Music and Meaning

Thanks to a great personality, I was intoroduced to one of the divine singers of this age, TM Krisshna. Since the day I heard him in a concert around newyear's, I have been dying for more. Yesterday a good friend and I were at Planet M and I picked up a CD of the man with the brass voice. Today was listeneing to it on my way to office. At the busy MG road traffic signal this fantastic voice is doing this neraval and in a moment, at the busy signal, my mood elavated. The joy became so profound that tears burst forth. What is it that makes me so happy? It's not words, but just the 7 swaras and the play with it. Or, may be it's just the flow. The ups and downs and the interlacing of it. There are a million things that carnatic music holds in itself. What would be life without music...beautiful but then lacking in beauty.







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Random thoughts from a single origin

Love is like sand in hand, hold it too loose and it flies away, squeeze it too hard and it slips away.

Expectation - Translitereation from kannada: If it does not bend as a sapling, will it bend as a tree.

Nip it in the bud - even if you hope it might bloom into a flower - if the bud wants to rush to become a flower, wants all the attention, a bud that is weak or does not understand that there are other buds in the plant but sucks all the sap away.

One bad stands out despire a hundred good.

Sunsets

I work on one of the tall buildings in the city. I am on the 10th floor and the pantry overlooks the Southern side of the city. There is nothing that obstructs my view. The sunsets are the best thing here. See some shots I took on my phone. I pray to god, next time make me an Eagle.

Sunsetting

Sunset

Manfredi Triathlon

This month has seen me devouring 3 fantastic books. All by the Italian writer, Valerio Massimo Manfredi. The titles:
Empire of Dragons
The Oracle
The Talisman of Troy

He is a fantastic writer who is a master at interleaving history and fiction. All the books are very good but the best was Empire of the Dragon. It has a good blend of war, struggle to survive, for power, of deceit and valor, ego and it's breaking, travel, history and fable.

My next on must read by Manfredi:
Last Legion
Alexander collection

Please note, I am accepting gifts, in case someone is feeling like you know what to get me :-)

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cast in sugar

India, Tradition, Classical, Customs, Festival, Festive food, Festival Preparations, these are words that ignite a sort of passion in me. Somehow, I feel we are a lost generation. We are neither Indians nor Westerners, we try to ape the westerners and we succeed in being apes. I don’t even see the point of trying to become like them when they are so not ready to accept us even as humans, let alone as "them". Why do we want to become part of the hypocrisy? The worst is the kind of outlook we have towards our own language and customs and the "not so well off as us" people. Why do we want to spit at ourselves? The worst thing in the world is internal conflict of a man against himself and accepting to be degraded. I see a lot of people from my own generation going through it. The internal conflict is how they identify themselves as, in reality they are Indians but are supposed to be western in behavior. We can see clearly that being modern is not all about drinking and partying but in making our nation strong, getting our infrastructure right, getting back to being a developed country. It is sickening to be called cheap labor, to be thrown tit-bits, leftovers and rotten junk and being told that we are the IT capital. This is against what we read in our history, what we see in our grandparents and we are left lost. There is absolutely no respect for the generation, from the elders nor from peers. Everyone knows we are doing nothing great and in such a case where does the respect come from? The money is there, but the respect and dignity, it's just not there. Sometimes I hate our previous generation, for not being the kind who taught us to care for our own values, for wavering and loosing identity and many other reasons the top of which is the desire for money in dollars and for respecting dollars and not humans.

These were random musings as I was making the cast sugar sweets for the harvest festival. We are like the sugar casts, tasty and sweet but not strong, who melt away easily and loose our identity but then essential for flavor.

Memory down tea-lane

Not too long back, everyday evening I used to have friends over at home. It was not the posh - get slosh kind of crowd but just the boy next door, level headed bram-boy, kind of friends. I would make tea, we would sit at the steps of the front door overlooking into the garden and talk. Anything, right from academics to music to sex. We would spend a hour or so together and they would get back home. It was such a filling experience. Since work started this custom has stopped. Everyone is now grownup, all are busy, and the void is growing bigger in the heart. I wonder why at office colleagues remain acquaintances and never become friends.

mango season's here!

:-) Can't wait to have the mango flower chutney, tender mango pickles, raw mangos with salt and chilli power not to forget the juicy mangos.

The trigger was this tiny mango fallen from my tree:



by the way, that's natural sunlight streaming from between the tree :-)

This is a look at my tree:

Hats off!

He is a Perfectionist. In play, in life, in talk and whereever else. He is as precise as a swiss watch and handles all kinds of tennis styles with ease, just like a swiss knife. He is calm on the outside like a lull before the storm and charged up like a raging storm inside. It's beyond pleasure watching him play. Roger, you rock man! Hats off to you!

Misty Mornings

Finally I managed to get out of bed early in the morning today! I went to my favourite place, lalbag and as I was jogging around the lake, I heard the familiar quack quack of my ducks! A sort of welcome call to me. The misty air was running through my hair, leaving a tingling sensation as it caressed my body and soul. I reached the far corner of the lake and as I turned the pre-dawn scattered a scarlet red across the sky and a shimmering reflection in the water. The mist laiden trees dividing the Heaven from Earth and as I watched this colour play my mind streached across the boundary and united with nature. I then jogged on and as I completed another 2 rounds, the sun peeked from behind the palms.

I usually get to savour the lovely sunset across the city's skyline and as I was watched this splendid sunrise mirrored in the lake my joy was magnified two folds. Louis armstrong with that husky raw voice was the apt choice for today's jog. (remembered a moment with my ex, he got me the pod last year around this time). As the divine morning turned towards a normal day, I headed back to a mist kissed bike.

Invasion time and again

Somehow I have come to the conclusion that India has been and will be one of the richest and most sought after country in the world. Time and again outsider come here, make money, put Indians down and get lost leaving behind bad taste and memories.
It all started with the muslims invading this place a few centuries ago, looting it, polluting it and now living in it but not loving it.
Then came the Brits and the other colour changing skins from Europe (not sure why call them white when they turn red, blue and green depending on their mood). Again it was the same loot, pollute and abuse story.
Finally we got independence and got branded as a country with people to use as slaves for the so called developed but immature minded nations. The same pre-independace story in a different form, Some select people were taken to the developed countries to make it more rich, the others were used as "skilled labour" for the fast growing IT Industries's crappy clean up and maintainence work that no one enjoyed doing. If maintenance is "GOOOD" work then why do we look down upon people tending to gardens and buildings and look up at architects and landscape designers with awe? The same shit applies to IT. Now the developed countires are given "warning" that developing nations are become developed! (see this) Scared hyprocrits that they are, don't even have the courage to accept that other nations can be developed too and they have the balls to talk of world peace and growth (may be they forgot to put a note that they are talkin of their world and not Earth).
Next comes the invasion into our own country for all the Travel stories they want to make. I don't mind them making a travel show. As travellers they show a different prespective but as long as they are un-biased and openminded its fine. Ofcorse, they expect to see Europe/US in asia, which is very absurd but then again can't expect much out of narrow minded travel guides. What I really am against is why the hell do some non-indian person have to tell the world about Indian culture and cooking? Recently I was watching this chinese cooking show and the chinese woman settled elsewhere was making these chinese dishes and in between she was praising the Chinese and China's culture. On the other hand there was this other show in which some horrible firang who does not know the name of the spices used also was trying to cook some Indian food and half the time he was complaining on how spicy and fattening and what not Indian food was. Then why the bloody ***K was he making a living cooking Indian food! The same thing happened another time where they were showing Durga pooja preparation and the moron acting as the host goes about saying "The gaudy colors that Indians seem to love so much". I am shocked to see such sick comments from people who are used to "neutral" statements and of "mild" nature. Then there was this praise of Calcutta as India's literary capital and I confused. I mean, there are so many languages in India and there can never be one single place for our Country when it comes to cultural/lirerary superiority. Why can't people frame correct sentences that give out the complete facts. These are what make our country different and special and how can a Firang even be expected to understand this when most of the Indians dont! This happens time and again and it's time we raise our heads and stand for our dignity; than letting the Firangs screw us and our dignity. It's time the channels/producers recruit some "proper" people from India for shows based in India.

p.s: This is just a verbalisation of reaction to some events on TV and is not meant to hurt sentiments of anyone on EARTH.

Xmas!!

Ok I know this post is a little delayed but then I got the pictures only now!!

For this last christmas, I joined with a few of my friends and with a lot of help (concepts including making us practice, getting the songs and tunes) from my teacher Ivy Thomas, we made a small choir. Here are a few snaps from that party. It was one jolly good party and we sung carols in German, English, Spanish and even Japanese!


Oh ya the Santa gave me a gift too and there was free cake and coke from the maxmuller cafe.

THats me with SAntA...


Thats my instructor in the shawl. One energetic person with a fab voice!


THe entire bunch Zinging :-)

About bikes and technicalities

I was generally musing about how the reserve fuel thing works on my bike. I know it's just 2 intake pipes at different heights and all that but still I wanted to google it and see what comes up. I found this really nice site that has some pretty neat stuff!



The main article

The valve used to control the intake is called petcock. (don't get ideas here! funny name I know!). Click petcock to findout more.

Also, I found out why excatly I crashed into the hill last time when getting down at a bit of a high speed. Pretty nice article. Didn't know the concept of countersteering, now that I know, I shall practice it and get my reflexes used to this. The link to counter steering is here

Ok before you start making comment, yes I have had my bike for 2 years now and yes I am paying more attention to knowing it's working only now. Better late than never! :-)

At devarayana durga.

This Sunday, I and a friend of mine decided we would go to devarayanadurga, a hill top fort on Banglore Tumkur highway. It was a lovely ride, but could not stay till sunset as I had to get back to Banglore by evening. I could not find much details of the route on the web so, here it is:
There are 2 routes to this place.
1) From banglore, go till Dobaspet. Go under the flyover and take a right. The left leads to Shivagange betta and right leads to Devarayandurga. There are 2 roads on the right, take the one that is diagonal to tumkur road and not the one perpendicular. Better to ask one of the villagers if confused. :-). This road is in quite bad shape and it's a longer approach to DDurga. On this route you get DDurga first, and then as you go towards Kyatsandra, you get another Hanuman and Shankara temple, a little further is Namada Chilume and then Siddaganga mutt (different from Siddagange betta) and a KM from there is Kyatsandra where you hit Blr-Tumkur road.
2) The other route, as you might have guessed it, is to get in from Kyatsandra side. Ride about 5 kms from Dobespet on Tumkur road and you will reach this intersection. From there, Blr->on Tumkur road, a bit after reliance A1 take the right at Kyatsandra->Siddaganga Mutt->NamadaChilume->Hanuman Temple->DDurga. The roads on this side are much better and I feel this route is shorter and faster.

Fact File:
1) For food pick any of the resturants on Tumkur road starting from Kamath to Reliance A1 but I liked the good old pavitra hotel at Kyatsandra the best :-)
2)Food is not availabe at DDurga, so better fill up before you get there. You can carry it too but then beware of monkeys. You however get tender coconut and the like.
2) Namada Chilume has a small heard of deer in an enclosure and a spring (ok water DRIPS only) from a boulder.
3) Hanuman temple - no idea how this is. Didn't go there.
4) DDurga has 2 temples, BhogaNarishma which is at the base of the hill and YogaNarsimha which is on top of the hill.
5) Road goes almost to the temple on the top. But to reach the temple you got to climb about 50 odd steps.
6) There is a small stone structure further from the temple, on a large boulder that can be reached from a steep climb through (kinda) caves and paths taken over by forest. The view from up here is worth the climb :-)
7) All these places are very cleanly kept and there are enough dustbins. Please use them and help keep our country clean instead of praising other countries. It's our responsibility! We are afterall a race that are more cultured and learned than them.

Happpy travelling!

Some Snaps below

The serpentine roads:


The temple from the top:


The fortress:


My Love:


Me!! On top of the world!! (ok top of the hill)


more here

a week with music

The new year started off with me relishing a wonderful concert and the entire week continued with that same elavating experience. The past one week I have met, spoke to and seen upclose and personally some of the most well known people in the field of carnatic classical music. I also went through some prominent changes in this last week.

The most important was in the way I appreciated carnatic music. Sitting amongst well versed students of a very great singer, cuddled up with a special frnd, getting to know the different aspects of the concert, has added a diffent dimension to my feeling and enjoing carnatic music.

I started to look at todi raga in a different sense, rather was show to see it in a different way; for me it was always a sober raga but Ravikiran painted an altogether different picture on his gotuvadyam. I got introduced to a superb singer, TM Krishna, a man with a voice that scales 3 octaves with ease, with a ring in it as clear and strong as a brass bell, whose knowledge and creativity in music is so good that people have modified songs which praise the lord krishna and they sing it in praise of TM Krishna! I also got to speak to and take the blessings of Kanyakumari, the first one to get on to my list of favourite violinists. It was a night that I shall remember, I still shiver just thinking about it. She is one of the most sweetest and charming lady I have met.

I also got to see a yaga and yagna for the ragas. It was a very pleasent and new experience for me to see scores of people singing in unison; and then later on all of them got to have lunch and leave. It was close to 3000 people! I have never been to a tyagaraja aradhana but this is how it would be I think, a goosebumpy and thrilling experience!

I was also enlightened on the fact that the richness of Mysore's artful people has not yet been completely wiped off. After watching the divine brothers, Mysore Nagaraj and Dr.Manjunath, I am glad to say all the great musicians are all not in Tamilnadu :-), we still have some left in mysore who can lift you to heaven. They brought so much of emotion into the music that I was moved to tears, once in an alap and again in one of the "neravals". As RKP sir said, this is a concert unforgettable for ten years, but to me it will be unforgettable for life, the day I got the first glimpse of these 2 gods on stage. They right now top the list of my fav violinists.

The last day was a different program, a dance drama presentation of the story of Vadiraja. it was simple but very tasteful and creatively done. It was a special program in more than one way for me but we wont go there here. It shall suffice to say, I was overjoyed watching it all.

This is one week where I got to meet legends that are and legends that are going to be, where I made a few new friends and have had a week filled with happyness every single day!

A fab xmas weekend

Weekend was butt achingly fantastic!!! Me and a friend of mine decided to go out biking for 3 days. Did some 650 odd kilometers in 3 days which included a stupid accident with the side of the road, where my bike got badly damaged but thankfully we both escaped almost un-scrached. Now the repairs is gonna cost me a bomb and I dont even have insurance!! But all in all it was simply fantastic. Places visited:

Day1:
Banglore->Ramnagar->Maddur->Shivanasamudra (Bluff falls for ye english lot)->Talkad (Awesome beachy looking place)->T-Narispura (Sangam of 3 rivers)->Mysore
stayed at mysore after a nice 270Km ride of which 100kms was just mud road!

Day2:
Mysore->Nanjangudu->Gundulpet->Bandipur(missed taking a turn to our actual destination)->Gundulpet(had to ride back about 15 KM of bad roads)->Gopalswami Betta(Wanted to see elephants but missed it)->Gundulpet->Nanjangud->Mysore
In total about 200Kms mostly good roads. Left early morning and reached the misty hills while it was still misty :-) so returned back home by afternoon. Hogged on good lunch and took a nap. Evening went to chamudi hills. In total abot 220 or so kms of riding.
The stupid accident was here on the chamundi hills!

Day3:
Mysore->Srirangapatnam->Cauvery Sangam (Cauvery splits into 2 before Srirangapatna and merges after it)->Srirangapatna->CoffeeDay on mysore Road->Banglore
Did not want to rip at 100KMPH as I usually do 'cause I was not sure how the bike was doing after accident. So came at a horrible snail's pace of 60KMPH! I dont ride so slow even in the CITY!!
Now nursing a sore butt and feeling like accomplishment achieved!!

weekends, working

Today has been quite boring at office. We are compensating for some holiday and hence working on a Saturday. All my friends have called me since morning and asked me "where are u? working? I thought I'll meet you today" like ya rite, you didnt feel like meeting me for the past 1 month! And there is no work too since morning! I have been chatting or reading blogs or something like that...how terrible. I wanna go home! I wanna finish of the book I am reading for the past month! I wanna go shopping, I wanna do something else!!!

I wonder how people on bench feel, I mean if this is my state in a few days how must they be feeling for like months...

a very cool cartoonist

gabeart

Green Valley!

Misty mountain tops, lush greenery, a lone path, a railway track, endless number of high bridges and dark tunnels, this is Karnataka’s most favorite trek route. The Sakleshpur rain road trek, a must do for anyone who calls himself a trekker. I have wanted to do this since 2 years now. This last weekend, thanks to a good friend, I made it!

We started out Friday night almost close to midnight from Bangalore. The bus took us to Sakleshpur, the nearest town, in the wee hours of the morning. After a hot cuppa and packing some breakfast, we boarded another local bus that would drop us near Maranhalli, the starting point of our trek. We took a muddy slushy path in the forest, along scattered houses for about a kilometer to reach the first bridge. This railway bridge will be our actual starting point of the 16 KM trek on the railway track. We freshened up in the crystal clear stream water and finished up our breakfast. I rolled up my tracks to leech proof my legs by a liberal dose of amruthanjan, a strong balm of sorts. I was unfortunately too late, a little fella had already crawled up and latched on and was sucking my blood. My first leech bite!!! After 4 monsoon treks in the western ghats! Took a snap of my dark parasitic friend before salting him off. After armoring with the above said balm, we go on the bridge and set off on the track.

Took some snaps at the bridge. It was quite awesome standing on the bridge at such a height and no guard rails or such stuff. Started walking, measured steps on the sleepers, almost a catwalk. Little did I know that my walking habit would need re-training after the trek! A hundred meters and we encountered our first tunnel, a good 250 meters long one. Photos shoot time again! Picked up a rusty railway bolt as a memento and moved along. The bats had all flown off as the trains have started plying, this was a bit disappointing. As we started walking into the tunnel, it became pitch dark and we switched on a few torches. But after a few minutes of walking we decided to walk in the dark for the thrill of it. Reached the end of the tunnel and realized another tunnel starts off just a few meters away! The whole track is like this, full of numerous bridges and tunnels. It’s just fantastic!

The best tunnel was close to a kilometer long, which happened to be the longest one we had encountered in the whole trip. This has some wild turns in the middle and its pitch dark, quite a challenge. The only missing element was a loved one to smooch, feel up and maybe more! As we were walking along, we heard the following sounds: “It’s going left, completely left, left yaar, left, thud, ahha!” Our foreman, an enthu daredevil had miscalculated and instead of taking a right, he had taken a left and had fallen into a not so deep rain trench close to the tunnel wall and now he sports a nice mark on his head and nose! 

The best bridge was a wooden bridge, a few decades old. The wooden sleepers have not yet been replaced by iron ones and as such it is quite worn out and broken at places. This took a lot of nerve and concentration to cross. It was quite long and had a fast flowing stream underneath a few hundred feet down. It was a thrilling experience!

Towards afternoon we took a break, had just another 3 KM to our destination. We took a small path leading to a waterfall. After a cold bath and good water massage, and lunch, I slept off on a rock, head resting on my friend’s lap. It had been a while since I slept on someone’s lap… A good half hour’s rest later I woke up to a grey sky and by the time we packed and hit the track, a drizzle had begun.

We reached the destination station, Yedakumeri at around 5.30. The station master had setup quarters and the workers had moved on. After a bit of negotiation, we managed to get a room to stay for in the night. It was a diesel generator room, thankfully not running, the floor was not swept for ages and the slight smell of diesel oil hung in the air. No complaints, adjust and survive is the motto. The cook there agreed to give us hot water but no food as they were low on supplies, so just had cuppo noodles and a shot of whiskey and some vodka to keep warm and then sat down with the station master for a chat till 10 and then we hit sack.

Our initial plans for the next day was to cut across the forest, walk up 5KM and reach a near by village and catch a bus from there. Due to heavy rains, the path had an overgrowth of vegetation and would be infested with leaches. So, we made and alternative plan and kept this as a last resort. The station master told us that a goods train would be passing by at some unknown hour in the night, and he told us he could stop it briefly but it was for us to convince the driver to give us a ride. In the mean while another group of software guys had also come along and the station master refused to give them shelter and they ended up sleeping in the open-aired waiting room. People skills training does not seem to be effective enough.

The next day round 3 we were woken up and the station master told us to hurry. The train was almost there and was chugging along slowly. We all hopped on to the train and soon it started to move with a harsh jerk to warn us of its “non-passenger-friendly” way. Somehow I feel that the station master had sort of convinced the driver to take us - over radio. Oh that was the first time I saw what GSM-R is used for. And along with us the other group also tagged along. We all huddled up like sheep in the small coach and the since it was dark outside and there is not electricity in goods wagons, the other team were using all their torches. After some time all switched off except this one guy, all dressed up like a cowboy but hardly had the courage. He kept it on till I finally got annoyed and asked him to switch it off.

What an experience it was! The dark, the rattling train, the tunnels and bridges, the greenery, the mist and the emerging twilight. We reached Subramanya, a temple town with busses connecting to Bangalore at around 7. From there we took a jeep to the bus-stand half hour away. The jeep was stuffed, that’s the best way to describe it. I was practically in the driver’s seat and he in turn was almost leaning out and driving! 4 people in the front and 6 in the back and the luggage! And the man is ripping across in the Ghats! Whao! We reached the bus stand, caught the first bus to Bangalore and after a gruesome 9 hour ride reached home at 6 in the evening. The first 3 hours was in the Ghats section and man was it awesome! One fabulous trip done and many more to go!
The snaps are here by the way.

Passport!

Today I saw this sign on the passport road.



If this is the state of the road leading to the passport then which way do we go with our passports? No wonder we have a lot of confused travellers! :)

Reservations in India.

Today's headlines scream out to the public that "Our Prime Minister's Grandsons are ill and have Dengue". I so hope and wish that as an eye opener one of the grand child must be treated by merit students and the other by reservation students exclusively. That will I hope show to the PM how he is playing with his citizens and give him an understanding between basic education for all and professional courses on which lives depend.

According to our history, a good King would treating his citizens as his children. But our nation is in such sick political hands. Let the PM disprove this by treating his children like all his other citizens!

Don'd blame me for wanting to be under a great able king than under such lousy sick politicians.