Saturday 17 January, 2009

I will be in Tamil Nadu for next few weeks

Friends, it gives me enough satisfaction to read ur comments. Thanks for all ur time & comments. Smriti, Prem and Beena have been regulars to leave a comment.


Dear Prem, you wanted to know if i undertook my trip to tirupati in my dad's scooter or another bike. Well prem, the journey was undertook on Yezdi, belonging to Mr.RadhaKrishnan, the Ex-Air Force gentleman working in H.A.L., who i believe also happens to be either your relative or family friend.

Keep posting comments, as it enlivens my desire to keep blogging.


I WILL BE IN TAMILNADU FOR NEXT FEW WEEKS


I got orders today evening, to leave for a place in tamil nadu on operational work on 19 Jan 2009 , extending for a few weeks. I guess my new work place's connectivity with outside world or the facilities aren't as good as iam having here. Still, i shall explore possibilities to access internet from my new place of work, which i know is little remotely located.


Tomorrow i will be tightly scheduled, with all my packing and paraphernalia to be looked into, whilst also doing a morning shift and a night shift. But i am sure new places will bring new experiences and new things to learn. When i return online, something more interesting i shall have to share with you all. Until then, may god be with you always. My prayers & best wishes. See you. So long.

My encounter with a snake

Today i had an afternoon shift, and didnt have much work to worry about. While i was scanning TV channels in my office, my colleague who was standing outside whispered something to me and gestured with his head towards the floor. I couldnt make sense of his theatrics, and so i went outside to have a look. Lo and behold! i could see an adolescent snake struggling to slide forward on the glazed tiles floor.

Snakes have always mesmerised me, and i didnt want to lose this chance encounter. I hurriedly searched for some kind of a stick to pin the snake at one place. When i got one and stuck the stick gently on its body, its movement was arrested. Now the toughest task was getting hold of its head. The snake having more than half a feet of its front body free for action, i didnt want to take chances. I summoned an onlooking soldier brother to search for another thick stemmed stick to put its head at one place. When he got one, i asked him to hold the stick held by me and took possession of the stick he brought in. I shoved the stick towards its head in simulated attacks and it started striking at it. I kept shoving the stick towards it and it kept shooting its head towards the stick and biting it. Around 6 to 7 bites strikes later, it got exhausted and thats what i was waiting for.

Then slowly i placed the second stick on his head and caught it with my right hand, while my left hand secured the tail part of the poor thing. I quietly walked towards our gate and went outside little away from our area and gently put it on terra firma to resume its normal life.

Though i am not a snake catcher by any definition, i always love to catch one. I have caught atleast 2 snakes earlier and tried catching many more whenever i have encountered them, though unsuccessful in my attempts. I should say that i am scared of snakes and importantly their bites but i love them a lot too. Since i have no idea of recognising their species or toxic value, I treat all snakes as potentially poisonous, whenever i go near them.

(The last snake i caught was also the lengthiest at around 6 feet, caught in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, 2 years back. I couldnt save its life, as public's demands to have it killed was in majority and abided with.)

Friday 16 January, 2009

Nightmare during the last pleasure trip

I was ever complaining to Beena that we werent having time for ourselves. Tired of hearing this, she atlast suggested that we go for a outing, and thats how our last trip to the shevroy hills near Salem, popularly known as Yercaud, happened.

When we reached the hotel that we had booked, they came up saying our room was not yet vacated as the guests wanted to stay for another day more. Since they had extended our booked room to others, it was their problem to sort it out, and they did. They allotted us their suite for a day and requested us to shift to our regular room the next day. We agreed and went to the suite allotted to us.

The suite had a distinct factor in it, and it was the floor. One small part of the floor was see through made of transparent fibre glass. Looking downwards through the floor, we could get a nice view of the slope of the hill, on which it was built. The flip side was, if anyone went underneath our room, they could get a view above their heads too, how prospective that view could be was anyone's guess.

Throughout our time in the suite, i kept stealing a view down through the fibre glass, just to ensure none was acting as a peeping tom. Our worst nightmare did come true, when once i glanced downwards, i found a labourer jaywalking about the hill slope below our room. i was perplexed, annoyed, disturbed and quite furious to see him. Luckily enough, we both were safely clothed at that time. Beena immediately called up the reception, and pulled them up sufficiently. they promised to sort our issue and clear the hill slope of all people. they kept up their word, but our fears never left us.

Only when we shifted to our regular room, the next day, did we care to be ourselves, blissful in our privacy. It was quite a nightmare on the first day, for us. Luckily enough we were quite watchful and open to the worst possibilities and hence took caution. The hotel's name is GRT Nature Trails, Hotel Sky Rocca at Yercaud. If at all you need to book room with this hotel, kindly dont take their Suite, which could spoil ur peace of mind.

My first long drive

The year was 1992 end and i was almost 19 years old. My dad's friend came with an offer that if i could accompany with him to tirupati for the new year darshan on his bike. though i wasn't particularly religious, the prospect of going for such a long drive got me excited and i was raring to go. somehow i pursuaded mom to permit me for this long road journey on bike. my dad's friend Radhakrishan, with whom i was to go also pitched in to convince her about my safety.

Without much of a struggle, my mom atlast agreed. mom always had the last word in my home, as dad was always easy to assent to any request. thats the reason mom took over the reins of all decision making of our house ever since i can remember.

Radhakrishnan chetan and myself had lunch at our house and left for our journey on 31st December 1992 at around 1 pm. though i didnt have a licence, i couldnt care less, nor could chetan. He had a helmet was well as a rayban glass, while i never thought of arranging for a driving glass. our journey started with him on the handle, and made pit stops to have little refreshments and rest on the way. we kept riding alternately every 80 kilometres or so.

At around 7 pm we reached our destination, and quite quickly got freshened up and stood in the long queue of devotees awaiting their turn for darshan. from all that i remember, we kept standing in the queue for the next 13 hours till 8.30 in the morning the next day i.e. 01 Jan 93. for all the hardship we underwent the darshan only lasted a fleeting moment. even before one could put together our hands in obeisance to the lord, we found ourselves away from the diety. such was the flow of pilgrims at tirumala, especially since it was the new year.

By the end of our darshan we were two tired souls. we didnt want to make a stop-over as Radhakrishnan chetan had more pressing works to be attended to at bangalore. without having as much as a wink of sleep we once again freshened up and set out for our journey back. though quite tired and deprived of sleep, my energy levels for driving was never deflated. i took the front seat and set off riding for almost more than 2/3rd of the journey back. without a riding glass for eye-protection, my eyes were blood red in colour, thanks to all the lorries that were ahead of me, injecting spray of sand and other things into my naked eye.

We reached back bangalore by around 4 pm and i felt elated about having had a blast of a journey. its another matter that my eyes took more than 3 days to regain its white colour. lots of sleep and rest later, they resumed their normal stance. but atleast i had this story to tell u all.

Wednesday 7 January, 2009

The Power of Sense Stimulants

How many times we have met people who arrested our attention quite magically with just their fine attire or their speech. And even more may be the times when our presence did not get acknowledged just because we didnt stimulate the other person's sense organs, i.e. through fine speech, a smile, or not being dressed for the occassion.

In my life i have encountered enough number of people, who didnt get closer to me on the first meeting. But when i kept meeting them over a period of time, they thought iam not that bad afterall. The reason is i just didnt attract any attention towards me. A Person's attention span gets wider when his sense organs are titillated, to put it another way.

The Kathopanishad says that the nature of the sense-organs is to proceed outward, to enjoy sense-objects, such as sound, etc. They are therefore not capable of knowing the indwelling Self. When knowing about self itself becomes such a hard battle, there is no surprise when people dont treat you on ur merits in the initial days.

I have had the privilege (if i could say that) to be associated with people from the lowest strata of society. They still form a part of my socialising network, though not as much as earlier. In my association with my lesser privileged friends, i have always endeavoured to be one among them. I never showed one upmanship or acted smart. As far as i believe, i blended almost seemlessly with these friends.

Seeing their hardships, i have helped them countless times with little amounts of money. There have been occasions when they have lied to me about some hardship to get some cash and then gone and spent it in the liquor shop. I could have easily put a stop to this, but i know their hardships will continue and they may need my help. That always pushed me to forgive them, and not let them know that their bluff has been caught. Over a period of time, they stopped lying to me, because they came to know that i had seen through their lies but still acted as if i didnt know about their bluffing. Thats the point they stopped lying to me. It took some years, but i kept getting punished without ever complaining, but atleast iam happy that they are better human beings now.

(Countless times i have had the opportunity to help my lesser privileged friends by paying their house rent, electricity bills, hospital bills etc. Many a time i have pulled them out of starvation by providing them ration for the entire month. Some of my friends are gainfully employed now and dont need anymore help. That gives me enough satisfaction.)

Sunday 4 January, 2009

New Year Wishes

I wish all my blog readers a great year ahead, full of good things. May this new year bestow ur life with lot of pleasant surprises, career growth, happiness, adulations & humility. My prayers for all.

This new year eve party didnt go as per plan due to some hitches. But none the less, i had my close buddy Ravi in Chennai, with whom i spent some quality time together, had a beer and also played volley ball match with him & his friends. I wound up the evening quite early at 11pm as my bro-in-law was to leave to Dubai the next day morning.

My holidays in yercaud hill station was fabulous. Did lot of trekking and rock climbing along with beena. She felt as if she was on a boot camp, because i wanted her to move her body a bit, as her midriff has been growing of late and wanted her to realise it with my actions involving her. (sorry kutta, i felt i should put it here as only our friends read this blog). Two days of trekking had given enough pain to her leg muscles and she was complaining. Some pain killers later, we decided to have motorised outings to give her some rest. Took some pictures, which i hope to upload later on. Overall, a great time spent together in cool weather & pristine location.