Govinda Goooovinda

This was long overdue. I still can't believe that it had been more than 2 years since I last visited Thirumala. It definitely had to happen before I started one of the most important phases of my life.

So on a beautiful Saturday morning, Bala and myself left from our house in my SX4. We picked up Srinath and Pande in Malleswaram and then Lakshman at Krishnarajapuram. By the time we left Bangalore it was already 7 AM. The weather was excellent and the traffic was sparse. Perfect driving conditions. These conditions spurred a range of topics from politics to cricket, and the discussions were as usual well balanced and informative.

After our breakfast at Palamner, our next stop was in Kanipakam Vinayaka Temple. The temperature was in the higher 30's by now and our darshan was also delayed. But all of us were really patient, and in the end we had a very good darshan.

Our next stop was Srinivasa Mangapuram, on the way to Tirupati. Legend has it that, if you pray for a life companion here, you will immediately find one. Since I was in no hurry to find one, I prayed for a wonderful life for my brother and sister in law. The deity was wonderfully decorated. And the place was so clam that my mind was almost instantly in peace. This deity infuses a lot of "bhakti" in a person.

We were slightly behind schedule due to bad roads and we were trying to play catch up. We reached Tirupati around lunch time, and immediately went into Bhimas restaurant for a completely authentic Andhra meal. After lots of rice and pappum, we started to look out for accommodations. Either they were expensive or dint have car park. Since I was very particular about the car park, we kept on searching.

After looking a few places, we were fed up and decided to visit Govindaraja patna. Surprisingly Tirupati was so less crowded, we almost felt we were in the wrong place. There was minimum queue for everything, nothing more than a Saturday queue at Ragigudda. So every Darshan was super quick. After Govindaraja patna, we continued our search for a accommodation. Finally we landed up on one with both a car park and also well within our budget. The rooms were decent, nothing much to mention about it, although the mattresses could have been better. But the room search had eaten into our plans and we were so behind that we had to drop Sree Kalahasti.

We next went to Tirchoor Alamelu Mangamma temple, wife of Lord Srinivasa. Yet again we had a super fast darshan and started to hope that the crowd is sparse in Thirumala too. It was night by the time we came back from Padmavati. Our hotel was on a one way. And we dint know how to reach it. Due to our arrogance and stupidity, we decided to find the way on our own without local help. And that was a BIG mistake. We ended up in a dead-end on the 10 feet road, with heavy two wheeler traffic. SX4 being a shockingly big vehicle, reversing it out for 100 meters or so in that traffic was an achievement. After that we asked for directions and reached the right road. We had light dinner, owing to the lunch in Bhima's, which was equivalent to 3 normal meals in terms of quantity. Since we had to get up early next day, we all crashed as soon as we reached the room.

Next day morning we got up at 3:30 AM. As usual Srinath was the lazy bugger who got up last. Everyone was ready by 4:45 AM. And we reached Alapiri by 4:55. And as per our plan we started the climb by 5 AM. We were at the Galigopuram by 6. The climb till Galigopuram is the toughest. But it is the most beautiful climb too. Although you are surrounded by people, you feel alone. It is the time I always use for introspection. You can feel the first sun rays filtering through the clouds, experience the wonderful chirping sounds of the birds, listen to your own breath. The smell "kunkum" and camphor is solacing. This climb will take you to your pinnacle of devotion. It can make an atheist a God loving person.

We were there at Galigopuram by 5:45. Now TTD is giving free darshan tickets to climbers, so that they can have a darshan as soon as they finish the climb. I personally felt it was a great gesture. After getting the ticket, we continued our climb. The rest of the climb is realtively easy and we asked each other a lot of lateral thinking questions. We reached the top at 7:45 AM. It was a decent paced climb. Once on top, we found a room to take a quick bath (through influence :( ) After that we headed to Mayura restaurant for a breakfast which later turned out to be brunch.

We headed for the Free Cloak room, which turned out to be heavily crowded and took almost 1 hour to deposit our bags. Next we joined the darshan queue. We instantly knew that it was not the normal Tirupati crowd and our darshan would be super smooth. And we weren't wrong. The whole darshan took just 2 hours. We got a couple of lucky breaks in the queue which helped us save atleast 40 minutes. But the entire trip was more than worth for the 10 odd seconds. The prasadam was as usual mouth watering. We collected the laddus and took a jeep back to Tirupati.

Once back in Tirupati, we checked out of the room, and headed straight towards Bangalore. The drive was by itself uneventful. It took approx 6 hours with half hour break. I reached home by 10:30 and had the most amazing sleep ever.

Updates

Its been some time since I wrote a post here. Partly because I have been busy with work, my brother's marriage preparation, but mainly because I am so damn lazy. Lots of things have happened since my last post worth mentioning here.

-Elections : This has become the talk of the nation. Every other thing is subdued and rightly so. The General Election is and should be the biggest event in the country. I have mixed feelings regarding the elections. Sometimes I feel great to be part of the biggest democracy. Comparing the situation in Pakistan, I feel blessed to be part of India. But at other times I feel Sad, Disappointed and outright Angry. I feel that I'm part of a circus crowd watching the clowns (read politicians) perform. I won't go into the talk of which party is better, who has a better manifesto, who has criminal records, or who is worthy. Its not for me as a single person to decide. Its for the entire nation to decide. But I do feel for our country. India in its current state does not deserve Democracy. Its too much power in the hands of innocent people who are being exploited. But having heard stories about all the deadly dictators in history, I feel we are better of with the clowns leading us.

-IPL : Ranks in Second only to elections. The IPL fever has caught everyone and I'm no exception. The shift to South Africa clearly demonstrates that IPL is a truly global event. I am, have been and always will be a true supporter of Royal Challengers Bangalore. They have had some hard luck, key players losing form in crucial moments and also at times some dismal performances. But the way they have fought through criticism, is inspirational. A special mention has to be made here for Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble. You have made us, kannadigas proud with your determination and talent. Keep the red and yellow flying. Our support is always with you.

-Friends : Lots of good news coming from friends. Ravi left to HongKong for his internship with Merrill Lynch. Aditya got his admit call from XIMB. Neeraj got a call from IIMK and converted it. Amit Bhansali got a call from SP Jain and he is coming to Mumbai.

-Tirupati : The much avaited trip is finally happening. It used to be my custom to visit Tirupati after every semister in Engineering. It gave me confidence and strength. But after Engineering I have not been able to have a darshan of Lord Venkateshwara. Not that I was busy or I was arrogant. It just din't happen, and that makes me feel sad. But I'm going to Tirupati tomorrow with Bala, Srinath, Pande and Lakshman. Hoping to have a great darshan before I go to Mumbai. Govinda Goooovinda.

-Movies : Watched lot of movies lately. Firaaq and Gulaal are two movies worthy of watching. Firaaq is extremely well directed by Nandita Das and Nasaruddin Shah, Paresh Rawal, and the small kid (don't know his name) give mind blowing performances. The film seems so real. The pain suffered by each individual is communicated to the last tear drop. Extremely well made movie. A must watch. Gulaal is also a good movie. Kay Kay's performance is top notch. The dialogues are excellent. It gives a interesting insight into politics of a different kind. Also watched The Reader, Revolutionary Road, Madagascar 2, Me and Marley, All the boys love Mandy Lane, Milk, Luck By Chance and lots more. Uff... I told you, I'm a lazy bum :-)

Brain Power - Am I fully utilizing it?

I was talking with one of my friends recently, and he came up with an interesting statistic:

Humans use only 10% of their brain power. And that too this 10% is used by the most brilliant, falling in the Einstein category. The rest, mortals, like me use even less.

I hadn't heard of this statistic before. Understandably I was bemused. Much later I came to find that this was a pretty common knowledge. Even my mom knew about this rather absurd statistic. So this one is not a thing that is cooked up in one of the thousands of senseless mail forwards that we get. And my mom also confirmed that this was known to my grand-mom too! So this is definitely been passed since ages. But I consider this to be a myth. And I'll list out my reasons for the same.

The idea that we only use 10% of our brains is probably such an enduring myth because it's comforting to think we have spare capacity. The 'unused' 90% could take up the slack after brain injury or offer the possibility for miraculous self-improvement. These were some of the thoughts that were passing in my mind to refute this myth.

• If we only use 10% of our brains then damage to some parts of our brains should have no effect on us. As most of you will agree that this is patently not true.
• From an evolutionary perspective it is highly unlikely we developed a resource-guzzling organ, of which we only use 10%. This doesn't make any sense.
  
• Brain imaging such as MRI shows that even while asleep there aren't any areas of our brain that completely 'switch off'. Seen this in one of the episodes of 'House M.D'. I know, it is still a TV show. But it might be true too.
  
• Parts of the body that aren't used soon shrivel and die. Same goes for the brain. Any neurons we weren't using would soon shrivel and die. Its just principles of evolution.

Anyone who still maintains we only use 10% of our brains after all these facts, has to come up with a counter-argument for each one of these. Actually, you might argue that imaging technology is rubbish or the neurons are only working at 10% capacity, but refuting all four, taken together? Now that's tricky.

Whatever its provenance, the 10% myth is certainly a slippery customer. The reason is two-pronged: first, it's impossible to prove something doesn't exist and second, people like to believe it. If I say I've seen God, or visited Mars, or that all our brains have huge untapped potential, you can't definitively prove me wrong.

Perhaps putting it the other way around might deliver the knock-out blow. Instead of talking about the 90% of untapped potential, just ask people why they only use 10% of their brains. Would anyone seriously admit to that? I, for one, am working at maximum capacity. Well, most of the time anyway...

Wayanad - Truly God's own country

After my trip to Mumbai for the NM admissions, I was back in Namma Bengalooru to celebrate Ugadi. The Hindu New Year. I was also back on the same day for one more reason. Road Trip to Wayanad. Since Ugadi was on a Friday, we had an extended weekend and that meant more time for the trip. But most of us (including me) wanted to celebrate Ugadi at home. So we agreed to leave after the 'habbada oota' on Friday afternoon.

But the planning was not easy sailing by any stretch of imagination. Just getting people to agree on matters (mostly trivial) was a humongous task. It was like 8 people pulling a cart in 8 different directions. Sometimes the mailchains(mode of communication) used to go so out of topic that people would start to get confused why it all started!

But finally we had 8 of them on board. Sathish, Madhu KV, Aditya, Ravi, Vikram, Sujith, Prashanth and myself making it a all BMS gang. Couple of them did opt out due to personal commitments (Ani, Ketchup and Vijet)

Everyone was asked to assemble at my place at 2:30PM. And to my shock, everyone was there! Adi had picked KV, KP and Ravi from his house and Sat, Vikram and Sujith came directly to my house. Adi had taken his Swift and I had taken my Swift. So we left Bangalore at 3 PM hoping for a 'Swift' journey.

The Mysore road was pretty empty and we kept a very nice pace through out. We took a small coffee break near Maddur. Apart from that there were no stops in the entire journey. We had booked a room in Kalapetta which is one of the bigger towns in Wayanad. People had told me that it would take 6 hours to reach Kalapetta. Considering the night journey in the latter part I had told the Chandragiri Inn (hotel where we stayed) that I would reach by 10 PM and would do dinner on the way.

After Mysore road, we took the Ring Road to join Ooty road (NH 212). The stretch of road from Mysore to Nanjangud is not that good. Though there are no potholes, the tarmac is not smooth either. But after Nanjangud, the road becomes a heaven to drive. At Gundulpet, we took a right deviation towards Bandipur-->Manthunga-->Sultan Bathery-->Kalpetta. The road is excellent throughout and the weather was cool. A pleasant surprise for us. We reached Kalpetta at 7:30 PM. Just 5 hrs 30 mins drive including a short break. I realized that we had ripped a little, but we were happy to have reached early.

We settled down in the room. The room was good. Fully carpeted, excellent bathroom with all modern fittings, cable TV, double bed and a small balcony. We had booked 3 such rooms which cost us Rs 550/- per day. Indeed Chandragiri Inn is a nice budget hotel at the center of the town. After that we went to Haritagiri for dinner. This is the part of Kerla I hate. The food, where ever you go in Kerla is pathetic for tourists (the locals do enjoy it :-)) It feels that every food is immersed in coconut oil. Everything smells like the oiled head of a Mallu. After dinner we went back to the room, played some Uhno cards and slept. We had planned lot of things for the next morning.

As usual we were late in getting ready and behind the schedule. We had planned to cover Soochipura falls, Meenmutty falls, Pookode Lake, Likkidi view points and if time permitted an Ayurvedic massage. We had breakfast at Woodlands hotel. This is the worst hotel I have seen regarding service. It has just 1 chef who takes all the orders. But even sadder part is he prepares everything order by order. So if two people have ordered dosas he wont put it together, but he will put one dosa first and then again put another dosa after severing the first one. Dumbos! Drive to Soochipura falls was mesmerizing. The winding roads through tea plantations was pleasure to the eyes. After 30 mins of traveling we reached the falls. We had to walk couple of kilometers on steps to reach the falls. But once we reached the falls, we were shocked to see the crowd. Its was extremely crowded. There was not even a inch of space under the falls. Most of them did not want to get into the water there and continue to Meenmutty falls. But after waiting for sometime, we decided to get down. Even the crowd had reduced by this time. And what a wonderful decision it turned out to be. The Soochipura falls is heaven on earth. Although the rocks are damn slippery near the falls, its all worth the effort. All the 8 of us got under the falls. Although couple of them did manage to fall (including me), there were no serious incidents. The climb back was tiring. The sun was out in full force and that meant all our energy was sapped by now. So was most of our enthu. We had lunch is a very bad restaurant who took a total 1 hour to serve pathetic food. By this time half of them wanted to skip Meenmutty falls(not me). So a coin was tossed to make a decision. They won, so Meenmutty was skipped :-(

We headed back to our room, and it started raining. I guess in Wayanad it never rains, it only pours! Each drop was like a small rock. It was a short thunder storm. After it subdued, we headed towards Pookode Lake. Its an amazing lake. Very serene. Nice picnic spot with boating and stuff. But for a bunch of hooligans like us, its a boring place. The boating was suspended and later closed due to the rain. We took a walk around the lake, ate some stuff and since there was lot of time left, we came back to the room hoping for an Ayurvedic massage. But the crowd beat us there again. To our disappointment all the places were fully booked for the night. So we just had dinner, and slept blissfully.

Our agenda for the next morning was to finish Edkkal caves and drive back home. So we had breakfast in Kalapetta and checked out of our rooms. After a short drive to Edkkal caves, we started our hike. The climb to the caves is steep and strenuous. There is nothing much to see in the caves. Some prehistoric carvings that none of us bothered about. I felt the actual cave part was very small for it to become such a big tourist attraction. But later I realized that it was not just the caves that interested people, but the trek after the caves to the peak of the hill. The climb does get pretty tough at certain points, but nothing unmanageable. The climb to the top was tiring and people from our group started to drop off in the middle. First casualty was Sujith. No big surprise there. Next to drop off were KV and KP. Again no big surprise. The rest reached the top of the peak. The local maxima. The view was wonderful. The climb down was easier that I thought it would be.

The drive back to Bangalore was as pleasurable as the drive to Wayanad had been. Relaxing. That was the theme of our trip. Apart from the climb to Edakkal caves rest of the trip was so relaxing that at times I felt we were outright lazy. In all it was a fun filled trip, with loads of wonderful memories. Although the place did have its charm, it was the company of these amazing friends that made this trip a pleasure. Looking forward for the next trip :-)