Over and out!

Will write in disjointed words. No time to frame sentences.

Train journeys-"The Blue Mountains"- The Nilgiris-Annamalai-Mudumalai-Cold chills-hot, steaming coffee-rich tropical forest-nature trails-night walks-leeches and ticks!-Teak, rosewood and of course sandalwood!-Inevitably Veerappan!!-Trumpeting elephants, Gaurs and Sambars-some photographs-late night nostalgia with friends-gossip and gupshup-moments-the last tour-the last time as a class-the last time with friends...

End of the Year Blues

Is it something I am missing after all this while?

After all once the gutsy heart dared to dream.

I wish I could find that place once again,

I could see the point where the sky embraces the earth.

To be a child or an adult is the eternal confusion,

And standing at the precipice is not fun.

Decisions are always tough and eat away precious time.

But sticking to them is tougher than anything else.

Each day is good, each day brings with it a new wonder,

And I firmly resolve now not to lumber.

Past years are best relegated to the attic,

Dustballs and grime will slowly fade them away.

The mind is the quickest time-traveller,

Skipping nimbly through long-forgotten images.

The year is drawing to a close

And my heart is returning home.

Chaos and colour

The state of the mind these days. Whirling dervishes-strong winds-flashing lights-brandishing lights that look like knives-need to kill.
Waits are long, longer than it takes to say somethings.
Words fall short to describe and pinpoint that exact temperature.
Twiddling thumbs and whistling out of tune, whiling away the ticks and the tocks.
And then when you get it for keeps, you realize that you were better off without it.
Chaos and colour-all jumbled. What if everything was just black and white?

Score: Me=100, them=0

Dhud-dhud-dhud-dhud-dhud..Drrrrrr rrrrrrrr drrrrrrrrrrrr...thudd thud thud thud!!!! Enough I screamed. My head was being drilled into and smashed at the same time. My ears continued to ring..first far and then slow, louder and then softer. I put my hands over my ears but I couldn't shut out the feeling. Even with eyes closed I could see the drill entering my head.
Opposite my home, 2 cranes had made my life a medley of obnoxious sounds since the past 3 weeks. Days and nights I was dragged to their horrid party. Our request to stop the drilling after 10 p.m. fell on deaf ears.  Blatant violation of the law and a cocky attitude was their modus operandi. I bet that people must have suffered sleepless nights but not one had the thought of stopping them.
So here is what happened next:

11.45- Dialled 100. Phone rings.On the 8th ring the phone was answered.
Him-Hello
Me- Hello. Main Wanowrie se bol rahin hoon. Mere ghar ke paas roz raat ko construction ka kaam hota hain... petrol pump ke samne.
Him-Aaarey madam. Te road construction asel. Te allowed aahe.
Me- Nahi! Te road che kaam nahi karat aahe. Ani te pan 10 nantar allowed nahi aahe!
Him- Okay Madam. Tumcha phone number ani naav sanga.
Me-Pranietha Mudliar ani phone number **********
Him-Okay madam. Thank you.
Me- Tumcha naav kay aahe?
Him (Long pause)- Bagha Madam. Tumhi police control room la 100 dial karun majhyashi boltat aahe. Fakta he garjecha aahe. Baaki sagla soda.
Me (Rolling eyes)- Okay. Thank you.
Now I was restless. I paced my room like a caged lion.
00.00-Voila! They came! I ran to the window. Saw them wield their power. Within seconds the crane shut itself off. Now the only sound I could hear was the men and the police talking. A group gathered around the police with a bunch of papers. The police gave some damming instructions I think because nobody dared to say anything.

Police at work

00.12- The police sat on their bike and zoomed off. The silence persisted. No sounds now, just men moving in the dark that looked like stunned shadows.

There has been no drilling today. One crane is not to be seen. Everything is peaceful and quiet once again.
Normal? Just need to wait and watch now.

The light shines...and all that.

The fact that University days are over for good is hitting hard these days. Undoubtedly this were one of the most memorable journeys that I have had until now. So many new vistas opened and every day was like a new discovery of the self. Ambitions long forgotten started being realized and the good-kind-of-feeling started rubbing in real hard. University does grow on you.
Now if I'm asked to pinpoint any particular memory that stands out everything just seems like a blurred film in fast forward mode. Rush rush rush. A curious mixture of 1 and a half years packaged into a 30 seconds. We entered, made the best possible friends and now we are on are way out all too soon.
Being out is strangely exciting, so many magical stories, worlds and people to explore and so many chances to imbibe their experiences and learn. Again the feeling of being a small fish in a big, big pond.
But this small fish will grow- That I promise you :)

Clear Confusion

 

Walking on the road, with its innumerable twists and turns,

A path struck out, fantastically long.

The path, the legs longed to learn,

And the mind broke into an impromptu song.

Hidden behind spangled grasses green,

A dew dropped, pretty pink winked and preened,

Neither an illusion, nay a delusion, 

It was nothing but clear confusion!

Sinhagad Sightings on 5th June

Black Shouldered Kite. It's a sad pic, but I was thrilled just the same.

A merry Shoeflower.

Purple Sunbird

Crested Bunting

Nuts!

Results

This is how my marksheet in my nightmare read:

Pollution- Logical

Environmental Economics-Emotional

GIS and Remote Sensing-Lachrymose

Statistics-Leering

Computers-Provisionally Passed

Practicals-********

I think my results might be in a few weeks time. I hope I pass. This nightmare  doesn't portend a very  promising result for me. I'm superstitious and these things unconsciously play at the back of the mind. I swear to God that I will really study the next time around. Anything to keep nightmares like these at bay.

2nd day of the rains

Lights conked off suddenly. I didn't see it coming. I thought that the it would never build up into a storm. Thunder-storm. Ma'm says that there is a depression near Mumbai. This explains it. Water falling down in torrents. It's white-pure white. Crystal white. I can make out cyclones and anti-cyclones in mid air as the  wind effortlessly tosses  the rain about like it's some fascinating game.  And the rain seems to enjoy  this-surrendering in  an exploding rapture and the Thunder Gods growl. Hailstones showered down now. Looks like a sheet of pearls from afar but a closer inspection would call them perfect cones.Topazes would be more accurate.

For a while all the space not occupied by rain was filled with leaves. Helter-skelter they flew. A branch has fallen on someone's car. Where do all the birds go when it pours like this?

Now the storm has abated. Everything is wiped off the grime and dust. The green looks fresher. There's a traffic jam outside. Horns blaring loudly. But the rumbling thunder is louder drowning everything else. And a hideous dance enfolds.

Yesterday the rains nearly got me but I escaped from it's clutches. I raced with it yesterday and I won. Not a lick I got. Today I'm in the indoors. But the rain seems to have won the battle. I've yet to reach home :) 

Click click-In Tamhini

Used a Nikon D70s.

Common Mormon.

Tamhini and D :)

Off tomorrow to Tamhini once again. From being one of the places high on my mother's list of forbidden places, now she surprisingly approves of me travelling there. I have no idea why the sudden change. It has nothing to do with me. Now I wangled it out of here. She trusts one among my friends-a super duper lovable bully who also screams like a cantankerous fisherman when she is 'teaching me the right way' to drive :)

D is pretty cool, she sometimes lets me be sarcastic, lets me wield her camera, lets me exasperate her as much as I can-but oh yes..she does exact her revenge in no uncertain terms. However, now I can't help bursting out with laughter when she is scolding at me for my idiotic driving. Her expressions are priceless at those moments, she doesn't know what to make of me at those moments and there I am doubled up in full glory. D looks comical then, her hair looking like a mop on her head.

Have to get up at 4 tomorrow and I am clueless as to why I signed up for this madness. I absolutely detest waking up at anytime before 8 and this unearthly hour is mighty unsuitable for me. But the trip there holds tantalising promises again-a flaming flash of the Giant Squirrel, the mating song of the cicadas, and Blue Mormons enticing you to follow them before disappearing in the wink of an eye.

The Rajasthan Chronicles-Day 7 (Ranthambhore-Tiger Country Continued...)

Shoved down a quick lunch and set off for our entry into the park in a canter. As usual there was some deliberation and people were being shuffled from one canter to the other. One boy with a girl's name and our sweetest friend was unceremoniously asked to leave our canter much to our dismay. This did much to dampen our mood. And then we set off!!! Super excited at this point of time.

The hill ranges rise up majestically on the right with wide expanses of land and then slowly the landscape turns more rocky with plentiful streams tossing out of some secret place. Vegetation too become denser as one goes deeper and at some places they knot themselves threateningly. It's very dark then and you are reminded that here you are nothing but an outsider. You don't belong here. We were allotted Route 1 and boy the twists and bumps we were subjected too!! The canter surmounted impossible rocks, squeezed itself through the narrowest paths while we remained mute spectators-the landscape was too captivating too elicit any word of protest from us. We were lost back then, the eyes always searching for some sign, some hidden movement, some glistening of the eye-hidden treasures of the forest all. We exclaimed only when someone spotted the deer, sambar and the neelgai. But the tiger remained as elusive as ever. But in the end that really didn't matter. Going inside the park itself was an event for me. The fact of missing a tiger doesn't stir up any charge in me though I would be be the last to deny the fact the that sighting the tiger would rise up my emotions sky high. In other words I would simply be mesmerised and wanting to sigh a sigh that only erupts when the magical wild spell-bounds you and you say-that's beautiful. So this dream has to mark it's time for another day. The tiger will wait for me.

And so we spotted the usual fauna of Rajasthan. Wild boar was and so was the call of the leopard that we heard while on our way out. It silenced the forest into stillness. The langurs on the tree didn't move an inch and then the sambars called out to each other. Something was not right for them. We hung around for a quarter of an hour but lady luck didn't budge to smile at us. The tour guides said that the leopard is going further away from us. Perhaps the leopard sensed the fact the idiotic tourists were waiting to gape at it with mouths hung open. It must have been a long way off before we decided to quit and move.

Evening we drove into town and loitered around. Had dinner at a useless place which thankfully had a television. Had a good time pulling faces at my class-mates. After dinner I was with a friend in her room. She was not keeping well and we both were sitting just yapping. That is when we heard terrible banging anf laughing erupting from the corridors. One of tour senior's had been locked into her room by the hotel staff and she was banging the door from inside. The other girls were outside holding the sides and laughing uncontrollably while the hotel boy sped to get the key. And lo! behold! he opened the door to find it empty! Our ever enterprising senior had risen to the job magnificently and had flied the coop! ( read-she had escaped from the bathroom door into her neighbour's room) and while the hotel boy was searching for her, she turned up from behind. The night was just beginning!!!

The infectious atmosphere spread and she decided to dress up as a local with a toy doll and scare our Ma'm who is mortally afraid of appearances like these. The plan was made and the lead actor ready. A black skirt, bangles, heavy payals and a dupatta covered her fhead and face. The doll completed her outfit. She was sneaked into our Ma'ms room and the lights were switched off. All was calm and quiet on the front. And then-out came the scream and alongwith it our Ma'm running out of her room with her hands over her ears. She was bone-scared by this apparition which called to her from the bathroom in the dark. And then out came the monster tumbling with tears of mirth. It was most hilarious. Ma'm recoverd enough to give us all a spanking on our butts. It was well worth it.

Next morning was again to be a lazy one. Others were catching an early morning canter ride and now much to my chagrin I'm regretting my foolishness of turning down the opportunity.  They spotted a Caracal! I,  however was more intent upon recovering from my illness and wanted a nice bit of morning rest.

On entering our room it looked as if a tornado had swept through it. It was a horrible mess. But we didn't care. I don't remember much now. I think I just plonked onto the bed and was fast asleep.