Friday 27 February, 2009

Adventures Galore

Working in my job has its own adventures and perils. You never know whats up for you the next moment. It doesnt happen everyday, but when it happens it makes u strong and lets u have a story for posterity.


More than a month its been since i have typed anything here. The place i was attached to was untouched by internet and other luxuries. I even got the opportunity to walk 5 kms just to receive a parcel from post office. Walking i had forgotten altogether i must say. The days in tamilnadu was similar to an expeirnece i had while posted in rajasthan. Right after the parliament attack, there was some troop built-up along the border. I was sent to the designated place along with 2 other seniors. We were told things will be arranged by the time we reach there.

We did reach the place to find ourselves in the midst of no-man's land. Presence of civilians wasnt visible and army's presence was located and we contacted them. We told them that we were instructed to contact them for all admin support. Our comfort levels that surged after seeing the army, deflated quickly enough, when the subedar on duty there said he had news about our arrival. There was some major communication gap and the vehicle that dropped us simply returned back to base. Till our tents, cots and communication equipment arrived we were to utilise facilities of the army. Now our hopes dashed after hearing the army subedar.

Not the ones to lose hope, we asked the subedar the directions to his boss's office. He directed us to the top of another mound at a distance of 2kms. It was already 3.30pm and we hadnt had our lunch. After a tiresome walk over the steep mound, we entered into his office; ofcourse inside a tent too. We briefed the Major about our predicament. Without enquiring anything more, he ordered lunch to be served to us by his orderly. He quickly called his subedar and asked him to accommodate us and look after us until airforce support arrived.

It wasnt before 3 chilling nights that we spent with the army sleeping on the sand floor of the rajasthan desert, that our vehicle arrived with our tents and equipments. The first thing we did was to erect the communication antenna and establish contact with our base through radio telephony. We made our unhappiness quite clear to the authorities over the other end for such a cluttery job. They tried to pacify us. After that within hours we got fully operational.

It was an altogether different experience working with army. They utilise anything and everything thats available in their surrounds to suit their needs. Wild donkeys were caught using ropes and trained hard till they became adept at carrying big jerry cans filled with water up the mound. It took 3 days to train the undomesticated donkey, but after that the job of lugging water was just pushed onto its back. My stay in tamilnadu somehow brought back those memories.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hey Joshi, good to hear back man. It looked like you stopped blogging.