Karnataka - Mysore & Bangalore

... I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things....

                                                                                                                        - Henry David Thoreau


I was reading an article Simplify! Simplify! by Henry David Thoreau in a magazine of May 1999, Modern Practical Psychology and was obliged to share this excerpt. I am grateful to have found it in my dad's big drawer and for his acceptance to let me borrow it. I know this is a digression from what I usually share but there is no harm in sharing wise words which touch our hearts and are obscure to our practical or realistic minds.




Mysore from 14th February, 2016 to 16th February, 2016 : In Photos

The first night in Mysore was a bike ride to this beautifully lit Mysore Palace

The place I couchsurfed in Mysore

Sunsets are always worthwhile

Mysore Palace in the daylight

Bangalore from 16th February, 2016 to 24th February, 2016 : In Photos

Cubbon Park

The place I couchsurfed in Bangalore

Other couchsurfers with me in Bangalore

State Library

Another park to hang out together

During the walk in the rural side

Tamil Nadu - Chennai, Pondicherry & Auroville

1st February, 2016

The day I reached Chennai, I was already exhausted in the struggle to reach Mambalam via a local train from Chennai Central. First of all, the names are a bit tricky to remember. Second, the temperature was unpleasantly high. Third, my absentmindedness increases the hard-work (like paying for a ticket at the counter, coming all the way to the platform after two flights of stairs and then realising that I didn't carry the ticket).

The train journey from Ballarpur to Chennai was a comfortable one which gave me ample of time to think (But too much of introspection isn't fun). It included sleeping, talking to the guy who was travelling to Chennai from Delhi for two nights to get a copy of his lost certificates, thinking, planning and sleeping (I did it a lot, trust me). 

The short local train journey wasn't a big deal until I realised that no one can actually speak in Hindi or English around me. A lady with an irritated countenance jerked me aside for my error to block the way. To my relief, the lady sitting on my right initiated to help me out and told me the number of stations until Mambalam. 

Sri Mani, my CS host in Chennai picked me up from Mambalam station. He lives at a beautiful abode with his parents. Being a photographer, he is searching for a job in Mumbai.

Chennai gave me an impression that people in this city live in their own world. It might not be an impression but a vibe.

Sitting at the Bessy beach with a friend at night, hearing the waves, looking at the lights far away, star-gazing, observing the couples around you (not to the extent of creeping them out) and a cup of coffee. A drive within the city by Sri Mani and his parents' care for a stranger. Meeting a schoolmate after almost 9 months. Chennai was all about these.

3rd February, 2016

If you're willing to interact with strangers, you will find someone to talk to during most of the bus and train journeys. Also, interaction is an important trait to hold as a traveller.

After breakfast at Sarvana Bhavan with Sri Mani, it was time for me to leave for Pondicherry. This bus journey had scenic views in store for me, music served as a wonderful accompaniment and the Keralite woman next to me, travelling to Pondicherry College after a vacation, made a good companion.

Pondicherry and Auroville have given me lots of interesting moments to reminisce. I had two hosts in Pondi, Sadeesh and Tamiz. It's surprising how Sadeesh took care of me with brotherly affection and made my stay homely. Tamiz took out time to show me a few places in Pondi and Auroville.

The coincidence of meeting Richard when Tamiz was supposed to meet his next guest, Leah is one that I shall enthusiastically share. Leah was to stay as Tamiz's CS guest while I was supposed to leave for Kodaikanal that night. But my flexibility was to the extent where I didn't have a ticket for my planned destination two hours before I was supposed to leave. 
Richard and Leah were volunteering at Sapney farm in Auroville and that's how I took Leah's place in the farm and Leah took my place.

It was after 10pm when Richard and I started from Pondicherry to Auroville via the murky road with hardly any vehicle passing by, starry night to gaze at and pleasantly cold winds slapping our faces during the Scooty ride.

11 days passed by in Pondi and Auroville. Last day was spent with Sadeesh before bidding him farewell to leave for my next destination while Tamiz dropped me at Chennai Central railway station where I was supposed to catch a train.

Below are the pictures of

Pondicherry from the lighthouse

Lighthouse

A glimpse of Pondicherry

The top floor was where I stayed. Farm Fresh restaurant on the ground floor made it super-easy to get pizzas and pastas instantly.

A walk around Sadeesh's place led me to a temple

A beautiful picture of Gods and Goddesses on the ceiling

Another glimpse of Pondicherry during my walk

A random click of a building I really liked

Matrimandir in Auroville

The entry gate of the farm holding a board

Tasks to be done at the farm

The hut I stayed in at the Sapney Farm

Hammock that helped to display my laziness throughout a day

The place where nights were spent

The Volunteer Group at the Sapney Farm

Maharashtra - Mumbai

15th January, 2016

It was the day I decided to take a full-day rest until I left for Mumbai with Caroline and Matt. Before leaving for the bus to Mumbai, we burnt our own Chinese lanterns.
This was also the time I was uber excited to meet my friend, Eshan who had probably all panned for me - my stay and food.

16th January, 2016

One night of bus journey and there I was in Mumbai for the third time. Caroline and Matt got down at Santa Cruz and I was waiting for the last stop, Bandra. I met Eshan at the station and we went to Band Stand to grab some snacks from CCD (again, not recommended at all for a traveller) and a cup of cardamom tea. 

A good conversation and some time spent with my feet in water under the pleasantly warm sun. 

Below are the pictures of

Ahmedabad from my CS host's place

Band Stand

Relaxing at the Band Stand

The next few days weren't much of an active journey as my health condition seemed to go on a downfall. I was ill-starred for a few days which led me to a doctor and then to Ballarpur for my treatment. Ballarpur is a suburban area where my dad grew up. The house is almost fifty years old with the Ballarpur Industries Limited (BILT) right in front of it. Once in the pink again, I was all set for the resumption of my trip.

Below are the pictures of

Fishermen spotted during the ferry in Gorai (Mumbai) to reach Global Vipassana Pagoda

Global Vipassana Pagoda

The house currently occupied by my grandparents, uncle and their pet, Bruno

The terrace gives the pleasure to observe the sunset each day

Gujarat - Ahmedabad

Ahmedabad on 12th January

In the evening of 12th January, I took a Volvo bus from Vadodara to reach Ahmedabad. During my expensive (a low budget traveller would consider taking an AC bus to be expensive) bus journey, I took a look at the Gujarat map to plan a little bit and decided to visit a tourist office for The Rann Festival booking.

On reaching a bus stop in Ahmedabad, I went through another bewildered situation.
I asked a lady regarding my destination and took the bus to the place she mentioned. It's pretty hard to catch a local bus with rucksacks on your back and front as the buses do not tend to stop for more than three seconds. 
Once I got down the bus, I asked an auto-rik driver about my destination. I was taken aback at his reply that I came all the way opposite to where I was supposed to reach. Lesson learnt - Ask multiple number of humans about a place even if the first person sounds very confident. It was already near 8 pm and I didn't have the energy to go through another bus ride for the tourist office. Plan procrastinated for the next day.

Another problem that Ahmedabad created for me was the unavailability of CS hosts.

I asked the middle-aged driver to drop me off at a decent hotel with moderate tariff.
The Grand Eden Hotel turned out to be pretty grand. With the 3300 rupees out of my pocket, I couldn't think of staying for more than a night there.

13th January, 2016

The next morning, I decided to take a bus to Modhera for a Dance Festival after a city tour in Ahmedabad.
After the complimentary breakfast and check-out, I approached the nearest auto-rik. The man was greedily brave enough to ask for 800 rupees for a city tour. And I was ignorant enough to bargain just by 200 rupees.
He was a nice man apart from the fact that he charged me double of what was to be paid.
Lesson learnt - Check for city tours in the city or ask the locals regarding the tariff.

Below are the pictures of

A picture of 

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and 

Kasturba Gandhi in Sabarmati Ashram

A temple

Sidi Saiyyed Mosque, a lady isn't allowed to enter a mosque. 

I did enter to get a good view of the semicircular windows covered by mesh 

popularly known as 'Jali' but soon told to get out by an old man.

Adalaj Stepwell or Adalaj ki Vav 

Kankaria Lake

Soon, the good news of the availability of a CS host arrived. Bandish already had two couchsurfers reaching his place. I told him about my struggle to find a host before he showered his generosity to host me. I was exhilarated and decided to stay in Ahmedabad for the Kite Festival.
After the tour, I reached Bandish's place at the same time when the other two CS guests arrived - Caroline and Matt. Bandish lives with five others in a huge apartment.
Caroline, Matt and I were given a room for our stay.

After a short conversation, three of us decided to go out for lunch at a bistro suggested by Bandish. I had a chicken shakshuka for the first time along with a cup of tea. Tea was just to relieve myself from the nascent stages of cold I had gotten.

A siesta seemed to have deteriorated my throat and deprived me of my voice. Missed out on a Poetry event.
The impending night was worthwhile when all of us went for a group walk to see the market place during the Kite Festival preparation. If one enters the crowded streets of kite shops, it's hard to stand still to take a good shot. People would be buying good number of kites and holding them up to save them from getting damaged, youngsters would buy noisy plastic toys to whistle, small stalls of creams rolls and other street food are necessarily present including people like us to observe the action and take some good memories.

The walk ended with a discussion about individual observations and experience, some snacks and hot tea.

14th January, 2016

The next day was all about Kite Festival - kites and Chinese lanterns.
Bandish took us to the old city of Ahmedabad for kite flying. After trying once, I was sure to consider it a skilled sport which it might be. The morning passed with all the hard work to successfully fly a kite. The evening was all about Chinese lanterns in the sky.

Below are the pictures of

A kite which was succesfully flown

Old City in the evening

Tried to get a good picture of a Chinese lantern.

 This one seems better than the other pictures.

Gujarat - Vadodara

11th January, 2016

On reaching the Jaipur railway station without a ticket to Vadodara and oblivious of the train timings, I passed the security check and kindly asked the security guard regarding the train. I am sure he was a curious man to ask me why I was in Jaipur. I, in my pure honesty, answered that I am travelling alone for recreation. It seemed as if he got a little offended and interjected what in the world set me off to travel alone. A short smile and I went for the ticket queue.

Obviously, I had to get a General Ticket and that meant standing in the line or apparently, in a group of men howling in front of the ticket counter to get information about the train timings. Once, I got to know that my train was supposed to leave at 2 pm, I bought a ticket and had three hours to kill. I went to a small dhaba outside the railway station for brunch. The rotis and kadai paneer with hardly two small pieces of cottage cheese and a layer of oil surely gave me the calories to keep me going till evening.

Never in my life have I sat on a platform of a railway station. I had more than two hours to kill and even my playlist seemed to be taking me to the age of monotony. After an hour, I decided to sit on a proper seat. 
On seeing me with the rucksacks, a man approached me and started his questionnaire until the whole shebang started feeling creepy. When you don't want to create a scene, the least you do is answer politely and look away. The creepy man (who also saved his number on my phone and dialed it to get my digits on his phone but luckily, I snatched it back just early enough!) finally left me after he took my word on getting a call or message from me. *Phew*
Time to board the train. And there comes a disaster. Due to the cancellation of a train, the General coach was unbelievably full till the gate. I walked to the Non AC coach and decided to sit there until the Travelling Ticket Examiner arrives to charge me with a fine. During schooldays, there used to be times when getting punished with classmates felt better than standing out alone. This was a similar situation. I found accomplices who didn't get any space in the General coach and were apprehensive to sit in the Non AC coach. They were two families travelling together with two young kids.
I have never been through this situation and travelling with the wrong ticket felt crazy.

We stayed together throughout the train journey. The imminent problem was to find some place to sit once the lawful temporary occupants of our seats arrived. Sundown, many came and many left. Night arrived and so the TTE who charged us all with a good amount of fine.
The families were unwilling to pay the amount and I felt it wasn't our problem that we didn't get to stand in the stupidly crowded coach resulted due to the cancellation of some train.

I slept for two hours until the train reached Vadodara at 2 am. The ladies and the kids of the two families were asleep in a cramped space of a lower side berth. Their destination was four hours away from mine.

An auto-rikshaw ride to reach my CS host's place and I was received by Meghal downstairs. He lives with his wife at his beautiful abode. I was given some biscuits and a water bottle once he showed me my room. He went to his room and I decided to kip once and for all.

12th January, 2016

The next morning, I set off to see what Vadodara has got for me. My first stop was Lakshmi Villas Palace which proved to be the best palace I have ever visited.

The next stop was Sayaji Baug.

The next stop was Kansaar Gujarati Thali Restaurant which proved to be worthwhile. If you have a sweet tooth to the extent where you would like your whole meal to be rife with sweetness, Gujarati food is for you. Once I was done with my sumptuous meal, I decided to walk back to Meghal's place. It was a long walk in the scorching weather but which traveller wouldn't like to take a city tour.

Below are the pictures clicked during the walk.

Kite Festival Preparation, this is a procedure to keep 
the threads on the spools untangled.

Sons helping their blind father cross the road

Random shot of dilapidated houses