Travelogue - Kodaikanal

This was a trip that was long overdue. From waiting for friends to join me and constantly postponing the trip every weekend, to finally frustration getting the better of me and deciding to go there all by myself. And as luck would have it, a friend I hadn't met in ages decided to join me at the eleventh hour.
The place I wanted to go to is Karuna Farms. This is a secluded 25 acres of wilderness on the mountain top, located a 40 minute drive from the city centre. This property has many small to big cottages scattered around and connected only by a small clearing among the trees and shrubs. A place which usually attracts backpackers and off-beat travellers as it's completely off the map. 
On the first day I got here, I was overwhelmed with the rusticity of the place. My bathroom, even though private is located outside the room and is barely covered with a flimsy curtain. The electricity comes on only after 6 in the evening and is usually a dim zero watt bulb or a strip of LED's in every room. The hot water is available only on a sunny day (as it's solar powered), but considering it's located 2100 meters above sea level, it's cloudy most of the year. And one needs to use bright torches to get around post sun-set. 
I spent a couple of hours absorbing my surroundings and wondering how I would get through these basic amenities for another three days. 
Lunch was a simple affair with basic Indian food and this was when my view of the place completely changed for the better. 
There is a main area adjoining the kitchen, where all the travellers meet for breakfast, lunch or dinner. There are just two small adjoining tables, and chairs are pulled in as more travellers join in. All guests sit together and exchange stories and experiences and get to know each other better regardless of backgrounds or any differences, it's like we are all united in this secluded place away from home because of our collective choice to stay at Karuna around the same time. 
Being shy, I wasn't sure how I would fit in, but that doubt instantly vanished as people are so warm, friendly and easy to talk to. I met people from all around the world; travelling alone, travelling siblings, some who made travel plans on the go based on co-traveller suggestions, people who were backpacking for the last three to six months. The variety was amazing, and their free-spirited souls is worth admiring. Because we are all so caught up in the circle of working, making money, buying a house, making a name etc., that we forget what life is really about.
I have never been to such a traveller friendly accommodation before and this surely has been an enriching experience.
Aside from the friendly tourists, the place has a gorgeous view of the mountain range with low-lying clouds from every nook and corner. A view point called the 'rock', which is a rock jutting out of the mountain side has a view to die for. I could sit there for hours together, listening to the chirping of birds, watching the clouds pass by, seeing the lights turn up in the neighbouring towns as the sun sets. There are a lot of hiking trails to the top of the mountain, through bio diversity forests, through water falls, to natural pools, through nature in all it's glory.
And the day in Karuna ends with all the guests huddled close together over warm, tasty dinner as the mist sets in and completely disconnects us from the rest of the world.
This place means a lot of different things to different people, for me it was the liberated feeling that was tugging at my soul and asking me to let-go. Needless to say, the three days passed in a jiffy.

the world of dating

My views and beliefs on dating have undergone several stages of painful metamorphosis before shaping up the way they are, but it appears like there are still miles to go before I sleep.

My first view on dating which took shape as I finished graduation was about a life with one man in it. You meet him, love him, marry him and the rest is history. There are no options, no second guesses. You deal with whatever life throws at you but stick on together to the end.  That’s as simple as it gets.

When my first relationship with my then boyfriend fell through, that was when I had to learn my first hard lesson on love. You fall in love, but you could end up with a broken heart, endure pain and suffering before you fall out of love and fall in love all over again. While I started to accept this side of love and making my peace with it, I was introduced to casual dating. Having always migrated from being good friends to lovers, this was a new concept to me. Casual dating, where the guy I’m having a pleasant dinner date with is probably having many more such pleasant dates with other women until he zones in on one.  The thought that I’m just another pea in the pod was disturbing. But this was the only way forward, so I took it in my stride to start casual dating so I don’t get left behind.

Close behind casual dating came flings. Although I knew of flings and I knew of a lot of people who were having flings, I always maintained a distance because I didn’t think I was wired to be a part of a fling, what with my old school thoughts and the speed at which I got attached to the men I liked, which is a complete red signal for the flingers. But life had other plans for me, and before I realized it, I was with a guy who was treating his time with me as a fling while I was thinking up of possible honeymoon destinations. The realization came sudden and quick and I had to bring in damage control as soon as possible before I lost more time on a cause which didn’t deserve it.  The only plausible way was the hard and long route of accepting it. Accepting that people could want only ‘fun’ and no commitment from one another even though we had a great time together, accepting that it didn’t mean I was any lesser but that we were in different phases of our lives, accepting that the guy I thought was probably the one, isn’t the one and will never be the one. This experience did not make me any more open to flings than I already was because I still believed that I wasn’t wired for one, but it did make me wiser to know one when I see one and make careful choices.

And now, when I think that I have reached a comfortable position in the how’s and what’s of dating, I see myself facing a new problem. The new-age problem, the problems technology bring into the dating world. With apps like Woo and Tinder, where a bunch of similar people are all looking at the same subset of potential daters, there is a high chance that my very good friend could be dating/meeting/progressing with the same guy that I’m pondering about. All the casual dates and flings a guy was having in the background was fine as long as I couldn’t attach a face to it, it got worse when I could see who it is with and now it couldn’t get worse when I know who it is with.

I’m yet to accept this new turn of events, yet to accept the thought of sharing a potential with your friend before either or both of you zones in or out of him. So I find myself yet again in the process of metamorphosis. It’s scary to think where all this would lead to, to wonder what’s the next thing that would spill out of the cauldron.

I think a lot of this is to do with the in-between generation that we are a part of. We are shifting from a loyal society of our parents to a promiscuous one of the coming generations and as the generation bridging the gap between the two there are unfortunately no short cuts but to look at the truth straight in the eye and to flow with the change.

quotes that inspire me

Your destiny lies in the path you resist most. - Kung Fu Panda

Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.

The soul always knows what to do to heal itself. The challenge is to silence the mind.

"There is a time for risky love. There is a time for extravagant gestures. There is a time to pour out your affections on one you love. And when the time comes - seize it, don't miss it."
--Max Lucado

this one says it all!

don't postpone joy!

fernweh

fernweh (n.) an ache for distant places; the craving for travel

I didn’t know a word existed that could express the desire and the mad rush I felt whenever I thought of a place I wanted to visit until I stumbled onto “fernweh”. It’s a German word which means - when you feel like you have to leave your familiar surroundings to discover new places. And this hit the nail on the head.

Not being the lone traveler sort of a person, I usually make travel plans with my friends, most of which fall through, but this in itself is like a path to discovery wherein we research on one destination and fall onto so many others that we want to go to that the list is endless. So I started to maintain a list of sorts and the top three of these currently include: Rio de Jeneiro, New Zealand and Japan.  And not to forget the many other local places that I want to visit within the country.

When I’m not travelling or making travel plans or planning to make travel plans, I follow many travel blogs, shows and websites and live my dream through them.

Why I like to travel is a thought that has crossed my mind many a times because travel comes linked with so much effort - to look for places to go to, to plan an itinerary, to think of an economical and yet a fun route, places to stay, things to do, to consider individual concerns and wishes, en-route toilets, the local weather and currency and it goes on. I have done this routine time and again for every travel of mine but at the end of it when I set foot onto the new land and experience what it has to offer, all the effort that I put in is justified. I have always come back from my trips - a happy and contented soul, ready to go through the grind of planning another trip all the way again.

What I enjoy best about travel is the experience that it brings which in a sense is the expansion of the mind and its horizons. Meeting new people, discovering their ways and their culture, realizing how different and at the same time similar they are to us, adapting to their food and habits, seeing new places and learning about their history, are some of the things that no amount of reading or browsing would give me. It is all about being there and soaking it in and making it a part of my own fabric which finally re-defines who I am.

Travel also has an underlying reward; it helps to forge great relationships be it in the form of new friends or strengthening what you already have with your companions.  Sharing new moments, and riding the same wave of excitement and anxiety with someone, puts us at a higher level of synchrony than any common get-togethers would.

Signing off with a quote that completely resonates with me and with other travel lovers – travel is the only thing that you can buy which makes you richer. 

Notes from my tea-tasting

I went tea tasting to my current favorite tea place in Bangalore - Infinitea; with Gaurav Saral.
Gaurav Saral, the guy who owns the place, eats, breathes and lives tea, and he gave us many insights on the whats and the whys alongside tea tasting followed by finger-licking starters and desserts.
And here are some interesting facts, and the only information I still remember from the event.
Yes, yes this is going to be a little dry and a technical post but I had to write it because I'm sure that a few months down the line, I would read this and go 'Oh! I remember nothing of this', just like it happened with my coffee estate walk and wine tasting; except in those cases I don't have anything written so it's almost like it never happened except for the trailing whiff in my memory.

• A typical tea plant, has two leaves with a bud in the center.
• Tea is meant to be slurped-in and rolled in the tongue so the taste hits your pallet, before you swallow it down.
• The different types of tea are: White, Green, Oolong and Black
• Darjeeling has the most ideal weather conditions in the world for growing tea, and so no other tea but that that comes from Darjeeling is allowed to be branded as Darjeeling tea.
• Germany is the tea spot of the west, all imports and distributions to the western world happen from here.
• Assam is the only tea that's drunk with sugar and milk.
• When tea is boiled, it looses it's essence and taste, so the best of the tea's are had with hot water(only).
• All different types of tea are made from the same leaf, the difference comes in the way they are processed after plucking.
• Tea growth happens across all four seasons, and the tea taste differs based on which season the tea was plucked.
• The first plucking of a tea plantation is called the first flush, which has the real tea taste, and most of this is exported.
• White tea is the richest in anti-oxidants, and is of the most expensive kinds. It's made from the bud of the tea plant and hence it stops further growth of the plant which is why a lot of planters do not produce this tea.
• White tea and Green tea skip the fermentation phase of tea processing.
• Oolong tea has a few hours of fermentation and hence it is has the aesthetic beauty of green tea and the taste of black tea.
• Green tea should be brewed for only 2 mins, and the other for only 5 mins, beyond which tea starts to taste bitter.
• Tea contains caffeine but in very little quantities which usually gets released after 5 mins of brewing.
• There are two types of tea, the natural kind which retain the shape of the leaves and CTC (crush, tear, curl) which is of the more commercial powdered kind.

There ends the list of all things that I know about tea-licious tea. 

The Other Woman

Emma was a lot younger, and love was this idea about finding this perfect guy, with this perfect jaw line and the perfect manners with lots of money. Couples walking hand in hand, doing nice things for each other were what her dreams were filled with. Her life went on like that until one day; she went visiting this nice little cafe on a pretty little terrace with birds chirping and flowers blooming. She used to come here before, and she loved it for all the sunlight that poured in and for Aunt Matilda, who brought her warm cupcakes and flavored tea. Watching the sun set while enjoying her tea, she saw the man at the neighboring table, who was watching her intently, so intently that she felt a shiver run down her spine and so deep was his gaze that she felt like he could read her mind, not just about how she felt about the weather but deep down, deep deep down, into the very depths which she thought was only her own, until now. She quickly moved her gaze away, in an attempt to stop him from reading her mind further, in an attempt to stop him from knowing that he looked like the person she'd dreamed off ever since she was a child. He was now smiling at her, and came to sit next to her, so worried was she, that she ran from there leaving her half eaten cup cake and spilling whatever was left of her tea. She ran all the way home and locked herself in and vowed never to go back there again. But the next day, she found herself going to the same cafe again and the day after that and the day after, and this time she shared her table with the mystery who was called Richard. They used to spend a few minutes catching up on each other’s lives which turned into longer minutes and then hours. He used to amuse her with his antics at his work, his friends, family and life and she in turn would be raptured by everything he said and tell him some about herself too. She felt that she was finally in that place, that secret place that she always wanted to be a part off. He would sometimes teasingly hold her hand, and she would turn a blush red and wished that time just froze, because it was all, Oh so perfect. From the cafe their romance ventured out into parks, beautiful sidewalks, movies and to all those places where two people could hold hands and walk around uninhibited.

On one such breezy day, while they strolled around the market place looking at the items on display, the sky suddenly turned dark and it started to pour. Everyone around, ran helter skelter to any place which they found dry and Emma found herself squeezing between Richard and a fat man who smelled of sweat and dirt. Watching her twist and turn uncomfortably, Richard suggested if she wanted to go home with him so they could dry up until the rain stopped as it was a few minutes away from the market. Never having gone to a guy's house all by herself, she was scared and yet excited at all the possibilities it could mean and she gave in. His house was located on the second floor; it was tiny but tidy with a good view of the whole world outside. While they dried up and sat on his white sheet covered bed while looking at the rain through the big beautiful French window, Richard put his arm around her and drew closer to her. She felt emotions which she had never felt before; she was excited and scared, all at the same time. And when he excused himself to go check up on the brewing pot of tea, she was only too relieved to calm her mind down. She started to look around to find something to distract herself, as she looked around she felt there was something that wasn't right. She stood up and scanned the room once again, and there it was, on the snow white sheets, a few locks of hair. Hair longer than Richards', as long as what only a girl would wear. The wind could have blown it in, or it could be the maids, or. or. not wanting to think further because Richard would never do that to her. She decided she will let it be and walked into the washroom to freshen herself up before the hot cup of tea arrives and there she saw, by the sink, which cleared all doubts off her head, a pair of hair clips strewn casually around the sink. That was definitely not the maid or the wind; she looked at herself in the mirror, her eyes swelling up, what an idiot she had been all along.

"Emma! Emma! How long will you take in front of the mirror, the cab's here." Startled, she looked away from the mirror and from the hair clips beside it that had caused her to day dream for so long. It'd been three years since the incident. She'd never met Richard again, and her idea of Romance had totally changed. She'd stopped believing in a perfect guy, but her hope for love still remained intact.

After her college and studies she moved out to a neighboring town and started her first job there. Steve was her colleague who was older than her by a few years and he would help and guide her through the different things she had to do. When not working, he would offer to show her around town and take her to the town fair where she would excitedly try out trinkets and go on amusement rides with a child's joy because she never saw all this while she was growing up. Steve became her best friend, who was there for her whenever she wanted and she in turn would do nothing to hurt him.

One day after a long day at work, like always she started to walk towards her home which was around five blocks away. She enjoyed these walks as it gave her a chance to clear her mind. She loved to watch people packing up for the day with a satisfied look on their face and heading home towards their family and loved ones. The old man at the candy cart in the corner who always gave her a warm smile and offered a candy when he saw her, but she'd never accepted it because she knew that it would earn him some money which he really needed. She would have also helped him pack his candy but not today, today her thoughts were distracted. She was thinking of Steve, over the time they'd spent, she realized that she'd never known about his personal side, he never spoke and she'd never asked because she'd never needed to know. She wondered if she felt anything for him, but the thought immediately left her as she walked into the comfort of her home and she went about preparing to go to bed.

As the sun rose the next day, her day started early, as she walked the five blocks to work and greeted everyone, Al the flower man, Shiela the maid at the cafe, Russ the candy man, they were all her friends. Once at work, she rushed to Steve's desk to grab a cuppa with him, but unlike all days, his desk seemed empty and he wasn't in. That was very unusual because for as long as she'd worked here, Steve was always at his desk by the time she came and never once left before her. This worried her a bit but she went back to work thinking that he was probably late. But she could hardly work, and the rest of the day went just like that, with her rushing to his place to see if he was in, and she found it as empty as she did the last time and she walked back more worried with even little interest to work. By tea time, she couldn’t hold on any longer and decided to go to Steve's house to check if he was okay. This was the first time she'd ventured into these areas of the town, his house was located on the corner of Marks Street. She was worried sick as she rang the doorbell once with no response, until finally she heard some faint footsteps in the background and her relief knew no bounds when she saw Steve open the door for her. She then learnt that he was sick the whole day with fever and couldn't get up to even eat his meal. She quickly went about making a nice healthy meal for him and tended to him for the rest of the day and very soon he visibly started to look better. As it grew dark in the evening, it started to rain and Steve insisted that she got home quickly before the rain got torrential. Even though she didn't want to leave him in that state, he insisted and said that he was anyway feeling much better and asked her to freshen up while he called for a cab. And it was while she was freshening up that she saw them, the pair of hair clips.

She washed up and immediately left to get her cab which was waiting for her. Steve bid her goodbye while profusely thanking her for all her help.

As the cabbie turned the meter and revved the engine, she couldn’t help thinking that this time around, the tiny pair of hair clips had little effect on her unlike her previous encounter. Yes, she'd grown up, she was more mature now and she wasn't going to let anyone break her heart again.

Just then, a gust of wind blew in and displaced her hair, and Emma immediately tried to close the window shut while looking for something to hold her hair back and that's when she realized that she'd left her hair clip on Steve's wash basin alongside the other pair. She smiled to herself and thought that she was not going to be the other woman anymore.

weekend of first-times

It was Wednesday evening, and I was thinking that the coming weekend was going to be just like any other. Fast forwarding to the next Monday morning, I look back and realize that I couldn't be more wrong on the Wednesday evening. It was a weekend of first-times, as i would like to call it.
It started with Friday evening, with a trip to Mosque road which was a food trail to the non-veg of street food. This road is usually quiet for most part of the year, but during the month of Ramzaan and especially after 6pm everyday, the foot path is streaming with people and food vendors and lots of food. Being a cautious non-vegetarian, I'm a little thrifty when trying out street food, but I had to get my hands into some hot and fresh sheekh kababs and juicy kalmi kababs. There was hard-core Hyderabadi Haleem to try, which I heard was the best in Bangalore but not as good as the real-Hyderabadi one. For me this dish was a little bland but interesting stuff. Haleem is made by cooking minced meet over-night with lots of ghee, and it's meant to keep the fasting Muslims, hunger-free until dusk. Another dish which I tried only because it seemed interesting was pathar ga gosht, which is meat (usually beef or lamb) cooked on a thick stone slab, I don't know what the fuss was all about! Next stop - loads of nawabi sweets, ras malai and the likes. Rich milk based sweets and finally the famous pani-cum-chai, which translates to tea without water. Again, I don't know what the fuss was all about. Overall, a very interesting experience but may be not something I would want to do often.
Come Saturday, I had nothing planned but out of the blue I had a chance to get a full body massage done and I absolutely wouldn't miss it. Again, another first-time. One hour of pure bliss and pampering. It was one of the fastest hour of my life! It left me wondering why I hadn't tried this before. Definitely going back for more, a lot more!
Sunday, meant to be the Sabbath day, a peaceful day with the least activity, turned out just the opposite. There was war! Paintball as it's fancifully called. Adrenaline rush, gun in hand, being shot at, sound of loud pellets on your air bag, shooting others, running berserk, defending, attacking, taking your team to victory, small wounds, dirty clothes, tired limbs. Wow! what a game. It took me a little while to get a hang of it and my bad aiming skills didn't help at all, but I would love to try this game again. And this time around, I plan to be smarter and more prepared!

Was a fun packed weekend, from food to relaxation to sport, with friends through it all.
Inference: first-times, even though very unknown and uncertain, brings along loads of fun and adds a whole new feather into your cap, you just have to be willing to try it! And if it doesn't turn out to be fun, it leaves you wiser. So go explore and experience!