Love Story

CHAPTER - I

She was in my mind,
Don't know from when onwards,
One day I found her,
I loved her so much.

I gave everything she asked,
I did everything she asked,
I fought with others on her side,
I gave many things which she never asked.

She smiled at me,
She ate with me,
She sang with me,
She danced with me.

Days went by; her mind changed a lot,
She didn't turn up, she felt bored with me,
I offered her company, but with friends she felt better,
She felt my love as a jail for her wishes.

I never asked her anything back,
But wished she talked to me.
Never had I wished she do something back,
But I wished she be a friend to me.

I forgot my family, I forgot my position,
I forgot my fame, I forgot myself,
I begged her, she beat me,
I cried a lot, she never listened.

I felt great pain, she never knew,
I was humiliated, she never cared,
I split my blood, she turned her face,
I offered my life, she was happy that it is over.

Up in the heaven, I am waiting for her ever,
Up in the heaven, I own a beautiful house,
Made it awesome, forgot my pain,
I wished she should feel glorious here,
Because I am in Love.

Please Read Chapter Two Here ==>CHAPTER - II (Final).

Shimoga Trip – Spectrum’s Second Anniversary Celebration

Spectrum completed two years in MindTree Consulting Pvt. Ltd. Spectrum consists of the off-campus batch consisting 31 members who joined MindTree Consulting Pvt. Ltd. on 19th April 2004. After two years our strength diminished to 25%. Even between work pressures, though we are working in different projects for different customers at different places, we occasionally gather together to celebrate some occasions between us. When we celebrated Spectrum’s first anniversary in MindTree we conducted a get together at our cafeteria and invited Subroto Bagchi, Babuji Abraham, some of those who gave training to us in MindTree and people function representatives. This year, we were not is a situation to gather together like the previous year, since were working in different offices of MindTree as well as we were spread out in different geographies. So we planned an unofficial spectrum trip to Shimoga, the home town of Shilpa Revankar – one of us.

Sunset view from Kemmangundi Hill station

Thanks to Shilpa; who organized the trip very well, planned the locations to visit, arranged the stay and dine, cabs for traveling in and around Shimoga. We will never forget the delicious dishes; Shilpa and her family (father, mother, brother and sister) prepared for us during our stay at Shimoga.

We were not able to cover all the exotic tourist locations around Shimoga in two days. We spent almost the first day completely at Kemmangundi – a hill station. We trekked through the mountains, visited a temple, climbed up the hill against a small stream that formed small water falls here and there then watched the sun set from the top of the hill station.

Few snaps from Kemmangundi

The second day we went to Honneramaradu, back water of dam, where visitors are provided small boats of different sizes and shapes, as well as swimming suits using which one can float on top of the water, which were very helpful to those who don’t know swimming. Unfortunately we were only allowed boat rides since those facilities require advanced booking from Bangalore – Lalbagh botanical garden. On the way back, we visited a wild life safari park, the load cry of the pea-cock still echoes in our mind. We had a safari and saw lot of lions, tigers and other animals in the park.

The two day program at Shimoga was remarkable, the climate is very good. Even though it was summer time, we never felt tired of the heat of the sun.

Some more Snaps from Shimoga

Bike trip to Hogenakkal Falls from Bangalore

Ariel view of Hogenakkal Falls

I always liked long Bike trips, and made many. But in the last few months, I did not go for many bike rides and was waiting for an oppurtunity. I met John Loney, who is also working in MindTree along with Abins, my cousin brother. Minds with similar taste met, that what happened. We planned for Hogenakkal trip in two bikes; John's and mine. Decided to start early in the morning on Sunday, 2nd April 2006.

Abins and me started from our house at Banashankari 3rd stage exactly at 6:00 am on my Pulsar 150. We met John on his Fiero F2 at BTM layout, around 6:20 am, checked the air pressure, filled enough petrol to reach Karnataka border, because petrol is cheaper in Tamilnadu. Just before crossing the Karnataka border, we stopped at a Bakery and had tea & snacks. As usual that bakery was too run buy a Malayalee from Kannur district.

Bike ride early in the morning, is very enthusiastic, watching the sun, rising up and the fog getting disappear slowly. The ride through the Bangalore Salem highway is a fantastic experience, as well as dangerous. I said dangerous in the sense, trucks may not give enough care for two wheelers in highway. We maintained an average of 70-80 km/hour through out the ride.

Bike ride through the Highway

John was in the assumption that Hogenakkal falls is 130 kms away from Bangalore, but when we reached the exotic location, it was 193 kms. We reached the place by riding 5 hours starting from 6:00 am; we had a lot of intermediate stops for tea and breakfast. We stopped at a location for taking some snaps also.

Hogenakkal Falls

When we reached there on guy named Sivan who owned the special kind of boat used there (“Kottavallam” in Malayalam) bargained with us and agreed to take us through the river and near to the falls for 500 bugs. Cannoying there in Kottavallam is the main attraction of the place. He took us in the Kottavallam through the river. He took us very near to the falling water, we all got wet. Then he performed some tricks using the Kottavallam, like rotating it very fast in the water with all of us in it.

Kottavallam

The Hogenakkal falls and the river is the border of Karnataka and Tamilnadu. This tourist place appeared in many Tamil and Kannada film songs like “ChinnaChinna Asai” of the film “Roja”. Sivan told us that ‘Veerappan’ use to live in the nearby forests and they have seen him many times. One of the interesting part of the Kottavallam ride is that, in the river banks, localites will be serving us fresh fish fry. They catch the fish from the river itself and we can choose any one from them, they will fry it on the spot and serve us. It was a very delicious dish. Then Sivan took us to some shallow water were every body can swim and bath. The place was safe for swimming, there were places where the water current is soo strong and many peoples lost their life due to carelessness.

One strange thing we noticed there were kids of the age of 7 – 12 making their life out of the money they get from the tourists for jumping into the water from the rock cliffs near the falls. They were jumping from a height of 20 to 25 meters. While we were traveling in the Kottavallam, those kids will demand for 5 rupees for a single jump, once we say yes, they will jump from the rock cliff and will swim towards us and collect the money from us.

Kids Jumping from the rock

We started our return journey around 3:00 pm, and we did not have much stops on the way back. We stopped at an Infant Jesus Church some where in the Salem High way and prayed for a while, and then we took 15 minutes rest and resumed our trip. (70 more kilometers to Bangalore from there) We reached Bangalore by 7:00 pm. We were tired pretty much and had a very good sleep on that night.

The Church nearby Salem Highway

Wayanad Trip - Part III - Chembra Peak

Chembra Peak is one of the most beautiful locations for those who love trekking. Chembra Peak is situated near the place Meppadi, 10 kms away from Kalpetta; the district head quarters. From Meppadi, the road winding through the Chembra estate leads us to the bottom of this peak. This is the highest peak in Wayanad.

While traveling towards Meppadi from Kalpetta, one can see the astonishing beauty of the peak. Chembra peak is visible from almost all the parts of Wayanad. This peak comes under the control of department of forest and travelers need to get permission from the office of the department of forest situated at Meppadi in order to climb the peak. There are elephants and leopards in the peak and the nearby mountains, and while we climbed the peak, we saw the left behind pieces of a deer eaten by a leopard or some kind of predator. We also came across foot prints of wild boars, near the heart shaped lake.

The near by peaks that surrounds Chembra Peak are amazing, but it is not possible to climb them since, it is dense forest. But the views of the nearby peaks are really wonderful.

After climbing half the peak, we came across a big lake, a true wonder. We never thought that there will be such a big lake at the top of a mountain. The water level in the lake remains constant throughout the year, as it is supplied from the underground water by mother Earth. Trekkers choose this place ideal for camping in the night, but camping is very risky unless we are supplied with enough clothes to be protected from the cold climate and we should have weapons for safety from wild animals. Climbing further up, the lake revealed to be perfectly in the shape of a heart, not sure whether somebody shaped it so.

Looking down the valley from the top of the peak is simply great. From the top of the peak, almost all parts of Wayanad can be seen. We identified few places like Kalpetta, Panamaram, Calicut ghat section etc. Since the sky was a little foggy, we couldn’t identify the places far away, but we saw blue patches, which were water reservoirs and we believe they are the part of the Padincharathara Dam site.

When we reached towards the top most part the slope as well as the wind speed increased drastically, making it difficult to climb further. We where a little bit short of water supply also.

Some More Pictures

The Other Side of the Moon

I got this picture from APOD - posted in APOD as a picture taken by Apollo 16, link given below

Click here to see the original picture taken by Apolo 16 - posted in APOD

There was a time when we believed that Earth is flat and the sky is a dome shaped hemisphere with lot of tiny fixed white spots which are visible only in dark. Of course there are two disks that start traveling from the East to the West daily – The Sun and Moon. But nobody knew how these discs and white spots appeared again in the East horizon which disappeared in the West horizon the previous day. After some time we realized that Earth is the centre of the universe and the other celestial objects revolved around the mother Earth. Now Earth is no more the center of the universe.

The Moon never turned her face and showed us the other side of it, since the revolution of moon around Earth perfectly synchronized with its rotation on its own axis. This further delayed scientists to find out that Moon is a sphere, not a disk. Of course Sun rotated and showed us all sides, but it is too bright and scientists did not notice the black spot, so it remained a disc shaped object.

We have never seen the other side of the moon, and I believe that generally nobody cares about the other side of it. The fact ‘It did not showed us the other side’ made a lot in the scientific history. I need to rethink about the principle of scientific theorem “If all the existing behavior of anything can be explained by a statement, then it is accepted as a scientific theorem”. When new behaviors are discovered we invent new theorems. But nobody knows the absolute truth, which can only be revealed by the creator.

“The moon never turned the other side on us” made a lot of difference. When we say something, or when we invent something, or when we forward a mail received, or when we judge some one, think again, whether we have seen the other side which never appeared or does it have the other side. When we speak about countries and people far away be sure that you are not generalizing the relative truth that holds well only with the face that is turned towards you, or truth that holds well only in your view.

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Wayanad Trip - Part II - Kuruvadweep

Kabani River Flowing near Kruvadweep

Kuruvadweep or Kuruva Isaland is just 3 kilometers away from my home. I have already posted some photos from the nearby places but not rom Kuruvadweep. ==>Previous Post on Kuruvadweep Kabani river get divided into two first, then five rivers, and at last these separate rivers meets together, the Island formed by the pieces of land beneath these rivers is Kuruvadweep - A land covered with dense greenaries, rivers and lakes in between.

Rivers Inside Kuruvadweep

Kuruvadweep is ideal for a one day picnic. Walking through the dense trees between rivers and by corssing the rivers is different experience. Inside the river, if we carefully watch, we can spot lot of orchids of hundreds of types. Kuruvadweep is preserved by the department of forest and special permission is required to go inside the land.

Trees of different shapes in Kuruva

Kuruvadweep is situated near the border of Payyampally and Pulpally Panchayath. Two river - "Manathavady Puzha" and "Panamaram Puzha" joins together at "Koodalkadavu" to form Kabani river. From there the river flows towards Karnataka. A good resort is coming up near kuruvadweep and recently tree houses are also built near the bank of the river.

Some more view of the rivers

Kuruwadweep s about 15 kms from Manathavady, Pulpally or Panamaram. Some parts of these rivers are very deep, may be more than 2 or 3 times the heigt of an average human. So travellers should be careful while getting into the rivers inside. Very rarely we can see corcodiles in the nearby places, but they have never attacked humans and vice versa, they always make sure they stay away from humans. Elephants pass through this place very rarely from the nearby forests. The land is very safe for picnic except for the deep rivers.

Some more snaps from Kuruvadweep

WikiMapia link of Kuruvadweep

Update on 2nd Feb 2007
In the above picture you can see the Kabani River splitting into two and joining together after a while to create the wonderful 950 acres island – Kuruvadweep. There after you can see the joined river flowing towards the North East corner towards Karnataka.

WikiMapia link of Koodalkadavu

Update on 2nd Feb 2007
In the above picture you can see the two rivers – Manathavady River and Panamaram River joining together to form the Koodalkadavu. The two bridges which is clearly visible connects Payyampally and Cherukattoor, then Cherukattoor and Pulpally. The distance to Pulpally is reduced to 15 kilometers from 35 kilometers after these two bridges were established.