Bird Watching!!!

I have always been a last minute person. Planning has never been my cup of tea. However, since Priya was occupied with work, I had the ownership of planning the outing for the coming weekend. With heavy showers happening over the last few weeks in Bangalore, I decided to plan a visit to Coorg, to try our hands at Canoeing, kayaking and white water rafting. It was almost Friday evening when I made the first call to a resort to check on availability but with no luck. Subsequently, I tried calling ten to fifteen different resorts/campsites but all in vain. With zeal not to waste the weekend, we decided to visit the Mysore and Ranganthittu Bird Sanctuary.

We started on Saturday by 9.30AM. Our first halt was at good old Kamat Upchar for breakfast at around 11.30 AM. As we approached Mysore, we started following the bill-boards and calling up hotels for reservations. Being the last weekend of the month, we really needed to find a cheap accommodation so as to manage our trip budget. We booked our stay with Hotel Siddhartha and checked in at 1.30PM. With stomach’s howling, we straight away ordered for lunch. To our disappointment, it was a north Indian meal cooked with a dash of Sāmbhar powder in all the dishes!!!!

After a nap of couple of hours, we went out for coffee followed by a shopping trip to soothe my shopaholic wife’s heart. Later in the evening at 7.00PM we visited the century old Mysore palace. The magnificent images of the illuminated palace against the dark black sky will be itched in our memory forever. On our way back to the hotel we took a “tonga ride” which is also a part of the city’s heritage. We spent the night at the Park Lane hotel enjoying cold beer and listening to soothing Indian classical music.

Sunday, we decided to visit the Ranganthittu Bird Sanctuary which was about 18km from Mysore and is a home to some of the most exotic birds. It is a group of small islands in the Cauvery River. We spotted wide species of birds including cormorants, darters, white ibis, spoon billed storks, painted storks, white necked storks, etc (some of the names which I could recollect from the boards). Marsh crocodiles from the reptile family were also spotted.

Unfortunately, till date we were never in to birds but a small boat ride around the 6 islets gradually created an interest in the winged creature. We had an amazing experience unveiling this beautiful gift of nature. We learned a ton, saw a bunch, and had a great time!

A Smile that matters the most…….

I am an atheist; whereas my dad is an ardent believer in god. Right from my board exams till the first day of my job he has been egging me to visit the temple. However it’s been more than a year for our marriage & we’ve been postponing the customary post marriage temple visiting activity. Every time mom & dad would broach the topic of visiting our family temple, we had an excuse ready. This time however they caught us unaware & since we were not prepared with any excuse, we fell straight into the temple trap!

Our village, Walye is situated in the mesmerizing greenery of Konkan. Situated in Ratnagiri around 7kms from the big town of Rajapur, Walye is a small village comprising a mere population of 700 people. Nestled in a dense green valley, with a river flowing through the village, Walye could definitely pass off as a beautiful movie set.

To get to Walye, we took the KSRTC bus to Kolhapur, where we joint our parents & uncle, Santosh kaka. The drive to Walye from Kolhapur takes around 4 hours through ghats of Gaganbawda. The drive was entertaining as we were discussing the legendary Tawade politics, the bickering within the family & in general back biting about the rest of the clan!

Santosh kaka had booked our accommodation with Madhuban Resorts on the outskirts of Walye. On reaching Madhuban, we freshened up & on dad’s strict instructions decked up in Indian attire & left for “The Temple Darshan”. We first visited our native goddess “Nina Devi” followed by a visit to Lord Shiva’s temple. We were accompanied by the senior most Tawade, Mr. Bhalchandra Tawade. Lunch was at our village home and since we were temple visiting, non veg was nowhere on the lunch menu.

On mom’s demand we went to visit the goddess of Adhivere. It was interesting to learn about our history. Tawade’s were a brave & fearless clan, who were working for the great Maratha warrior – Shivaji Raje. Adhivere was the birth place of Tawades. On a fateful night, the enemy mercilessly killed the Tawades. Their wives, who were equally brave, went Sati with their husbands on the burning pyre. However, one of the ladies who was pregnant at that time wasn’t allowed to go Sati. She went on to give birth to 3 sons who later went & settled in 3 different villages, Walye being one of them.

After an exhausting day, we just decided to have a quiet dinner and crash. I was lucky enough to relish some fried fish and prawns curry.

The next morning started with a typical Marathi breakfast of “Kanda Poha and Tea”. We then visited our under construction farm house situated just off the Bombay- Goa highway in the picturesque village of Kharepatan. Santosh kaka briefed us about his childhood memories at Kharepatan. We were very excited about the farm house and have already made plans to get our friends here in rainy season when Konkan is at its best.

By then, it was time to bid adieu to Walye and Santosh kaka and leave for Kolhapur since we had our booking back to Bangalore on the same day. By this time we had actually started enjoying the trip and were in no mood to go back to Bangalore. The drive back to Kolhapur got dad talking & as usual we got our doses of tips on how we could lead our lives in an effective & simple manner.

In Kolhapur, we realized that the “Temple Darshan” tour had not yet ended. Mom & dad took us to Amba Devi Temple in Kolhapur. After a short & quick darshan we finally left for lunch. I finally got to eat mutton thali to my heart’s content & Priya got to shop the famous “Kolhapuri chapals” & “Thushi- the traditional Kolhapuri ornament”.

It was 6:00pm & our bus was due to leave for Bangalore. Mom & dad dropped us to the bus stop & with a heavy heart we parted ways. We don’t remember any of the temples we visited or the rituals which we performed. But we remember only one thing, mom & dad’s smile when we were performing the rituals & at that point of time we realized that it is our parent’s smile that matters the most to us. We always know that their blessings are with us. Thank you Mom and Dad……..

With luv,

Priya & Prasad

Pondicherry- A Romantic Get-Away!!!

It was end of February and Bangalore had just started to heat up. We had a long weekend for Holi and decided to head to a beach place to cool off. With our stay booked with Ginger hotel we left for Pondicherry on 27^th Feb at 6.00AM.

We drove past Hosur, Krishnagiri, Tindivanam to reach Pondicherry. On our way we visited the Gingee fort which is said to have originated from Sanjivani hill mentioned in Ramayana. It is the same hill from which Hanumana procured the life saving Sanjivani booti for Laxmana whilst he was lying unconscious during the war between Rama & Ravana.

It took us 7 hours to reach Pondicherry. We checked into our room and headed straight for lunch. After a nice nap of 2 hours we went to Auroville beach situated 7 km from the hotel. It was a virgin beach. We strolled hand in hand on the beach, collected sea shells & played like kids on the beach. We couldn’t leave Pondicherry without sampling the French cuisine. We dined at Rendezvous & relished our French dinner.

The next morning we went to Aurobindo Ashram. On entering the ashram the first feeling that hit us was instant peace. We paid our homage to Shri Aurobindo’s & Mother’s samadhis & felt peace & inner content like never before. It was a true blissful experience. Later, visit to the churches was a continuation to the blissful experience. We roamed through the local shopping market on the JN Street. Priya went berserk spending my hard earned cash……… J

Later in the afternoon we went to the Paradise beach. True to its name the beach was a definite Paradise. The clean & blue water was tempting us to dive straight into the water. We had to be content with just dipping our feet & hands in the water & went back to the hotel.

It was our last evening in Pondicherry & our trip was incomplete without a dip in the beach. We splashed water on each other, built castles in the sand & together watched the sun go down, bringing our romantic holiday to an end.

Peace Treaty signed!!!

Relationships are akin to war, where weekdays you spend preparing for the battle to be fought on the weekends when you meet face to face. We have been in the state of war since 23^rd Dec 1998. I finally surrendered after fighting the long losing battle for 10 years, on 20^th Dec 2008 under the Hindu Marriage Act. Since then I have been kept under house arrest by my wife. After a lot of negotiation and persuasion, she decided to initiate the “Peace Talk”. We chose the “V Day” for this “peace talk” and headed to a neutral venue “Chickmaglur-Coffee Paradise” to hold these talks.

It was 5.45AM when we started from Bangalore. We took the Bangalore- Tumkur-Hassan-Belur route to reach Chickmaglur. Our first halt was at 8.30 AM at CCDay, to wake ourselves up with a cup of hot and steaming Cafe latte. Our second halt was at good old “Kamat Upchar” for a quick brunch of Vada and Butter Dosa. We reached Chickmaglur at around 12.00 noon. We had booked our stay with a Woodway Homestay. Last one hour of the drive through the coffee plantation was very scenic and refreshing.

Woodway Homestay at its first look gave us a feeling of Home away from Home. We were greeted by a very warm and friendly staff. They ushered us into a very cozy and comfortable room. Woodway Homestay is a very well decorated house with a lot of attention given to detailing. We had a quick shower and hurried to the dining area for the lunch. The lunch was a home cooked meal of rice, chicken and veg curries and fried fish as a bonus for the non veggies.

After our coffee break at 4.00, we decided to burn some calories by taking up a cycling tour around the home stay. With birds chirping & a gentle breeze we pedaled through the exotic nature cherishing the good old times we had spent with each other. We remembered the fun times we had in our college, the innumerable V Days and the stupid promises we made on our so called Anniversaries. We laughed at all our silly tussles which we had over the years.

We continued to relive our past by taking a drive down the village of Malandur to watch the sunset. Hand in hand we watched the sun go down & made a silent promise to be with each other forever. We continued our romantic saga under the twinkling stars by the bonfire.

We woke up late on “V Day” & decided to simply laze around on the hammock. We spent a chunk of time chit chatting and day dreaming. Later in the morning, we decided to take the coffee plantation tour. The Homestay caretaker, Santosh took us around the coffee plantation explaining in detail about the entire coffee harvesting activity. It was quite a learning experience for us.

We finally bid adieu to this homely place at 12.00PM. During the trip we rediscovered each other and realized how special and important we were for each other’s existence. With the peace treaty signed successfully on 14^th Feb 2010, we reached home at 7.30PM.