Back. I hope, with a Bang.

Woo. Now this is what is called 'Staying out of touch', and that too from my own blog! But I was just out of touch, not out of words! So here we go again! After 8 long months, I plan to restart my blogging! I hope I continue; if not daily, at least once or twice a week. And what made me not blog those 8 months, that's what I'm gonna share! The things that I did, the places that I visited, the friends that I made and more importantly, the experiences that I had.

Since I've got a job in office now, I hope to spend lots of time in front of the computer doing something worthwhile, when not working. The place is different and the conditions are totally different. The last time I blogged, it was sitting in a 3mX3m hostel room, and now its a pretty big office room, where my space only restricts to my table and chair. The people here speak only about work, business deals, quotations, clients, purchase orders, and what not. Here the sweeter they speak with the client, the harder they swear behind his back. The phones keep buzzing, the fax machine keeps beeping and the chatters just don't stop.

So I have decided not to get bothered by them, and just mind my own work, that's given to me, and during my free time, I would blog.

That's all for the time being, will continue the rest later! :)

Sweet Nostalgia Killing Me

With less than a month left in college, I see everyone's status messages being changed to countdown of the days left. When I look back at these 4 years that I spent in college, I get all the sweet memories in my mind. I don't think I have had any major fight with anyone in the college, no enemies; although there have been few bitter incidents here and there. But, that's pretty much acceptable. I have come across some of the most beautiful people over here - I have been blessed to meet them, know them and befriend them, which I hope carries on even after the college. Guys like Basu, Prani, Puppy, Preetam, Rajan, Gogs, Poo, DD and all have been like a family. Whatever happens, you share with them, whether its good or bad, it doesn't matter. And branch-mates like Nitin, Sushant, Shri and Anna have been very supportive right from the time when I started to know them properly. Without Shri's and Anna's notes, clearing these 4 years would be an impossible task. Sushant was always there, whenever I needed any help regarding anything, but mostly academics. One night before the exam, I would go to his room and he'd explain me everything. There hasn't been a time when he would say no if he knew the solution. I wonder if I'll find these kind of guys anywhere down the line in my life. I still remember the first month of the college - I didn't speak much, would restrict myself to my room, but as I came to know slowly, I came to know how good they were and that it wasn't bad interacting with them. Slowly all of us grew fond of each other's company, we sat in one room cracking jokes, making fun of each other (always light-heartedly) and the common profs that we shared. From there till now, it has been a never-forgetting journey. The first month and the last month of the college are the worst, both in their own ways. Its never easy to say good-bye to anyone. Branch and party fare-well which will take place in few days time are going to be one emotional and senti affair. Will keep you updated with it. And all the four year break-up wise, I will post later sometime. 

An Eventful Roadtrip to Wayanad

This trip was long pending. Nitin was really keen on going on a road-trip somewhere. After he came to know that Wayanad is not that far from here, we decided that we'll go there itself. So, we rented a car - Diesel Indica to be precise, and it was the five of us - me, Nitin, Anna, Sushant and Shri. We left at around 7 in the morning from college, had breakfast at the Dosa Camp in Mangalore and then took the NH-17 via Kasargod and Kannur. Kannur is around 150 kms from Mangalore, it took just a little over 3 hours to reach there. I drove till Kannur and from there on Anna started driving. We stopped a little at Kannur, checked fuel and then left. On the way, we saw an Indian Coffee House at a place just outside Kannur, called Vatakara. We had lunch over there, nothing great - just simple Egg Biryani and Omlette, and this was the place where we first got to drink the Herbal Water of Kerala. It is served hot and looks pink in color. The weather outside was getting real hot, but we couldn't do anything about it. We continued our journey after lunch, when just a little later, some vehicles which passed by, told us to check our right back wheel. It was wobbling, not just little, but a lot. So we stopped at few places to check for tyres before we were told to go to Flora Car Service Station. This station was like a blessing in a place where we couldn't find even a decent restaurant. It was like a proper Gulf station with all hydraulic machines. There we discovered that the disc which hold the tyre was slant, so we changed that disc with the one used for spare tyre. The owner of the place was a retired captain from Army, he was a really nice guy, when he saw us standing outside - he told us to relax and sit inside. And we were relieved to find some guy who knew something other than Malayalam. After this, we carried on with our journey. We were supposed to reach a place called Quilandy, where we had to change from NH to an SH. But, before we reached there, we got confused with some roads and ended up on the wrong route. After asking everyone, we somehow reached Wayanad district. From there to reach Kalapetta, we had to go through a ghat section where the traffic was really high, and this road was going to Ooty and Mysore on two separate ways. I was driving from there. Till we reached Kalapetta, the district HQ of Wayanad, it was already dark. We looked around for some hotels, but to our surprise it was peak season and we couldn't find anything. By some indirect contact, we found a home-stay, which cost us Rs 2000 per night for 2 rooms. The place was pretty decent, it had totally five rooms which could be given on home-stay, and the guy was staying with his family on the top floor. We had dinner at a nearby restaurant which wasn't so great because it was already 10pm till we reached there. We parked the car, and crashed the moment we reached, since all of us were really tired.

The next day we left at around 8.30 in the morning, had breakfast at a place called Udupi Restaurant, which was no where close to any of the restaurants in Udupi, food-wise. On the way, we found a tourist information centre, where we got a proper tour guide and a map of Wayanad. The guy over there told us about the places that we can visit in one day. he shortlisted Edakkal Caves, Kanthampara Waterfalls and the stretch of Muthanga Wildlife Sanctuary till the Karnataka Border. We started off with Kanthampara Falls. It was a nice little falls, we were happy to see that there was hardly any trek to reach the falls unlike most of the other falls that I'd gone. And other strange thing was, we were not going from the foot of the falls, we were approaching it from where it was falling. We stayed there for sometime, took bath. All of us who had taken had bath over there had problem changing underwear since we forgot to get towels. We literally went in between the bushes to change.

We then moved on to our next destination - the Edikkal Caves. It was really crowded here, and after reaching there, we had to wait for sometime for the jeep which would take us on top. Of course you could even walk till there, but we were in no mood to take any physical exercise in that heat. We then hopped on the jeep which took us through a really steep track to reach the caves. That wasn't the end of it, we hadn't reached our destination yet. From there, we had to buy tickets and trek more till we could reach the caves. After a trek which involved getting into some other caves, waiting for the incoming traffic and lot of heat, we finally reached our destination. The caves had some Neolitic Age writings, the oldest in India apparently. But after all that trek, we expected them to be a little more worthy. We stopped there for sometime, took photos and headed back. Till we reached the foothill it was already evening and clouds were hovering over us. We sat there outside for sometime, bought souvenir and had juice. Just when we were heading back to our car, it started raining pretty heavily, it was good to feel the rain after months of heat. But rain would mean harder to drive back. A little while later the rains became light and the weather had become beautiful. Fresh breeze and good roads are a perfect combination. We realized this when we started driving on the NH to Mysore, we passed Sulthan Batery on the way, it was a small town which was densely populated (we could see that by the badly maintained traffic in the town).

After driving a little on that same NH, we entered the stretch of Muthanga Wildlife Sanctuary. The road was covered with bamboos on both the sides, some places the bamboos from both the sides made a canopy on the road, which was spectacular. The whole part - the after rain effect, the smooth wide road, less traffic - all made the drive look beautiful. We stopped at few places in between, took some snaps and carried on. The only thing that we were missing were some hot pakodas and good coffee! We stopped at one place where we found a tree house sort of structure, just few kilometers before the K'taka border, had tea over there (which wasn't so great). On the way we found the entrance to the sanctuary, but it was closed till the end of this month for some works. We reached the K'taka border and then decided to head back since it was already getting late. I drove on the way back to Kalapetta, we reached there just before the sunset. Went to our home-stay, refreshed and relaxed for sometime. Then, for dinner we decided to go to a restaurant attached to the Woodland's Hotel. The food was just okay, it wasn't so great. We came back to our rooms and dozed off in sometime.

The next day we woke up a little late, and we had many things to do. We had to see some places around and then head back to college. We started off with Banasura Sagar Dam, apparently the largest earthen dam in India and second largest in Asia. There were speed-boats available at the reservoir of the dam. The boat-ride was pretty good, it was for 20 minutes. There was a waterfall called Meenmutti waterfall around 3 kms from there, so we decided to go over there also. But as we reached the falls, we came to know that the water had dried and it was just rocks left over there. We still trekked all the way till top, took some snaps on the way and headed back. We were then headed to Mananthavady, a place where we were supposed to decide either to go via Kannur or Coorg. After having lunch at a decent place in Mananthavady, we thought of taking the Coorg way, since the distance was almost same and most of us hadn't seen Coorg.

After driving for some distance, we thought we made a wise decision by taking this route since it was pretty good. But we were proved wrong, just 10 kms before the K'taka border, we came across the worst road possible, it wasn't even a proper route, we were just going along the path. Till after 15 kms into K'taka the road was like this. After this the road wasn't great but it was still bearable. It was just narrow, and the shoulders were at a different level from the road, so when it was problematic to overtake and when two vehicles would pass. Coorg was around 107 kms from the K'taka border. We passed through Virajpet on the way. I drove till Madikere, and we stopped in Madikere for sometime, looked around few places there. We went to Raja Seat, it is on top of a hill from where the whole road to Mangalore was visible. The garden was maintained really well, the flowers were beautiful, and there was this small toy-train thing outside it. We went on a ride in it. After that, the musical fountain started, it was beautiful. The sync of the lights and the water with the music was splendid. It was getting dark, and we had to drive back to Mangalore which was still 140 kms far, so we left from there.

After driving on the ghat section for around 15 kms, we stopped on the way to pee. After this, when we tried starting the car, it wouldn't. No one had any clue what went wrong with it, the dashboard was showing 'Check Engine' remark and we didn't know what to do. So here we were in middle of no where in pitch dark, had no clue what went wrong with the car and the next town was around 30 kms far. Thankfully, there was this small hotel where we stopped. We asked him for some help, but he said there won't be any mechanics since it was a Sunday. One car stopped on the way while passing by. They looked at the engine and other things, and found that the water in the radiator container was completely empty. So that meant that the car wasn't starting because it was heated totally. So we filled water back there, but it wouldn't stay there, it was leaking all out. We thought we were in some big trouble, and had no idea what to do, whether to go back to Coorg/Madikere(15kms) or continue driving till we find the next town (at least 30 kms). We decided to carry water in the water bottles that we had and drive back to Madikere, since it was risky driving back more than 100 kms in that condition. We reached Madikere at around 10pm. I called up one of my didi who was staying there. She told we could come and stay at her place. We had dinner and stayed at her place for the night.

In the morning, she served us a real sumptuous meal for breakfast. All of us hogged properly, and then got our car checked, and headed to M'lore. The drive back was fine, this time the car showed no problems, but the heat was killing us. We drove via Sullia, Puttur, B.C. Road to Mangalore. Anna drove till Sullia, Nitin tried his hands at the stretch from Sullia to Puttur and I continued from there till Mangalore. We reached Mangalore by 5pm, returned the car and took our advance back, that we had kept with him. We then had ice-cream at Ideal's parlor in Hampankatta. We reached all tired and exhausted to college at 6pm. The trip was good, apart from few incidents in between, but incidents are experiences that are part of life. That's what makes life more fun and interesting.

All the photos have been uploaded here. Do check them out :
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=198627&id=507927124&l=3abf4b60de

Shutter Island - Disturbing, Yet Gripping

The film is based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lahane. It is a psychological thriller, directed by Martin Scorsese and stars Leonardo DiCaprio in the lead. Shutter Island is a place where dangerous criminals are sent for treatment which are led by Dr Cawley, played by Ben Kingsley. Two U.S. Marshall (DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo) are sent here to search for a missing patient, Rachel Solando. While investigating, DiCaprio gets flashbacks of World War II in Dachau, where he was posted, and he starts relating those scenes to some of the incidents which are happening in Shutter Island. Some scenes are disturbing, like the pile of dead bodies, lying frozen during the World War II and a girl waking up from them, and telling DiCaprio that he could have saved them. The films locations are beautifully shot, especially the light house scene. Scorsese has brilliantly crafted the film, and the editing is awesome. DeCaprio delivers an awe-inspiring permormance; Ben Kingsley and Mark Ruffalo perform equally good. It deserves a multiple viewing, not just to know the plot, but how the build-up takes place. I'd give it a 4/5.

Well Done Abba - A 'Well' Made Satire on Indian Politics

Shyam Benegal is known for his feel-good films. After Sajjanpur, he comes up with another rural India story, but a satire this time on the Indian Politics and corruption. This time its based in a small AP village of Chikatpally. Boman Irani plays Armaan Ali and Rahman Ali, who are twin brothers, but are totally unlike each other. Armaan Ali is a God-fearing honest chauffeur who works in Mumbai, whereas Rahman Ali keeps stealing and doing other unsocial things in the village, along with his wife Salma, played by Ila Arun. They both take care of the daughter of Armaan Ali - Muskaan (Minisha Lamba). Armaan returns to village to find a suitable groom for Muskaan, only to find that the water situation in village is really bad. So, he decides to make a 'Bawdi' (a well), so that it would help him suffice the needs of water and also irrigate his fields. But, only later does he come to know that it is not as simple as he had thought it to be. The corrupt government officials, the pending works - all sum up his agitation and he finally decides to give up. But, Muskaan, being educated, shows him a way to mend the government officials. The performances by each and every cast member is really good. Boman Irani in his Hyderabadi accent brought back some old memories of Mehmood, he was outstanding in both of his roles. Minishha Lamba was a surprise - after Yahaan and Shaurya, she comes up with an equally good performance in this one. Ila Arun, Sameer Dattani, Ravi Kishen and Sonali Kulkarni live up to their roles. If only the script was well paced and some of the scenes were not repetitive, it would have been more entertaining. That is the only difference between Sajjanpur and this one, the former was far more entertaining and had some really interesting characters, unlike few selected characters here. I'd still give it a 3.5/5 for the feel-good factor.

Paathshaala Music - Admirable Debut by Hanif Shaikh

After seeing the trailers of Paathshaala, I was pretty keen on getting the music as early as possible, as I really liked the track Aye Khuda from it. The album has 5 original tracks, 1 theme and 4 remixes. The music and lyrics are given by singer-turned-composer-cum-lyricist Hanif Shaikh. The last time I heard him was in the song 'Ye Dooriyan' from Fool n' Final, which I guess not many have heard. It was a dance number, which I pretty much liked. He comes up with a brilliant soundtrack this time as a composer. The soundtrack starts off with Aye Khuda sung by Salim Merchant. This song is a pleasant number, which you'll start liking from the first time onwards. But after hearing a few times, you might not like it that much. But its still a track worthy mentioning. Then, there is a peppy number by Vishal Dadlani, called Paathshaala (Khushnuma), which is again pretty decent; Vishal is pretty much capable of carrying out these kind of tracks. Then comes Bekarar by Lucky Ali, which again is a nice track, he sings it in high scale to perfection, just like his other tracks (Ahista Ahista from BAH and Khudahafiz from Yuva). The soundtrack then goes into romantic mood with a number by Tulsi Kumar, Akansha Lama and Hanif Shaikh himself. Its a pretty good track, with nice vocals by the female leads. For some reason, Hanif Shaikh sounds a little like Himesh to me in this track. But, the voice is still not as nasal as Himesh, so its still within the listening limits (at least for me). Then, comes my favorite track from album. Its another version of Aye Khuda, called Teri Marzi, sung by Kailash Kher. It has beautiful lyrics penned by the composer himself. They go something like this:

aye khuda teri marzi ke aage kya hoga,
hai pata tu jo chahe waisa sama hoga,
teri raza tu jo chahe tapti dhoop mein,
ay khuda khilta hua gulistaan hoga!
tune banayi raahein, tune banaayi manzil, 
hum le chale apna karwaan!


tehni tehni se dekhoon toota hai har patta, 
bikhra hua pada hai aaj ye gulistaan, 
jhilmilata yahan, muskuraata yahan, 
tha khushi se kabhi ye aashiyaan!


reh-bar ho tum hamare, phir kaisa diya farmaan, 
farishte bhi ruswa honge, dekh ke ye anjaam, 
ye na chahe koi, ab bata de tu hi, 
keh kar apna tu kyun banta anjaan!

Thanks to the vocals of Kailash Kher, the lyrics give a much deeper meaning to the track. Paathshaala Theme is pleasant and passable. Nothing extra-ordinary from the remix section, just plain up-beat and techno mixes.
Overall, Hanif Shaikh comes with a pleasant soundtrack and he's definitely a talent to watch out for, given his capability to pen down decent lyrics too. Another thing to notice is that - every track has a composer singing.

The Awesomest Driving Experience

 
This was a pretty random plan that we came up with, just within a period of 2-3 hours. We rented a Santro, which was in a really good condition (which rented cars are rarely in one). On Friday night, after coming back from watching LSD, we thought of going somewhere long, since the car didn't have any distance limit. We thought of Gokarna (which most of us had visited), Kemmangundi (Chikmaglore dist.) and Kodachadri (Shimoga dist.). After searching for all these places on net, and working on the feasibility of driving conditions, we selected Kemmangundi, since only one guy amongst us had been there. I'd been to Baba Budangiri Range, which is pretty close to Kemmangundi, but that was 2 years back with family relatives, and I badly wanted to drive to a place like this. Kodachadri was ruled out, because we didn't want to drive at night, and the best part about Kodachadri is night-trek and sun-rise. So, Kemmangundi it was then. Along with me were - Puppy, Preetam, Pranam and Basu. We found the shortest route to take, from college to Kemmangundi (with the help of Google Maps). It went through Moodbidri, Belthangady and Chikmagalore, along the Charmadi ghat. We left at around 6.30 in the morning, filled petrol and checked tyres on the way.

We stopped at Moodbidri for breakfast, and then continued our journey, taking turns to drive. Then started the Charmadi ghat, which was pretty fine on the lower HP (hair pin) bends, and they weren't really sharp HP curves, so even long buses could take turns over there, unlike the Agumbe Ghat which had pretty acute curves for long buses. We reached Chikmaglore at around 12 noon. Just while entering Chikmaglore, we saw a CCD, where we stopped and had a pretty sumptuous lunch. Just for the record - CCD actually has most of its estates in Chikmaglore and its headquarters is also located here. Hence, that makes it special to have in a CCD where its roots lie. Chikmaglore is actually home to India's best coffee. So, we chilled out in CCD for sometime, freshen ourselves up, and then left to Kemmangundi. At a T-junction, when enquired, we were told to take a left, since that was a shorter route compared to the straight route which also led to Kemmangundi.

Now, coming to the route. The route that we took was real bad, comparing even to Indian Standards. It was supposedly a State Highway, but it didn't look like one, in any manner. Although the road was bad, we never stopped enjoying on the way. We came up with random lyrics in some Tulu words, for some trance music, which Preetam was playing, since he was driving the car, and we were just irritating him. As we reached higher and higher, our ears started closing and opening (if that is how I should put), and the road condition also became worse. At one place where we were supposed to take a lower right which led to Kemmangundi, we took the upper right, since it was directed properly. This other route led us to Baba Budangiri Range (Dada Pahad/ Datta Peeta) and a waterfall called Manikyadhara. This road was very narrow, and was really freaky since the level was very high and there was no fencing on any of the sides. So it was just like driving on the Grand Canyon of NFS Carbon game (only difference being the condition of the road).

Since Manakyadhara was just 3 kms away, we thought we'll just stop over there for 10 minutes or so. Manikyadhara was nothing great, it is basically a pilgrimage place and the falls was just little water flowing from the top of a cliff. We took some photos over there and hurried there withing 15 mins.

From top, I drove back to Kemmangundi. On the way, we thought we might run out of fuel to go back till Chikmaglore, and since there were no other petrol pumps, we considered filling it there itself. When inquired, we were told one hotel keeps fuel. So we went over there, and he was selling it for 75 Rs/L. Since we had no other option we filled some 6L over there and carried on to Kemmangundi. The further road was even worse, it wasn't even a Pukka road, to make matters worse. To cover a distance of 25 kms, we took more than 2 hours. After reaching Kemmangundi, we asked about the jeeps which would take us to Hebbe Falls from there. It was at a distance of 11 km from there, but the road was totally messed! I haven't gone in a road more bumpier than this one. I mean there were huge rocks all over on the road, and the jeep was going on top of all of them. Plus, the condition of the jeep was pathetic, I wonder what it was holding up to. But, I'm pretty sure there was no other vehicle which would've gone there.


Finally, at around 6 pm just before sunset, we reached our destination. From there we had to trek for about 10-15 mins to reach to the waterfall. The waterfall was worth all the trouble that we went through. It falls in two stages - Dodda Hebbe (Big Falls) and Chikka Hebbe (Small Falls), totally from a height of 550 ft. The falls are properly isolated, and are surrounded by dense forests and coffee plantations, which makes them more beautiful. Since the time we went was pretty late, and it was already getting dark, the waterfall looked just like milk flowing, among the greenery. We just took a dip in freezing cold water, and since we had no time we couldn't go under falls, as it would be difficult for us to trek back after it would get dark. So we left when the left was just enough to take us till our jeep. The bumpy ride was back yet again, and thankfully the headlights of the jeep were working. Given the condition that it was in, we had serious doubts. We reached back Kemmangundi by 7.30 pm, and we reached we were shocked to see the whole place deserted. I mean the time when we left there was a shack and there were some jeep guys sitting over there; when we come back, we see only our car parked over there. After that, we paid the jeep guy and asked him the shortest route to Chikmaglore from there. He guided us to something which worked wonders for us. The route he told us was not just short, but it was good too. After a distance of 20 km, we joined the State Highway and smoothly reached Chikmaglore, with our safe driver Pupps, who drove all the way back at night.


After reaching Chikmaglore, we had our dinner at a decent restaurant, and inquired about a good place to stay there. After getting to know the accommodation rates, we had a discussion on whether to stay during night or drive back to college. We settled on staying back, since traveling on the ghats was a little risky. And given the fact that most of us were sleep-deprived for the past 2 or so days. We stayed at a place called Krishna Residency; the rooms were decent and we had a really good sleep, although the power kept coming and going. I came to know about the power cut only in the morning, that's how well I slept. Got up in the morning, had proper south-Indian breakfast at a decent restaurant and left to college. We took the same way back to college, by which we had come. Again all of us took turns in driving, and we reached college in around 4.5 hours from there.

This was, by far, the best road trip for me till date. I have got experience in driving Ghat sections now, and am more confident. It will, Inshaallah, serve me well in the future.