiously for them might have been at the time of their birth”.

But, every wait has its end and the final couple finally made their way out of the airport and into the bus – and we were off. Out of the airport, into the warm, humid Guwahati. Soon we left Assam behind and made our way into the cooler greener state of Meghalaya. Along the way, I got to know how out of touch I was with today’s music scene. Everyone would be singing along to the song playing and I wouldn’t even have a clue as to whether the singer was male or female. After a quick stop for lunch, our first real halt was at the Umiam Lake. We were a bit late so we had to content ourselves with a long distance view of the lake. Once we left Umiam Lake, we had on the bus with us, Nishanth, one of the co-founders of ChaloHoppo – the co-organizers of this trip. He was a veritable treasure trove of snippets about the North East. His tales about the Headhunting tribes of Nagaland had me putting a visit to Nagaland in my bucket list. Soon a small group started playing 20 questions – with 20 being negotiable. This “20 questions” then turned into “ Heads Up” and then finally to good old Dumb charades. This had the whole bus joining in with the left side of the bus pitted against the right side in a battle for charades supremacy. The hardest part was getting people to count the words in a movie name correctly. Even though our team was lagging behind at one point, we came back and took a hard fought victory right as we entered into the Sai Mika resort.

Now, picture this. A sprawling compound dotted by cottages. A brisk chill in the air. A near full moon bathing the whole compound in milky light and sounds of guitars being played welcoming us to the Sa-I-Mika resort. Couldn’t have asked for a better welcome into Cherrapunjee. While we were waiting for the rooms to be assigned, we sat and listened to the local band playing – although I couldn’t recognize most of the songs, the passion with which they played and the ambience of the whole place made it a really memorable experience. After some confusion regarding the room allocation, which was quickly sorted out, we retired to our rooms to freshen up and get ready for dinner. My roommates were Nikhil – A fellow IT Guy from IBM, Gurjyot – Current E&Y, Ex-Nivea and still very brand loyal and Prathamesh – An Enginering student pursuing a diploma in Photography in parallel.

Dinner was served in the main hall and as earlier, the local band’s music accompanied it. Even though most of us were tired, no one wanted to go back to our rooms. The chill in the air, the bonfire and the music made for a heady combination and most of us sat around the fire, singing along till after midnight. Finally it was time to call it a night and the number in all our minds as we went to sleep was 3600 – the number of steps that we would need to climb down the next day.

Abode of the Clouds Day 0: Background

It all started when my oldest friend got a DSLR. Discussing photography with him and giving him tips on how to shoot got me thinking about my own dormant DSLR. It has been quite some time since it had gotten a good work out. It was time to start clicking again. With this in mind, I searched for active photowalk groups in Bangalore. I was already part of Bangalore Photowalk but it hadn’t been pretty active in the near past. My search made me come across another group Photowalk Bangalore and without hesitation; I joined their whatsapp group using the invite link. The group had pretty strict guidelines regarding what could be posted there. I was content with being a passive participant for now. Then one day, a group member posted about a 4 day trip to Meghalaya organized by Photographers of India. Poor guy got blasted by the group admin for posting links to events outside the photowalk Bangalore group. But that message sparked something in me.  Meghalaya – The abode of the clouds, the only thing I knew about that state is that it has the record for the highest rainfall ever recorded (courtesy: Standard VIII Geography text book). But somehow the name itself brought to mind a cool green paradise.

Next step was getting the necessary home office approvals. Getting the leaves would be comparatively easy but I felt that getting my better half to allow me a 5 day break from father and husband duties would take some doing.  That wasn’t the case to be. One evening, during some idle chit chat, I mentioned to her about this trip. The response was “You go ahead, if you want to go”. Although I couldn’t believe my ears at first, I took that was the green light and set about planning the logistics. The flights to and from Guwahati were the first on the list. Then the necessary formalities to be completed as instructed by the trip organizers, finally came the requisite shopping to be done for the essentials. It was time to dust off my trusty pair of Merrel shoes and get my photographers vest cleaned up.

Meanwhile Photographers of India (Instagram: @photographers.of.india) kept me updated via mails and the whatsapp group on what to expect from the trip. The description of the trip sent across excited me and at the same time scared my shoes off – Climb down 3600 steps? Really? Somehow I pushed it to the back of my mind and just focused on getting myself to Guwahati. This would be my first solo trip since my two week North Indian sojourn before my marriage.

My flight from Bangalore was at 5:55 AM on 13^th April. There came the first choice to be made. What time should I get to the airport? Should I stay at home, get up at 2:00 AM, get ready and proceed to the airport by 3:00 AM? Would I be able to get cabs at that time in the night? Would I get enough sleep? Would I wake up on time? Another option was to leave home by 10:30, Reach the airport by around midnight, catch around 4 hours of sleep there, wake up, get freshened up and proceed with the boarding formalities. The more I thought about it, more sense the latter option made to me. I didn’t want to think too much so finally decided to go with Option 2. 13^th night came; I was all packed and prepped up, saying my good byes. An Ola cab was waiting to take me to the airport. Being night time, it hardly took me 45 min to reach the sprawling Kempegowda International Airport, Bangalore. All that was left was to find a comfortable place to park myself and shut my eyes for a few hours before I could awake into the first day of a much awaited journey.

Does God Play Dice?

I am not an Atheist. Maybe an Agnostic but definitely not an Atheist. Now, before you jump down my throat, accusing me of spouting jargon right from the get go, let me explain what these terms mean. An Atheist is someone who denies the existence of God. An Agnostic is someone who believes it impossible to know anything about God or about the creation of the universe and refrains from commitment to any religious doctrine. Something that has been troubling me amongst the religious beliefs is the professed existence of an omnipotent, omnipresent deity. That raises a lot of questions. If the deity is indeed omnipresent and omnipotent, why are all the bad things happening in the world? This simple question is answered via a myriad of justifications all to prove how the deity is infallible and can do no wrong. But what this basically boils down to is that the victims deserved their fate. This is often buddied up with an explanation of how Karma works. He/she must have done something in their lives to deserve what they got. Unsurprisingly, these are the kind of people who on reading news of a rape often holds the victim responsible for their fate. Moreover when they cannot find enough bad Karma to justify the fate of the victim, the search for past sins transcends to the past lives too. A 2 year old baby gets raped and somehow the justification that comes up is that maybe the sins of the past life are being balanced out – because the deity they pray to can do no wrong.

Recently Kerala witnessed one of the largest tragedies it has ever seen – the fireworks mishap at the Puttingal temple in Kollam District. Number of lost lives were 115 at the last count. This fireworks display was conducted against the explicit orders from the district collector. Now, in the days following the tragedy, while the whole state is still trying to wrap their heads around the magnitude of what happened, social media is getting inundated with various kinds of messages

1.        Even after 115 people died and structural damage occurred to buildings within 1.5 km of the blast site, the temple itself was unharmed. Behold the power of the deity: Really? If you were to argue about the structural design of the temple and the architectural genius which enabled it to withstand the explosion of such a magnitude, that would hold more water. But when you argue that a deity which could not prevent the massive loss of life that happened right within the temple grounds was successful at self-preservation, are you arguing for or against the so called supreme power? If self-preservation is what the so called divine power values more than the lives of the people who come to pray, is it the right power to pray to? Referring back to what I wrote earlier, explanations will come up as to how each and every one of the 115 lost souls deserved what they got and the deity was absolutely right to let the tragedy happen.
2. .       Video has come out of how the “Thidambu” – the ceremonial symbol of the deity itself fell to the ground when it was being hoisted on top of an elephant. The theory that goes along is that this was a bad omen sent by god and since people ignored this, they were clearing the path for the tragedy that was about to happen. Hence my original question – Does god play dice? Imagine a scene on a pantheon far above the mortal plane where gods have gathered and are putting wagers on whether or not the mere mortals will understand that the Thidambu falling down means a bloodbath is coming if you don’t act fast. The mortals didn’t – and the bloodbath followed. The gods who bet against the mortals seem to have made a literal killing. So when there are a 1001 ways how god could have intervened to stop this disaster from happening, what god chooses to do is to give mortals a hint and sit back and watch the plot unfold – Sorry. I don’t believe in such gods.

Now, don’t get an impression that I don’t believe in gods at all. I do. I don’t believe in gods who live in temples and showers blessings based on how much you spend at the temples. I don’t believe in gods who being supposedly all powerful, prefers to sit back and watch babies getting raped and innocent people blown to smithereens due to the negligence of a few. I don’t believe there is someone up in the sky watching us all taking stock of whether we pray.

To quote Einstein, “I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the harmony of all that exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fate and the doings of mankind”. God is unexplainable. We see god in the inexplicableness of the world around us. Also, I believe in “Thathwamasi” – meaning “That is you”. God exists within each one of us. Like Santiago in the novel “The Alchemist”, who travelled the world to realize that the treasure he was searching for was always present right where he slept, we go searching for god in temples and churches but seldom look inside ourselves. When you are in touch with the essence of god that is within each of us, god exists in your actions. A friend of mine once gave an auto driver Rs. 5000 blindly believing his story of his wife being admitted in a hospital and him being short of money. At that instant, the auto driver may have seen god in my friend. It is that god who exists within all of us and urges us to be more than ourselves that I believe in. To see that god, one needs to open their eyes. For people who pretend to be blind by closing their eyes, the divine glow that comes from within, maybe lost forever.  

Excuse Me... I need to vent..

Disclaimer – The following is an attempt to vent out all my frustrations that have been built up due to the recent events in the country. It might not make complete sense and it sure as hell is not going to be pretty. Anyone with fragile sensitivities please stop reading here. Primal scream is a sort of psychotherapy and I am attempting a written version of the same. Here it goes..

1. Beef (be it cow, bull or buffalo): Hindus who eat beef – Good for you. Hindus who do not eat beef – Good for you too. I for one love my beef fry and before someone points it out, let me say, I also love my bacon cheeseburger. I do not support conducting beef festivals to specifically provoke the non- beef eaters. But I sure as hell will not entertain someone trying to impose their sensitivities on to my lunch plate. Wherever consumption of beef is banned by law, being an Indian, I will adhere to what the law of the land says. But where no ban exists, don’t you even dare come prodding into what I am eating in my own house or an establishment which offers me the choice of that delicacy. I will not look at your religion or the colour of your party flag before I kick you out. If your religious beliefs get hurt by me eating beef at my house – tough shit bro, learn to live with it.                                                                                       
2. Arvind Kejriwal – Talk about disillusionment. When the Aam Aadmi Party was in its inception stage, I loved what they stood for. I sincerely hoped that they would bring about a much needed change in the Indian political arena. When they came to power in Delhi with an overwhelming majority, I hoped that this was the sign of things to come and now we would see the power of a common man. Then they went about proving to one and all that even they are after all, just another f***ing corrupt political party. Turns out even being the CM, Mr. Kejriwal is still in the opposition. When he was not the CM, he blamed the then-Delhi CM for the rapes happening in Delhi. Now that he is the CM, he blames the PM for it. Really? I remember reading one of his campaign promises about a commando squad in Delhi with sole directive of ensuring protection for women. Any clue where I can find them?                                                  
3.       Media – There used to be a time when news channels actually telecast news. Now we are in the days of tabloid journalism. Biased, sensationalist and loud, we get opinions instead of news. In a mad scramble to break each news first, the TV channels are on the verge of another “Dewey defeats Trueman” fiasco. The quick fix recipe for sensationalist crap of the day seems to be – Take any issue, put a communal twist to it, bring in a panel of so called experts with their own biases, put an anchor who can cut sentences before they are completed and can shout louder than all these experts and let the show begin. When disasters and tragedies gets turned into hashtags, tears ought to be shed for the death of journalism.                                                          
4. Intolerance – A barber beaten up because he cut hair on Tuesdays, A man lynched on the suspicion of him eating beef, a 4 year old girl beaten to death because she forgot to cover her head while eating and so many more such instances cropping up each day. Really? What’s happening to people? Why does one feel the need to become violent in the name of their beliefs? Which god gives them the right to shed another man’s blood or extinguish another human life? If your beliefs and my beliefs don’t match, and I am strong enough to beat you up, does that make me right? The rising intolerance is like a ticking time bomb. You never know what will set it off. But when it does, we will no longer be able to use the word “secular” while describing our country.                                                                                                                     
5. Politics – The only job where you do not require any educational qualifications or even the basic civil qualifications. If all candidates with criminal cases against them are barred from politics, we would be left with an empty parliament. Bunch of corrupt greedy bastards sucking the marrow out of the country’s bones. When you can make a scam out of even the coffins for dead soldiers, there is no level that you will not stoop to. An honest politician is an oxymoron. I see no hope in the near future of any sort of improvement in the country’s political scenario. I really wish India had some sort of “separation between church and state” thing in place so that 2 biggest poisons known to men – Religion and Politics would not intermingle to create an even more deadly one. But if wishes were horses, beggars would fly. So all I can do is vent it out here.

 Aaaaaarrghhhh…. I’m done. For now.

Adventures in Parenting - Chapter 3: Of the Mother and her Moods..

This post is intended for male readers only. Female readers, feel free to stop reading here.

So boys, consider this a heads up for the time when your better half is expecting. Pregnancy is a minefield. All the hormones flooding her body turns your wife into an emotional wreck and her moods swing more times than a pendulum in a grandfather clock.

You would think that everything is going fine and then one innocuous comment and BOOM.. everything blows up in your face. Like I said, a minefield. But each husband has to navigate the minefield on his own. The positions and triggers of the mines might vary from wife to wife. What I am jotting down here are just templates based on which you may try to develop your navigation strategy.

1.       Cravings: This is an inseparable part of pregnancy. You can never predict what she would crave and at what time. Old Malayalam movies have led us to believe that a pregnant woman would crave raw mangoes or tamarind. Let me tell you at least in my case, that is basically bollocks. So don’t go stocking up on raw mangoes once you get a positive pregnancy test. You are more likely to be hit with a “Ben & Jerry’s Rocky Road Ice cream” craving at 12 in the night like Preity Zinta has in “Salaam Namaste”. There are basically 3 ways to deal with such demands.

a.       The Absentee Husband: Make it clear from the get go that she need not expect anything from you. Basically as if you were not there at all. I would not recommend this option at all as this would lead to escalation of emotional states which you want to avoid during the pregnancy. If you are opting for the absentee husband route, make sure you are actually an absentee husband, like if you are geographically separated during the duration of the pregnancy. Otherwise, try this at your own risk

b.      The Tautologist: In logic, tautology is a formula which is true in every possible interpretation. This approach would involve saying “Yes” to all her demands, however outlandish or inconvenient they may be. This will keep you in the good books of your wife and prevent any emotional outbursts (atleast on this count). But the risk in running this approach is the ever escalating expectation threshold. With each outlandish demand you meet, chances are that the next one is even more outlandish. So be aware and know what is set to come your way when you want to be the Tautologist.

c.       The Middle Pather: This is an approach that requires a certain finesse. Your married life prior to the pregnancy should serve as your guide while walking the middle path. In this approach, you basically say yes to her cravings as long as they are doable without much inconvenience. This way, you stock some ammunition for the time when an inconvenient demand comes through. For e.g, you might just be thinking of putting your feet up and relaxing for a bit after a hectic day and a heavy dinner when she might suddenly want to have some ghee laddoos. That’s when you tell her no and to the inevitable complaint that you never meet her demands, you list down all the times you have said yes. Handled correctly, it will keep emotions from acting out and you would have expertly diffused a dangerous landmine.

2.       Temper Tantrums: With the hormone world cup going on in her body, she is bound to lose her temper at times. What you need to do is to ride it out without you losing your own. I admit I have been unsuccessful at it during the initial stages but after a couple of shout-a-thons, I learned how to control myself. The key is not not to lose your temper but not to lose it in front of her. Two lost tempers would resonate like sound waves and produce a whole that is more than sum of its parts. Listen to her with a smile on your face, offer some words of consolation, go to the other room, punch a hole in the wall and return to her with the same smile on your face. Your fists might hurt but believe me, that is a far better option than engaging in a shouting match. You not only aggravate the mother but it also affects the child in the womb.

3.       Sting in the tail: Finally the baby arrives and you breathe a sigh of relief. But beware of the nasty sting in the tail called antenatal depression. With the baby out of her body and the hormones still going hammer and tongs, some bouts of depression are bound to happen. Whether it be regarding her self-image, ability to take care of the baby or just control of day to day happenings, anything might throw her off. Your role to play at that time is of a cheerleader, agony aunt and a best friend. Reassure her that there is nothing wrong with her and the changes happening in her body are just temporary. Reiterate that nothing that is happening will ever change the way you feel towards her. Support her at times when she feels helpless and cheer her up when she is at the verge of tears.

The pregnancy is a roller coaster ride for the woman involved. Some part of the unpredictability, anxiety and frustration gets passed on to the husband too. How smooth the 9 months or so are depends on how you are equipped to handle the unexpected. With the above mentioned tips, I hope you are better off than starting from scratch. Whichever way you handle it, just make sure to be there for your better half come what may, because what you see in front of you is just the start of a journey that will change your life forever.

Adventures in Parenting - Chapter 2: Google-itis

Since Larry Page and Sergey Brin rolled out Google in 1998, the unknowns in the world have shrunk drastically. “Google”, which started as a noun has since then been promoted to a verb and the whole host of techies have taken to the verb in a way that a baby duck takes to swimming.

Google has become the omnipotent – provider of all. Whether it is pirated mp3s of the latest Bollywood flick, DVDrip of the latest Hollywood blockbuster or definitions of complex medical terms like bilateral renal pelvic displacia, google knows just where to find them.

What this has accomplished is that everyone with an access to an internet connection and working knowledge of any browser has turned into a self-taught doctor. Rather than what the actual doctor says, people have now started believing the links that Google dishes out.

The one ritual after we got each of the scan report was to come home and religiously google each of the terms in the report. Who cares that the Doctor told everything was normal? We wanted to have Google’s opinion of the same. First couple of times, this exercise went off without any red flags getting raised. Then came the anomaly scan report.

In the anomaly scan report; there was a mention of mild bilateral renal pelvic displacia. During the scan, the Doc performing the scan had certified that everything looks good and there are no issues. But later, while taking a second opinion from Dr.Google, we found that the meaning of mild bilateral renal pelvic displacia is that the baby’s kidneys are larger than they should be. Cue Panic. On further consultation with other webpages referred to by Dr.Google, we came to know that the kidneys should be only around 4.5 mm while in our case it was 4.7 mm. one fifth of a millimeter was proving to be the cause of concern.

There comes another question. Who decides what is normal? In an age where we didn’t have machines which could measure a yet to be born baby’s kidney up to one tenth of a millimeter, didn’t people have babies? What if the baby has larger than average kidneys? The term average itself denotes that there has to be values more than the said number. Otherwise, this wouldn’t be the average. So who says a 4.7 mm kidney is abnormal while a 4.5 mm one is not? It seems to be with more knowledge man gains, instead of getting more answers; he is faced with more questions.

Anyways, this mild state of panic continued till the next scan, where it was certified that the kidneys are now of regulation length and are well within the “normal” range.

Fast forward 3-4 months. My wife spent her maternity leave at home, in Kerala, waiting for the young one to arrive. In Kerala, we had opted to consult Dr. Prameela Philip at Poyanil Hospital, Kozhencherry. During the first scan conducted there, my wife, with all the knowledge gained from Google, asked the doctor about the amniotic fluid level. With what could have been an amused smile, the doctor replied “ Aavashyathinu undu” meaning there is enough. The succinctly worded message within her response that I could decipher was, “Leave the medical worries to us doctors. You just do what we tell you to do”.

In the world where all kinds of information are available at a mere touch of your finger, if only that were possible.

Adventures in Parenting - Chapter 1: 2 Little lines.

2 Little lines. A “C” under one and a “T” under the other. That’s how it began. Initial jubilation turned into hesitation. What if it was a false positive? Another couple of rounds of “pee on the stick” put that doubt to rest. Yep. Definitely pregnant. First major decision. Which doctor do we consult? Most of the well-known gynecs in Bangalore have waiting times stretching above 2 hrs. And that is when you already have a confirmed appointment. Good luck trying to get through via a walk-in. Better bring your lunch with you.

One argument was that if everything went normal, we do not need an expert Gynecologist to see it through. My policy was, as the saying goes, “Better to have and want not rather than want and have not”. Thus we decided to go with the best in the business, Dr. Praveena Shenoi at Cloud 9, Old Airport Road. After a couple of walk in wait-a-thons, with my wife constantly reminding me that if we had gone with some other doctor, we could have reached back home by then, we succeeded in getting a confirmed appointment for the third visit. The trick was to book the next appointment as soon as you came out of your current consultation.

An array of tests and an ultra-sound scan later - nothing to report, which is actually good news when it comes to pregnancy.

Still, for the first 3 months, each bump in the road, each pothole that the car ran into, was a source of a minor heart attack. Every twinge of pain in the stomach/abdomen area raised the heartbeats. It is said that around 85% of miscarriages happen within the first trimester. And when you have already had one, the worry gets multiplied manifold the second time.

It doesn’t mean that once you cross three months, all worries are lifted and everything is hunky-dory. The cycle I found during this time is, Tension before the scanà No issues in the scan report à Jubilation and reliefà Tension before the next scan.

So basically, you are worried about a scan basically all the time, and you have an array of scans to go through too, Ultra Sound, NT, Anomaly, Interval Growth and so on. All you can do is keep calm and cross all your fingers and toes that nothing abnormal comes up in the scan reports. But even with all that, the worrying becomes an integral part of your wait for the baby. Or maybe life is just preparing you for the lifetime of worrying that lies ahead.

Adventures in Parenting - Chapter 0: Prelude

What does it mean to be a parent? How does it feel to have the responsibility of shaping a human life and by extension a part of society thrust upon someone’s shoulders? How many times should I think before I take a decision that concerns my child? All are questions that will need answers very soon.  While embarking on this exciting journey of parenthood, I plan to leave behind a journal cataloguing my adventures or misadventures in parenting.  This will be a father’s perspective into the exciting, scary new world that he steps into with the conception of his child. You might find these entries a bit male centric because that is the viewpoint from which the story is told. Stay tuned for the first entry in the next few days...

Back to Life..

3 Years.. It's been three long years since I have written something in this blog. The reasons for this extended period of absence were multiple - Lack of time, other commitments, writer's block.. let's not get into all that.

Since I have left this part of the blogosphere, world has changed quite a bit and so has my life. When the last entry was made, I was still working in Chennai, still an HCLite. Since then, I have relocated to the Garden City of Bangalore and after a short stint with the "High Performance. Delivered" guys, I am currently "Applying Thought". 

From being a newly married guy when the last entry was made, I am now post the 3rd marriage anniversary getting know the ups and downs of married life.

This is my first blog entry in the world where Sachin Tendulkar no longer plays cricket.

My world is set to change further. That particular change provides me fodder for a series of blog entries that I would be making in the coming days. Hopefully, I would be able to find some time to keep this going. With that optimistic thought, let me sign off for now.. But watch this space.. Lots more to come here.

There will never be another tonight..

"Wave your little wand, weave a little spell
Make some magic, Raise some Hell"

That is exactly what Bryan Adams did one day before Valentines at Bengaluru. With the crowd begging for more, he belted out one amazing song after another and by the time the show came to a close, we were begging for more. That is the magic of a live concert.

The first time I attended a live concert, I was a student of MBA Batch of 2006 in IIT Kanpur. The Band was Indian Ocean. Had never heard about them but evidently, they were quite popular among the IITK Junta. The true magic of a live performance lies in 2 factors. First, how the performer handles the crowd and second, how much passionate the crowd is. Some might argue that both are related. That is, the passion of the crowd depends on the performer’s handling of them.

Among the Indian Bands that I have seen Palash Sen and his Euphoria are the masters at crowd handling. Within the first few songs, they usually have the crowd eating out of their hands. My first exposure to Euphoria was during Manfest 2004 at IIM Lucknow. They played for around 3 hours nonstop. The crowd was going bonkers with each song. It was clear that all of them knew all the songs by heart. Being one among hundreds of voices singing along with the band is a really euphoric experience. Another thing that I feel is unique to Euphoria is that they are not fussy about what they sing. They perform their own compositions, old rock classics and even some hindi film numbers. Most of the well recognized bands stick to their own compositions during live shows.

On the other extreme of the crowd handling capability, I would place Atif Aslam. I love most of his songs. But he is so much better when he is singing out of my ipod rather than singing in front of me. His improvisations and crowd handling leave a lot to be desired. While we are on the topic of improvisations during a live performance, 2 guys who deserve a mention but not really for good reasons – Hariharan and Sukhwinder singh. Both awesome singers with lots of chartbusters to their names. But some of their improvisations during liver performances leave even the accompanying orchestra in the lurch. That feeling is best described as “Kabab mein Haddi”.

Coming to the non asian performers. I have had the opportunity to listen to only 2 of them. One I had never heard about and the other was Bryan Adams. The band in the former case was “Poets of the Fall”. They are a finnish band and had performed at IITK as part of the cultural fest, Antaragni. I had attended the concert to get a feel of what a Rock Concert feels like. I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I say they just blew my mind. I have been a POTF fan ever since. The performance, guitar and drum solos, crowd interaction – just awesome. So it was with high expectations that I went to Bengaluru for the Bryan Adams concert. About a month before the concert, when I didn’t even know Bryan Adams was coming to Bengaluru, I had gone on another live concert – that of Yuvan Shankar Raja. It was just a disappointment. The reasons are several – Dead crowd, zero crowd interaction by the performers and most of the songs performed were unheard ones. I remarked to a friend of mine who had accompanied me that the magic of live concert really comes out in Rock concerts. He replied that if Bryan Adams comes to India, we must really take the chance to attend it. Lo and behold, a month later, both of us were at Palace Grounds Bangalore waiting for Bryan to take the stage. Dressed in a Black shirt and Blue jeans, the Canadian star kicked off the night with “There will never be another tonight”. We could just stand and marvel at the silken voice even at the age of 51. Chartbusters flowed one after another. “Here I am”, “Please forgive me”, “18 till I die”, “Everything I do” and if palace grounds were an indoor stadium the roof would have been blown off when the oh so familiar guitar chords struck announcing the arrival of “The Summer of 69”. All in all, Bryan really made it “A Night to Remember”. The secret of an impactful live concert is to stop when the Audience asks “Why” rather than “Why not?” Bryan could have gone on for the whole night without the audience even thinking of dispersing. Such was the Charisma of the man and the power of his music. I for one am now a self confessed addict to live concerts. On this count I am really happy that I am moving from Chennai to Bangalore where the concert scene is much more active. Let’s hope there will be more such one night love affairs with rocking music and mind blowing performances.

Two week Vagabond: Leg 1: Chennai-Delhi-Jodhpur

Well friends, I had promised you all the story of my trip to North India. I know it was promised a couple of months back. But better late than never. So here goes.
I had planned a 2 week adventure of travelling alone through North India. Covering the deserts of Rajasthan to the snow capped peaks of Kashmir. But as it almost always happens to me, the adventure began a day early.

Friday, March 26th 2010 Morning:
I had packed my bag with the stuff I needed to take on the trip. All the packing was done and I just wanted to check how the weight of the bag would feel like on my back. I raised the bag on to my back and I heard something snap. Lack of physical pain told me that it wasn’t my spine. The shift of the whole weight to my left shoulder in the next instant explained the situation further. The right strap of my backpack had chosen the perfect time to bid goodbye to the buckle that was holding it steady. It was already 10:00 AM and I didn’t have time to take the bag out for repair. I was left with 2 choices; either travel through North India on one strap or go out and get a new bag. Since the weight of the bag was not inconsiderable, I decided on the latter. So around 10:30 in the morning, I found myself near Anna Nagar Round Thana, searching for a suitable backpack. It was almost 11 by the time I reached back home with the new backpack. I had to go through the whole process of unpacking what I had already packed and the re-packing what I had just unpacked. I reached office around 12:00 Noon.

Friday, March 26th 2010 Evening:
I reached the airport by 4:30 PM. So I wouldn’t really want to comment on why I actually went to office that day. I was travelling on Kingfisher airlines and that is always easy on the eye, if you know what I mean. Landing in Delhi around 7:30 PM, I had to face the weirdest pre paid taxi system that I have ever come across. While taking the receipt for the payment at the counter, the guy in the counter wrote a number on the back of the receipt. On enquiry he told me that it was the spot number from where I would get the taxi. On getting out of the airport, there were different parking spots with serial numbers. Mine was number 12. I reached number 12 and found the spot vacant. There were empty taxies sitting idle in many other numbers but they wouldn’t budge their car to number 12 where a passenger was waiting. I had to wait a good 7-10 minutes before a driver lazily drove into the number 12 parking spot. As I had a good 3 hours to go before I caught my train, I wasn’t really bothered.
There was about a 2.5 hrs wait before the train came. The right time of arrival at Jodhpur was 9 AM. After months of planning and charting out, finally there I was, putting the plans into action.

Next: Two week Vagabond: Leg 2: Jodhpur - Jaisalmer

Back into the rut.

Hello my good friends. After 2 weeks of incessant roaming around, I am back into the daily rut. From the sand dunes of Jaisalmer to the snow covered peaks of Gulmarg, the last 2 weeks took me across a variety of places and met a variety of people. My main aim while leaving on this trip was to take as many photos as I can of all the wonderful places before me. Well that has been fulfilled. I am left with over 1000 Raw exposures to post process. Dozens of Panoramas to stitch, hundreds of exposures to be corrected and lots of shots to be fine tuned. Post processing can be a real b***h. You will have to wait a few more days before the photos start appearing on my Orkut/Blog pages. I will tell you all about my journey and the related stories right here. So watch this space.

Of God Men and their ilk..

Disclaimer: This write up is not intended to hurt anyone's religious sentiments. This is just me venting on these so called God Men. If anyone finds this offensive, they have every right to navigate away from this page coz I ain't gonna change my stance.


The so called godman Swami Nityananda Paramahamsa becomes the latest in the line of exposed Godmen. For those who have been living in a hole for the past 2-3 weeks, the news update is that Swami Nityananda was caught on video with a Tamil Actress,in a compromising situation. Agreed what someone does in the privacy of their bedroom shouldn't be anyone's business but their own. But for someone who preaches to anyone who cares to listen that he is a practicing Brahmachari, to be caught in such a situation is no less than suicide.

For the less knowledgable, the meaning of Brahmachari is as below:

"A Brahmachari therefore is a male (and brahmacharini a female) who observes sexual abstinence unless intentionally procreating."


The first time I heard the usage of the word "Godman" was in reference to Chandraswami. You might remember him as the "Spiritual Advisor" of the then PM, Narasimha Rao. In 1996, he was arrested on charges of swindling. He is still facing trial in 9 Foreign Exchange Regulation Act violation cases. So much for being a man of God.

From the time I started to form my own opinions about the world around me, I have had a revulsion for these men/women who gets worshipped as god. May it be Satya Saibaba, Harsha Mata or Mata Amritanandamayi. Hinduism as it is takes pride in having the maximum number of gods as compared to any other religion. According to the Puranas, there are 33 Crore gods. And as if they are still not enough, people create gods out of men/women and start worshiping them. I have no problems with the so called messengers of gods. Take for instance Kabir, Surdas, Tulasidas or even Mirabai. All of them supposedly have had experiences where God interacted with them or they have gained enlightenment. It is when the messengers start posing as the real thing that I have to disagree with them. As it is said,

"Believe Me....Not in Me....The Messenger is seldom worth it".

Religion, as they say, is the opiate of masses. Any small time crook, two bit hustler who can do a couple of conjuring tricks can put on a saffron robe and be Sri Sri Sri Swami Blah Blah Blah. With a majority of the population looking for short cut to salvation, within no time you would have your own following. Take for instance Sree Santhosh Madhava Vidyadhiraja Parama Bhattaraka Swamikal. This slimy son of a bitch got sentenced 16 years of Jail in May 20,2009 and can you guess what was his crime? Molesting 2 underage girls and making videos of the same. So forgive me if I don't trust these god men as far as I can throw them.

People like Satya Saibaba are said to perform Miracles in front of huge crowds. Creating ornaments, food etc from nothingness. Turning water into another drink and Gasoline (source:wikipedia). He performs all these in front of thousands but has not agreed even once to do it in a controlled environment. If he is indeed the real thing, what's he afraid of? Hey here's an idea....Make him the Petroleum Minister of India. Water is something we have no shortage of and once he turns enough water into Gasoline, no more dependency on these pesky OPEC countries for Oil. And if he can conjure up enough food to feed the hungry/starved population in India, then I'll call him God. Till then he is just another 2 bit parlour trick magician.

I sincerely don't understand the logic behind people worshiping these so called human gods. Is it because they have lost trust in the real thing? Do they think God will hear their prayers before others if they have some Swami So and So's recommendation? What does it say about the faith of the general public who would sooner trust any 2 bit crook wearing saffron robes than trust their own faith in god? One another thing you would notice about all this God people is that none of them lives a life of Sanyasa.

Sanyasa is a phase of life where the person attains "Vairagya" i.e.a state of dispassion and detachment from material life and spends the rest of his life in spiritual contemplation. But with all the plush Ashramas and A/C cars, don't you see a conflict?

These are people who make religion a business. They peddle faith to the common public for whom it is just another way of getting high. They are actually no different from the drug peddlers who are taken to task for selling charas/ganja/heroine to junkies looking for a temporary high. But you can't be caught for dealing in faith. That is what makes this field so attractive. Starting from the road side astrologers waiting to predict your future, who invariably needs an extra dakshina to tell you the solution to some impending problem to the Tantriks performing yagnas/havans for showering you with good luck to the Godmen and Godwomen of our country, all of them are making money dealing in matters of faith.

So what does it tell about your faith when you stop trusting your connection to god and start paying someone to intermediate?

The Record is where it belongs...

Finally...all is right with the world..Sachin Tendulkar, the best batsman in the world now holds the record for the highest individual score in an ODI and becomes the first batsman in the world to score a double hundred in an ODI.This was something he threatened to do in the Innings of 186 n.o. and 163 against New Zealand and 175 against Australia. Fate conspired in different ways to keep him from reaching the milestone. If the first time, he ran out of overs, second time he was hampered by injury and was unlucky to receive an awkward bounce during his knock of 175. But against South Africa at Gwalior nothing could stop him. From the first ball he faced, it was as if he was playing in a different zone altogether. This was a day that destiny had chosen to put the rightful heir on the throne. Right from the time he started playing, there was a belief in the people who watched him that if someone were to score 200 in an ODI ever, that would be Sachin Tendulkar. But as the wheel of time rolled by, that belief slowly started to die in many hearts. They thought at almost 37 years old, it was beyond him now.

Personally, I wanted Sachin to get a 100 yesterday and I am not ashamed to say that I didn't care if India won or lost as long as that happened. The way he started and got to the half century in a flash, I started getting a bit nervous. In my mind were many of his innings in 2008-09 where he fell in the nineties. There was no way to watch the match as I was in office. Cricinfo and AIR commentary on my iPod was the only avenue to keep abreast of the happenings. When he reached his century I started breathing easier. I was expecting him to cut loose after that and lose his wicket in the bid to accelerate the scoring. But as the scores started climbing, I was slowly realising that we were witnessing something special. Next milestone, 150 runs, came and went. With that he became the batsman with maximum 150+ scores. With each ball I feared the worst. A mis hit to long on, cramps, a run out while trying to pinch a double. Then exactly that happened. While going for a double, the stumps were broken and the decision was referred to the third umpire. I could not see the replays first hand and had to wait about a minute to know the verdict from the commentators on all India Radio. Might have been the longest one minute of my life. My palms were all sweaty and I didnt have enough nails to chew on. But even before the commentators confirmed it, the roar I heard in the background from the stadium told me it was not out. Then the belief set in...this was going to be Sachin's day. On this day in 1988 he entered the record books for the first time along with Vinod Kambli for the partnership of 664. After 22 years, he was meant to make history all over again. He crossed his personal best and entered the 190s. A small matter of the highest individual score was passed on the way but sights were set on the big one. Then something happened. Dhoni came in and started hogging the strike. Even though he was murdering the bowling and scoring heavily, never have I wished more that he mishit one and keep a boundary to a single. There were 2 overs left and Sachin was on 199. 49th over from Dale Steyn was played out by Dhoni and more irritatingly, he took a single off the last ball. I would have cursed him out loud if it were'nt for the fact that I was in the Office. I couldnt imagine Sachin being left stranded on 199 n.o. But then finally Dhoni took a single and Sachin wasted no time sealing the deal. First double hundred in an ODI by a batsman. Okay....not really a first double hundred in an ODI. Belinda Clark from Australia scored 229 against Denmark. But who cares about Women's Cricket?

Batting through 50 overs in the swealtering heat and then taking the field in the first ball of the South African Innings, add that full length dive in the first ODI to save a boundary and thus save the game, Sachin Tendulkar is single handedly proving that age is just a number. There might have been comparisons earlier...with Lara, Ponting, Richards, Bradman. All that stops now. Being Sachin Tendulkar means the following

1. Lose the chance to live a normal life
2. Bear the expectations of 1 Billion people every time you walk out to bat and they expect nothing less than a century from you....every time
3. Singlehandedly reclaim people's faith in the game after its darkest hour of match fixing. (The bookies would accept bets on Indian matches only after Sachin got out)
4. Put a smile on the face of the nation after the grievious terrorist attack in Mumabi (by leading the run chase with a century in the 4th innings against England.)
5. Remain untouched by any scandal whatsoever to such an extent that he was compared to Mahatma Gandhi.
6. Maintain the boyish enthusiasm and the love for the game after all these years (Even Lara took a break from Cricket to re focus)

When someone does all these for a span of 20 years and performs as Sachin has done, Then and Then only will one be eligible to be compared to Sachin Tendulkar. Throughout the time Sachin has played cricket, he has been the embodiment of what Aamir Khan preaches in his movie 3 Idiots.

"Success ke peeche mat bhaago...Excellence ke peeche bhaago, Success chak maarke tumhaare peeche aayegi"

The Joy of Travelling

There are two kinds of people in this world. One who like to grow roots and stay put in one place. They are happy with where they are and they like the comfort of familiarity. In free time they would rather enjoy some quiet time at home rather than venture out. The second kind are the ones bitten by Wanderlust. Their aim in life is to see everything. Given a couple of free days, they would pack their bags and head to explore the world. I have been finding out more and more each day that I belong to the second category.

The joy of travelling is a heady one. Earlier, during my student life, travel was kind of a necessary evil. I would have avoided it if I could but sadly I couldn't. I have had some horror stories of travel from those days. Once during my engineering days, I had to travel a 6 hour journey home literally standing on one leg, as I didnt have enough room to put my other leg down and I was getting poked in the back by a huge carton all the time. I didnt have enough space to move to a more comfortable position. Think a can of sardines and you will have a rough idea of what it was like. Another time, I travelled from Kanpur to Delhi sitting on the train doorway and one fine gentleman kept spitting his pan out of the window. No amount of reasoning could get him to stop doing that. While these experiences were tough to swallow at the time of happening, later I realised that whatever happens on a journey, they nevertheless make excellent stories. Like someone has said, "Adventure is discomfort recollected in comfort".

The first major travel I undertook voluntarily was after my summer internships during my MBA life. I had around a week left before the next semester was due to begin and I decided to spend that travelling. The sole purpose of this travel was to meet my geographically spread friends. First from Cochin to Chennai. Land in Chennai early morning, start from Chennai late night. From Chennai to Bangalore. Couple of days in Bangalore catching up with old friends. From Bangalore to Pune. Spending some time with my brother at AFMC. Then from Pune to Mumbai and Mumbai to Kanpur.

Once I got employed and became able to bear the cost of my own travels, I have taken all the opportunities that came my way to see the world. I have a group of friends equally bitten with the wanderlust. We plan and conduct tours at regular intervals. St.Mary's Island Mangalore, Bekal Fort, Tada Falls, Pulicat Lake, Nelliyampathy, Ottapalam, Wayanad, the list goes on. When I cannot find any company and I have some spare time, I travel alone. I once travelled 19 hours (up and down) to spend about 5 hours at a village that used to be a Dutch Outpost called Tharangambadi. Check out the archives of this blog for details on that trip. I also joined Chennai Trekking Club to avail of opportunities to explore the world around me. With CTC, I have been to Nagala, Talakona, Yelagiri, Kalrayan Hills and most recently Ooty.

Till now my travels have been limited to 2-3 days at a maximum. Now I am planning to take it to the next level. I am all set for a 2 week trip of Rajasthan and Jammu & Kashmir. If everything goes right, I will be flying out of Chennai on March 26th and will be back on April 12th. In this time I would be covering Jodhpur, Jaisalmer, Jaipur, Amritsar, Jammu, Srinagar and Delhi. Tickets are booked, Accomodation arranged and leaves have been approved. Another month to go before I set off on this trip. The current plan is to make a travelogue out of this trip. If my laziness does not hold me back from writing it down, you can bet you will read all about it right here. So till then I leave you with the famous lines from Robert Frost

"And Miles to before I sleep, and Miles to before I sleep"

So I love Comics. What's so bad?

I am an ardent fan of comics. This includes titles from DC and Marvel Comics. Superman, Batman, Flash, Green Lantern, Captain America, Hulk, X-Men and so on. I have a huge collection of the soft copies (at last count I had around 140GB worth of it) of these comics. The problem is that whenever I tell someone that I like such type of comics and start talking about my collection, they look at me as if a third eye just opened up on my forehead. And then comes the oh-he's-still-just-a-kid smile. Really,what's so bad about liking comics?

Most people think that these are meant for kids. I respectfully disagree. Actually with some of the storylines in these days' comics, you would want to keep them out of children's hands. For e.g, In Identity Crisis, Dr.Light rapes Sue Dibny when she finds her along on the Justice League Sattelite. Comics are meant for children? Yeah..Right.

My attraction towards comics has different dimensions. Firstly, it is about what the character portrays. Superman is not just faster than a speeding bullet and more powerful than a locomotive. Superman is a character with such depth that we seldom think that much. I'll give you a taste. Those who read comics or atleast know about Superheroes know that all the Superheroes have a secret identity. Batman is actually Bruce Wayne, Spiderman is actually Peter Parker and so forth. They put on their costumes to become the superhero. In the case of Superman, he came to earth from a doomed planet Krypton. Earth's yellow sun gave him superpowers. He is actually Superman. He puts on a costume to become is alter ego Clark Kent. Clark is a mild mannered reporter. So, Clark Kent is how Superman sees the human race. Clutsy, Stumbling and a bit dumb. That's just one part. There is much more to the Superman mythos if you think about it.

Similarily Batman- the only superhero with no super powers, Spiderman - With great power comes great responsibility, Green Lantern - The power of emotions - Will, Hope, Fear, Love, Rage, Avarice and Compassion, X-Men : Another take on Racism. All these characters have such depth that you cannot help marvel at the brains that thought them up.

Secondly, Comics to me is an escape from the daily dreary routine life. For a few minutes I get transported to a world where arch rivals Hal Jordan and Sinestro are teaming up to fight Nekron who is bringing the dead back to life as his slaves. For those few minutes, I forget all my worries and fly with them. This serves as a stress buster for me. A safety valve for all the pent up tension of the day.

Thirdly, I admit, it fills the child in me with wide eyed wonder. The wander lust in me is sated to some extent by seeing new worlds ,albeit fictional and in a digital media and leaves me in awe of the great comic writers like Grant Morisson and Alan Moore. They created worlds out of nothing. The sheer creativity and attention to detail boggles the mind.

So I like Comics. Before you criticise, try it out yourself. I have some great graphic novels in mind for you. If you ever want to know about the magic of a great comic, you know where to find me.

Photography and Me

It's been about 2 years since I have taken up Photography as a serious hobby. Unlike most of my hobbies, where after some time I lose interest and move on to something else, Photography has kept me engrossed in it. Maybe it's because there is so much to learn in this field. Every day you come across some new technique or a different perspective of an oft seen subject. The wonders of photography never ceases to amaze. I still remember the first camera I held. It was a Konica. My mother was the one who first instructed me on how to take a photo. It went something like "Look into this hole. You will see 2 square brackets. That should be in the centre of the photo and then click this button". I just loved the noises the camera produced. First the click of the shutter, then the motor whirring to turn the film to the next unexposed frame. As we were kids, me and my brother were not usually allowed to take pictures using this camera. It was a real treat when on a trip my parents would give me the camera and say "Take a picture.". Before I grew up enough to handle this camera, it stopped working. If I remember right, it had some problem with the shutter. Noone at our home cared about Photography enough to go through the pains of getting this repaired.

My second camera came as a gift to me from a family friend. I was asked what I wanted when I passed my 10th with Distinction. I don't know what prompted me, but I told him I wanted a camera. He gifted me with a Fuji compact. Unlike the more expensive Konica, this was almost fully manual. One had to load the film manually( meaning hook the end of the film to the chamber and rotate it till the first frame was loaded. After each shot, the frames had to be moved manually. But still, I didn't mind. The only thing that stopped me from going around and taking pics was the prohibitive cost of developing the film and taking prints. Developing and printing a full roll cost around Rs.300. So this camera came out only on special occassions like School Excursions or camps. Once I had gone on a camp conducted by Rotary Club Alwaye. As usual, I carried my camera along with me and took around 35 pics (1 roll of film). Then it happened that one the way back, my camera fell down and the back flap opened. The film got exposed to sunlight and all the pics were lost. There was nothing I could do. The camera itself didn't suffer any damage. This camera lasted till my engineering days. But as time went by, it was relegated to one corner of the cupboard as Rs.300 for an engineering student was not a small amount.

My third camera, which was my first Digital Camera was also a Fuji. Fuji Finepix a 210 if my memory serves me right. I had written CAT and was in the process of attending the interviews. I had to travel all over India for these interviews and I convinced my dad to buy me a digital camera. Digital Cameras were just coming into the market at that time. It was a 2 Megapixels, 3X Optical zoom camera. This served me well throughout my MBA. Photos that appeared in the IITK MBA placement CD and IITK MBA placement brochure of 2006 were captured using my camera. Till then, photography to me was more of documentation than an art. I'll tell you the difference. Suppose you go to see a waterfall. You and your friends pose in front of the waterfall and get a pic clicked. This proves that you were there at the waterfall. This is a piece of documentation. These are the kind of photos that you usually see in Newspapers. Suppose you take few pics of the same waterfall. Noone is posing in front of the waterfall. You increase the shutter speed of your camera to give a smooth effect to the flowing water. This is photography as an art. I was under the impression that photography as an art is the domain of experienced photographers only. The ones with big cameras, long lenses and an external flash. As I have written before, this was around the time I came across a photoblog maintained by one of my friends. On enquiring with her, I came to know that her camera was just another point and shoot. This brought about a paradigm shift in my view on photography. That was when I decided to try my hand at taking some pics. But I needed a better camera.

My fourth camera, which is my current camera is an Olympus SP 501 UZ. 7.1 Megapixels, 10X Optical zoom. This is the first camera that I have bought using my own hard earned money. Buying this camera was the beginning of my current phase of being a Photography enthusiast. After I bought this camera, I started reading up on photography, starting right from the basics. What is aperture, what is shutter speed, what is depth of field in a picture, so on and so forth. The more I read, the more I saw, the more enthralled I got. I have been working with this camera for the past 2 years. Now I have started getting a feeling that the limiting factor in my pursuit of excellence in the field of photography is my camera. I believe it's time to change this and step into the field where big boys play by buying a DSLR.

One major change that pursuing photography brings in you is that you start to notice the beauty in the smallest of things. Where earlier you never gave a thought to the waterdroplets on your window pane, now you start to think whether it would make a good subject for a Macro Photograph. Where earlier, you didn't even notice when a butterfly fluttered past you, now you observe what species it is and whether it would sit still enough to take a picture. That is the beauty of being a photographer.

Moral Policing

"God created man in his own image. In God's image he created him; male and female he created them." Genesis verse 26

"God blessed them. God said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." Genesis verse 27

This is how Bible says god made man. At the beginning god didn't put forth much laws of do and don't. Then came the Ten commandments. Ten "Thy Shall nots" which man was supposed to live by. Then once the civilization set in, more laws came. The gray areas were fast being separated into black or white. In the modern society, there is a system of laws in the country which needs to be followed by the citizens. How applicable those laws are and to whom is an entirely different discussion which I do not wish to delve into at this time.

So In India, we have a set of written laws and we have a police department who sees to it that the laws are enforced and any breaking of the laws are appropriately handled. Till then it was alright. In these recent times, there has been a peculiar kind of homo sapiens who deem themselves the protectors of moral laws. They are self appointed and they work on an unwritten code which basically says anything they don't like is immoral. It can be the violence against people celebrating Valentine's Day or the attack against girls in a pub or in the most recent event, slapping an MLA who was taking his oath in Hindi.

These are a set of people who are hell bent on telling us how to live our lives. For them celebrating Valentines Day is westernization. Wearing western clothes is against Indian culture. What Indian Culture are we talking about here? India is the land of Kamasutra and Khajuraho. In the land which taught the world secrets of sex, talking openly about sex is against its culture. While it's ok to depict various sex positions in a temple, an actress wearing a short skirt is against the moral code. Do you see a disconnect here?

From the moral to the regional. The self appointed defender of Marathi Rights Mr.Raj Thackerey and his company of goons who calls themselves the MNS stopped a politician from taking his oath in Hindi in the Maharasthra assembly. Who the politician was and what his background is is not relevant to the discussion here. The constitution clearly states that any politician may take his oath in Hindi, English or the regional language. Last time I checked, Maharashtra was still a part of India and Indian constitution still applies there. Then what law gives these goons the power to stop a constitutional act? The latest news is that 4 MLAs who manhandled the said politician have been suspended for 4 years from the assembly. While I appreciate the quick action taken, the question remains as to how could you let such an incident take place in a meeting of so called "representatives of the public". Whether criminal charges would be filed against them and if any action would be taken on that front remains to be seen.

So look how we have progressed. In the garden of Eden, there was just one rule. Don't eat the forbidden fruit. Now we have laws spanning every human activity. Over that we have people telling us how to live our lives. We have the Moral police, Fashion Police and Censor Police over and above our regular police. If we don't nip this in the bud, it won't be long before we wouldn't have a choice but to live our lives as others dictate it.

Chennai in the rains

When I came to Chennai around three and a half years back, I was not very fond of this place. The weather was too hot to handle, the autodrivers were daylight robbers and the roads were almost always congested. But over the time, I have made peace with most of the irritating aspects of Chennai. I came to understand that life in Chennai makes you appreciate the little things about life outside Chennai that you used to take for granted. Like the weather in Kerala or the disciplined auto drivers in Bangalore.

One thing though that I cannot come to terms with is Chennai during the rains. I am a big admirer of rains. During monsoons when I used to be in Kerala, I would sit in the verandah just watching it rain. The pitter patter of the raindrops was music to my ears and the cold rainy breeze would freshen me up from the inside out. Then I came to Chennai and encountered the Chennai rains. This city has a very low water threshold. All it takes is a brief drizzle and the roadsides are already flooded. If that drizzle turns into a downpour, rest assured that you will have to wade through knee deep water. Knowing the condition of the city's drains, and wading through the knee deep water is a self inflicted torture that you cannot do without.

I have a friend who loves rain but hates walking in the rain. The main reason for that is the feeling of mud beneath her feet in her footwear. I can definitely understand what she feels. For me it is the feeling of the squishy shoes that I hate. In that context, I love my new Merrel shoes. I got this for trekking purposes. It is made up of webbed material. The water drains right out once you are out of the puddle. No more squishy shoes.

Last year, Chennai witnessed one of the heaviest monsoons for quite some time. This was the same time when terrorists hit Mumbai. If man made terror was flooding Mumbai, Natural terror was flooding Chennai. It had been raining for 4 days non stop and I had decided to work from home as you had to either know swimming or own a boat to reach office. And I had neither. On the 5th evening of this non stop downpour, I was watching a movie with my feet propped up on the table when my phone rang. It was the next door neighbour. He asked me where I was. When I told him I was at home itself, he asked me how come I didn't know that water had entered my house. I stood up in shock to see my house flooded with ankle deep water. In the next 15 min, I stowed off my bedding and important documents out of reach of the water and I put my PC's CPU on top of my couch. I packed some essential items and left the flooded house to seek abode at a friend's house.

The next day I came back to check out the situation at my house. I was dumbstruck to see that the water in my sitting room was up to my knees and the CPU which I had put on my couch was waterlogged. There was nothing much I could do so I just locked up and left.

It took another 3 days before the situation returned to near normalcy. So now each time it rains more heavily than usual, I start preparing for the worst and keep watching my door sil to see if water has started flowing in.

Tail Piece: A week after this disaster, a team of sales folks from HCL landed in Chennai as part of a training program. One of their requests was that they wanted to go to the beach to see the Sea. I had to bite my tongue real hard to keep myself from replying "The Sea had come to meet you. You are about a week late"