My Grandpa, A true story

Today evening, my mom was watching the opening of the movie named "Me and my dream"(Naanu.. nanna kanasu), a remake of tamil movie "Abhiyum naanum". Several actors were made to read out letters to their young kids about love and care for their little daughter which is the basic theme of the movie, A dad giving all that he can to his lovely daughter. Mom (as always!) being highly emotional and sensitive was taken back to her childhood memories and those old day memories just flashed by her eyes. Mom and I, being close friends, She shared her childhood story with me.

This story is two generations older and hence may seem very unrealistic to some but happening in all our lives.
Story line starts somewhere in 1960's when mom was in her school days. She was the latest addition to grandpa's family, I mean really late coz she was completing her tenth grade when grandpa retired at the age of 58 years! Hmmm... seems like no family planning soon after independence :P Well, If it was there I wouldn't have been here to say this ;)

It was a family of 8 people; Grandpa, his mother, Grandma, two aunts and two uncles elder to mom and my mom. They all lived happily in a posh villa in the area known as Malleshwaram. Even today it is being called the same after decades of development in Bangalore. To me atleast some places like Gandhi bazaar, DVG road of Basavanagudi, MG road in central Bangalore, 8th cross of Malleshwaram, Jayanagar 4th block hangouts should remain the same even after centuries.

Is there something like lived-happily-ever-after as in fairy tales!? Nope certainly not, coz this is real life. Betrayal, deception and cunning nature of some people inside the family rips it apart into pieces and that is the exact reason why I haven't seen one of my maternal aunts till now!(Anyway, That's another long story!) Grandpa lost his own beautiful house in this gambling of others! At this time, Mom was doing her second year BSc in MES college. (Even I did my pre-university at the same college :D)

Every father's thought of crossing all her daughters to safe house (its called Marriage! here) crossed my grandpa's mind and no sooner he was into action. Dad's family had come to visit the Mom's family in Malleshwaram and like every other bollywood movie the police came with a court notice on the that same auspicious day! Grandpa somehow managed to drive off the policeman but not the situation impending in about a month. There is a saying in kannada - "Nooru sullu heLiyaadharu madhuve maadu" meaning "Do marry even if it necessitates 100 lies". God knows why they people earlier used to take so much risks! Hmmm.. Not so different in our situation where we see lots of fake love, fake assurances and fake promises. Everybody lies and many of them flirt!

Before the house was bid for sale, Marriage was successfully carried out and the last burden(!) on Grandpa's shoulder had come down. Mom said that grandpa had asked - "What is my purpose of life next? I am done with all my responsibilities", after undergoing a lot of financial and emotional turmoil in the recent years.

Then comes the most dangerous part of life called old-age where children are supposed to take care of their elders. But as the favorite inglorious quote says, "where there is a WILL only then there are family members" comes into play. Inheritance of property causes a kinda civil war between sons and no sooner did grandpa decide to move into an aashram(Old-age home) at his own willingness together with his mother. It was quite a daring task to leave the small family to join a bigger family! But with all the energy, the young spirit and his back-end support called pension, he was able to move-on. Not only did he change but he was also able bring a reform in the aashram activities. He had been to Himalayas several times with his good old friends amongst all this. He started a new wing in aashram and audited the whole of it for more than 14 years. I have been there several times when I was a small kid. I had cried and somehow managed to bring home his hand lens which was used to read newspaper by him. I now apologize for giving you a lot of trouble grandpa. Every time mom sees my elder brother in his half sleeve shirts, she is perplexed to see you standing there. No doubt everybody sees their own parents in their kids. This post is a salute to my late grandpa who has been a brave heart and yet soo kind hearted too which makes my mom often say that "He was the best papa in the world" in a childish tone :)

Abstract dreams and subconscious mind

I am sure everyone have had some kinda dreams which makes no sense to them which they can't even recollect after getting awake but I think they have some implicit meaning behind them which we even even don't know of.

Yesterday, I had one such absurd(!) dream in which of-course, as in everybody else's dream, I was playing a lead role and as always it was highly colorful than the recent HD movies! :P

You are sure going to call me crazy after reading the whole story below :D

I don't remember where it all started. But in my dream, I was a kinda pharaoh. A bunch of other Egyptian/(or were they Roman! coz I'm not sure of the dress I imagined) guys were playing the game of cricket(!) and I was at fielding at the cover position. Not to be surprised, we were playing the game in the middle of the desert! I caught a cover drive shot diving and landed on the sand which swallowed me in as if it was quicksand. I fell into a circular concavity which led to a pathway of stairs below which inturn led into a dungeon. I saw some familiar faces been captured behind the bars and thought of rescuing them. Soon the jailer and his men attacked me to lock me in. I escaped fighting them out and saw one peculiar semi-sphere with some old odd inscriptions on it. Some resembled the shape of humans and some others were unseen unheard language writings. As I escaped and resurfaced the sand I was on the other side of the boundary line! All the fellow fielders were puzzled and asked me what had happened. I had just seen a portal to new dimension. I had traveled through space and time and broke that continuum. None believed me. No sooner everyone felt earthquake, sand storm coming. That huge semi-sphere emerged out of nowhere in the center of the pitch and storm drove us all away from the feet. Nothing to hold onto we were all in air-borne in seconds and soon I could no longer experience it turning into a nightmare, I got up.Sigh!

Human mind is really so creative. I am amazed how the brain relates our past visual experiences of books(fiction)/movies(action and thriller)/games(RPG)/dress/emotions into a nonsense dream to get the body and mind the required rest. I read articles about the understanding of sleep patterns and dreaming. I came across an interesting article which explained the REM state of sleep which does help in reprogramming the brain in offline state disconnecting us from sensory input and paralyzing the muscles of our body. The chemical locha in the brain connects a special way to reality by creating a lightning speed of perceptions metaphorically to match with whatever we choose to imagine as an environment. But I am surprised to see how I remember so much of my dream. Most of the dreams are meant to be forgotten by the time we get up but I made myself aware that I am dreaming which somehow got a connecting link between the subconscious and conscious in the cortex of the brain!

Why do I think a lot even about bizarre dream!? anyway, Good night and Sweeeeet dreams :)

I think, therefore I am single.

The title had been one of my status messages in the google talk in the recent past. Not surprisingly, I received all kinds of strange comments but the thing which interested me most was that I had a long argument over chat with one of my good friend over this "non-marital status" message :P

In India, as Chetan bhagat's latest novel says, Indian weddings are not like other love marriages around the world - Boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. Boy's famliy has to love girl. Girl's family has to love boy. Girl's family has to love boy's family. Boy's family has to love girl's family. If girl and boy still love each other(after all the turbulent-highly-emotional-melodrama between the families) then they can get married :D

The argument with my friend ignited over the assumption that I am not a strong believer of love marriages! Actually I am happy being single now. I have lots of time to spare on things which I have cool passion. Some people think I am crazy teetotaler owning a royal enfield bullet which seems to be like practicing two contrasting customs in the world. I am happy exploring the world around me. I am happy at work and looking ahead for a great career in which I am certainly making good progress. I am contented with all that I got except for knowledge. To me I am the most happiest person on this world! I love myself than any other person in this world. I have not (yet) met that someone who I can back on/whom I back on emotionally with all the care in the world.

Coming to argument of love marriages v/s arranged marriage, a dozen points/questions I listed are here :)

1. Arranged marriages are like contracts and one should spend life in fulfilling it.
2. Being in love doesn't mean losing freedom.
3. Parents have come a long way from 19th century and today individuals matter rather than caste, creed, religion.
4. Love marriages give you ample time before hand in choosing the right person.
5. Can't you fall in love with your partner after marriage?
6. Is it worth taking the risk to try bonding a relationship of feelings after marriage?
7. What if love is just a kind of euphoria which blinds you from his/her real truth?
8. How much is sufficient time to know a person beforehand to fall in love with?
9. What do you see in a person to fall in love?
10. Does one really have time to find that special someone in the midst of finding a career and work-pressure?
11. Does love happen only once in lifetime!?
12. Does love/arranged really matter after a few years of any kind-of marriage? ( since I see all couples fighting over taking care of kids, doing daily chores in kitchen and even buying groceries which get rotten in refrigerator!? :P )

Actually in this debatable topic, someone had to take each side otherwise there would be nothing to chat and discuss about :P so I unfortunately took "against" and landed up in position where I couldn't put-forward my argument sometimes irritating/leg-pulling my friend and going off topic. But that was hell lot of churning out our minds.

So awaiting for comments from other readers and their typical-middle-class-Indian views on the same ;)

Honing my Kannada writing skills

Here is my one more attempt in writing a poem in my mother tongue.

This post is dedicated to that "Gelathi"(Friend/Alter ego) whom I have not yet met in my life till now :)

ಬಿಳಿಯ ಹಾಳೆಗೆ ಏನೆಂದು ಹೇಳಲಿ ಮನಸಿನ ತೊಳಲಾಟ.
ಲೇಖನಿಗೆನು ಗೊತ್ತು ಈ ನಿನ್ನ ಸಖನ ಪರದಾಟ.
ಭಾವನೆಗಳು ಆವಿಯಾಗುವಾ ಮುನ್ನ ಕಾವ್ಯವಾ ರಚಿಸಿದೆ,
ಆ ಮಧುರ ಕ್ಷಣಗಳ ಮೆಲುಕು ಹಾಕಿದೆ, ಮನಬಂದದ್ದು ಗೀಚಿದೆ;
ಆದರೆ ಅದರ ಸವಿ ಹಂಚಲು ಇಲ್ಲಿ ನೀನಿಲ್ಲ, ಅದು ಈಗ ಖಾಲಿ ಹಾಳೆಗೂ ಗೊತ್ತಿದೆ.
-----------------------------------------------------------(13-10-2009 23:58 hrs)

Transitions - From a boy to man

Disclaimer : This post has no biblical/spiritual references and has nothing to do with mere physical biological developments in the changes during adolescence. Its yet-another-blurt-in-my-mind (Just my version, to be precise) about how thoughts of a boy mature in adulthood. I personally feel that it is not a "mature content" as you will come to know when you read.

Ok.. Here I go...

An innocent kid metamorphoses into a teenage boy at coeducation high school and has a lot of good friends but less of other gender. He doesn't understand what his feelings are to a person next to him. He is totally mistaken by the silly crush on her classmate as love-at-first-sight even though he does not truly know what love is! It can be just called a mere way to get attraction of opposite sex towards him as all the hormonal changes conspire to say the same. If they both get so ardently devoted to each others' puppy-love they get doomed in studies and spoil their future and end up exactly opposite to the fairy tale they often listen to, which surprisingly always ends happily-ever-after!

Some days later the boy realizes the fact that she-was-not-the-one! after having two,three or more... crushes. After all it is yet-another-testosterone-charged body. I don't blame it.

Soon he is into watching a lot of movies which create illusions of real life. Then comes the posters of actress all over the room walls/wallets. No, I don't say he is a corrupt brat! He has just another confused adolescent about his way of thinking about opposite sex. He has to be channelized to spend his energy in the right direction and major responsibility is on the head of parents, his best friends and chunk of the society around him.

Everyone around does a pretty good job in helping him overcome the distractions of his age. If not the poor chap turns pervert, addicted and what not!

He is forcefully somehow made to think ahead of time that education is the first insurance for his life and having no other choice he surrenders himself to suffer a lot of difficulties in college called course-work! but yet his eyes are roaming around the starving college campus in search of "Miss right".

He gets to meet a lot of other students who think very much alike and develops a good rapport and finds "cool" friends to hang out with. He learns a lot from their company and develops sensibility of what is good and bad in society.

By now the emotional quotient(EQ) would have attained particular stage enough to relate to and respect peers. He seems to connect to the emotional signals of the girls and connects to them in a proper way. (Somehow a girl's EQ develops a lot faster than boys maybe its the effect of earlier puberty!)

P.S. After graduating from the college he enters the industry with a formal Raymond's attire to become...... "A complete man" :P

Bengaluru cyclothon

I was so excited to join this rally that I registered very early, a month, before the D-day Oct 11th 2009.

Participating previously in Midnight marathon and completing a half-marathon of 21.95kms was quite a arduous running task!

I felt cycling is far more easier than running on foot or maybe its because I had enough practice commuting to office for past few days and dropping my cycle at Koramangala indoor stadium (for it to be transported to venue) riding it from my home near Hebbal, the day before the event took place.

Having reached the place a little late due to misadventures(?!) of the volvo buses arranged for us to the venue, I collected the cycle from hangar-2. Stretching the thigh and calf muscles and hydrating enough, We all started off from the same place. We were sent in batches and I noted my time of start to be 9:12am to be precise.

It was an exhilarating experience to be a part of this great event. A "young"old man(you will know the reason soon why i call him "young"),above 60 years of age was cycling a hero jet and rode past me when I had stopped to hydrolyze myself with electral after an hour of journey. To my surprise he was not wearing a BIB but had put a writing on his back which interested me and soon I chased him to find out what was on his back and captured it in my cell phone. It said - "I will never be an old man. To me old age is always 15 years older than I am."(See one of my pics) WOW! That one moment in my life,I enjoyed the spirit of life more than the fun ride of 36kms.

Sad part of the whole cyclothon was I saw fellow cyclists who were carrying broken chains and even pedals of the rented cycles(BSA Mach) which droped off!! after 15-20kms of ride.. There were not many mechanics(or were there any!?) who could get those fixed. And even more irritating was to see the condition of my cycle after transport to the venue. Damn! They had damaged a few parts Handle was not turning fully and freely.. but thanks for not doing any odd-tuning with gearbox.

Volunteers did a good job providing water for every 10-12 kms of ride. It took 1:40 mins to reach back to the base, after completing the 36Km ride. I met a couple of cycling clubs GoGreenGoCycling and Bangalore-bikers and joined them. Raghu Dixit's songs were rocking the crowd when elite race was going on. Actress Pooja gandhi, Actor Manjunath and lots of other celebrities were present in the occasion. BMX stunt biking was a nice attraction. Manipuri boys did great on extended studs of the wheel axle doing a 360 spin. I left the venue after getting refreshed with banana's and plenty of water. Pedaling again back home from BIEC to my place at Sahakarnagar was really cumbersome as I hit Nelamanga's "bad" traffic for the first time in riding cycle. Many cyclists were forced to choose the odd terrains off-road where even two-wheelers can't tread. But to be honest cycles are always faster than cars in such traffic. It was nice to see cycles participating which costed upto 91K(Trek fuel 5-5) INR :)

Hope to join weekend cycling in and around Bangalore. Catch ya guys. Later :)

Go Goa - Unplanned trip

This is cut-copy-paste/edited(by me) version of travel diary by Sundar J dev, who accompanied me to go out for a vacation of 3 days to Goa totally unplanned!

26th September 2009, Wednesay: Karthik pinged me casually on Wednesday night at around 10 'o clock asking what had i planned for the long weekend ahead. I had thought abt backpacking solo to kerala and told him that. he had planned to go to Kanyakumari I believe. so both of us hit off instantly. first we thought Kanyakumari. Then Karthik suggested Goa. this was more interesting and exciting and so we finally decided on Goa! we thought we should do the entire coast, rite from North Goa all the way to Karwar- a distance of around 130 kms, on bikes. so this was what got me going- the idea of riding a bike along the coastline!

24th September 2009, Thursday: Karthik booked a room for the 2 of us at Palm groove guest house in this place called Vagator in North Goa. I booked the bus tickets for the 2 of us. so we were now ready to go!

25th September 2009, Friday: the 7.30pm bus left Bangalore at 9.00pm :( it was a loooooooooong bus journey, with unscheduled stops in between for tyre replacement and so on, and we reached Panjim at around 12.30pm on Saturday :( :(

26th September 2009, Saturday: we had told ourselves that we are not getting into the cab or the auto to reach the guest house. but as we got down from the bus, we were forced into the cabs by the drivers there. we inquired the price after getting into the cab and the driver told us 400 bucks. we told not a penny more than 250. It didn't work out and we finally got off the cab. we then thought auto might be a good idea and asked a rickshawala there and he asked 300 bucks and we had lost our minds to actually agree to his price and get into the auto. I mean what crazy?! we were stupid enough to actually not walk into the bus stand right next to the auto stand and board a bus :( so here was our first stupid mistake(1st day in Goa) - spending 300 rupees instead of a mere 36 rupees had we traveled by the local bus :'(. Never travel in auto/taxi when you can catch a bus.

Anyway, we reached the guest house at around 2pm. we then got ourselves cleaned and had our lunch in the restaurant attached to the guest house. Then we asked the restaurant owner for a Goa map and 2 bikes for which he kindly obliged. The bikes, one activa and the other a hero honda glamour, were in very good condition as against what we had initially thought. so we were kinda happy.

We took our bikes and left for Vagator beach which was a short distance(1.5km) from where we stayed. the beach was calm and not crowded and stretched a pretty long distance towards the south. we walked almost till the end and found a few outsiders.. It was "interesting" :P

We then went to Calangute beach which was about 6kms from vagator. this was the most crowded of all the beaches.. actually both this and the one adjacent to it- Baga. The beach was a long one and stretched from Calangute on the south end to Baga on the north. we parked our bikes in Calangute and walked all the way till Baga along the beach (again in hope of finding what we thought baga was famous for). we did get into the water in Baga just for the fun of it. It was nice but was crowded and was always being looked over by the life guards. we then got out and started walking back to Calangute.

We then did window-shopping after bargaining with the wooden jewel box and chucking the idea of buying it and i did buy a bag. We then took our bikes and decided on going to fort Aguada and Candolim beach. The fort Aguada was accessible on bikes. It was pitch dark there. We parked our bikes for some pics. we then went to a small patch of beach adjacent to the fort. There was a restaurant on the top which had installed a high beam light bulb which was the only source of light illuminating this beach. This beach was full of crabs; tiny ones i mean. But nevertheless it was nice place. There was also another view point in the same fort. we went there as well. It was a beautiful setting for 9.30pm in the night.. No source of light, with the Arabian sea below and a row ships at a distance. After this we thought of going to Ingo's flea market that happens in this place called Anjuna on every saturday night. Devaki had told me abt this place. It sounded very interesting and we thought we should go there. but unluckily it happens only during nov-dec time we were told :( we then did the 2nd stupid mistake- went to a posh restaurant for dinner and paid 700 bucks for the meal which didn't even fill our stomach x-(. we had lost our senses that day i must tell u! we then returned to our guest house.

27th September 2009, Sunday: We got up bright and early only to find the rest of Goa still sleeping and there was no water in the tap and no one around to help us out either :( So we just brushed our teeth outside and thought we should go to Chapora fort next to vagator beach.. We went there, parked our bkes and went up. There were hardly 3 other ppl there and it was a very pleasant setting. This is the fort that is shown in Dil Chahtha Hai. We walked down the fort to this small hillock below. As we were walking we saw 2 peacocks run across our path!! Karthik did a good job of shooting one of them on his cam. It was indeed exciting to see a peacock in the wild and that too when we least expected to see them! After sitting/meditating on the top of the hillock, we started walking back and on the other side of the fort we saw 2 more peacocks- This time with their feathers open! what-a-sight! We jumped the fort wall and followed them into the bushes. But we were not able to spot them again :( we then returned back to the main entrance of the fort and then made our way back to our bikes. It was a perfect start to the day!

After getting ready and having our free breakfast, we left for Dudhsagar falls on our bikes at around 9.30am. we had to travel around 75 kms from our guest house to reach the starting point of the trek. On the way, we were fined 100 bucks by the traffic police for driving without helmets x-( i mean, what rot?! so anyway, we continued on our journey from there on with the helmets on, always.

Just a few kms from the starting point of the trek, in this place called Molem, we went to a small restaurant to fill our tummies for the trek ahead. we inquired what they had on the menu and the hotel-keeper told us he could get us channa masala,rotis for veg. We settled for the same along with roti's. I must say the channa masala was indeed good! and moreover the hotel-keeper was very hospitable and kind! so we had a decent lunch at a lesser than low-budget price! After this we thought the Activa that i was using had done enough for the day and so thought no point in pushing it any more. So we left the activa in the restaurant after taking the matron’s permission. We then reached the starting point of the trek on Karthik’s bike.

We now had an option of either trekking or riding on bike for another 14 kms to reach the falls. we decided to try our own bike :D but we used the wrong road, the one along the railway track and it was just not motor able :( and so we had to give up the idea :( we then parked the bike adjacent to the railway track inside a bush and started walking. it was around 1.30 when we started. we walked and walked and walked for almost 2 full hours and no sight of the falls yet . We were misguided by almost all of them at beginning of the trek that it might take us around an hour on foot! but actually the falls is a good 14 kms into the western ghats! we encountered numerous small streams and waterfalls all along the trek route :) Imagine just 2 ppl in the middle of mountains and no sight of anyone else around. I was loving it! After walking for around 8 kms we reached this railway station called Sonalium. not a railway station as such, but just a signal room with a station master (for a crossing is present for Vasco trains). It is not accessible by any other means other than by train! i was seriously wondering what was the purpose of this station! At this station, we met this Navy family, or rather a group of 2 families. Karthik inquired with them about how far the falls was from there, for which we were told that it was a good 6-7 kms further up along the track route and could easily take another hour to reach on foot.. Off went our enthusiasm in a whisker :( it was 3.30pm already i think. and the idea of trekking another 1 hr was not very convincing, but at the same time very hard to accept too :( this Navy family also suggested that we cud indeed go there and supposedly there is another railway signal room rite next to the falls(Dudhsagar station) where we could spend the night and return in the morning! sounded very exciting! had we not got our bikes, i'm sure we would have happily done that. But stupid bikes prevented us from doing it x-( nevertheless, the trek was a unique one for me and different from the others i have done! so we decided it was better we return back :( now happened the most exciting part of the whole trek- hitching a ride back on a goods train!!!! I must tell you I was excited to the peak :D I mean, how many times do u get an opportunity to travel on a goods train?! It was one of those rare experiences! We got onto the last vehicle in the goods train along with the Navy family.. The Guard was a real nice person! all along the track, when we trekked, we noticed milestone plates marked something like 43/500 and 43/400 and so on. we were not able to figure out what the numbers meant. I asked the gaurd this and he clarified our doubts! you read it as 43kms 500 mts or 43.5kms and 43.4 kms respectively :) and yeah i forgot to mention- it rained while we rode back on the goods train :D and we were more than happy to get drenched! I always thought we could get to see such things only in Hindi movies!?! So finally we got down at the Colem railway station, thanked the guard for the ride (one of those ride-of-our-lives for the both of us!) and the Navy family for advising us and also for giving us biscuits and potato bonda(:D), and then we walked a small distance to the place where we had parked our bike. we then rode back to the restaurant to pick up my bike and started towards our guest house at around 6.10pm

We now had to cover 75 kms along NH-17 (the one that connects Bangalore and Goa) which was full of trucks and state transport buses. At one point I used all the expletives i ever knew for a NWKRTC bus driver who could have easily sent me packing that day, nevertheless we safely reached Panjim at around 8.00pm. We then went to this udipi veg and non-veg restaurant (:P), a very small and dingy place on the first floor. Our stupid acts of spending lavishly the previous day had indeed taught us some good lessons! :) We ate veg fried rice and had cool drink Mirinda - Our bill was just 120 bucks :D and just fyi, the whole day's food cost was a mere 300 bucks for the both of us!! as we munched on the food, we also planned for the next day. We then left Panjim for our guest house and reached at around 10.00pm.

28th September 2009, Monday: We got up as per our schedule and got ready and checked-out of our guest house after thanking the matron there for all the nice facilities at the guest house. And btw, I would recommend this place to anybody heading to Goa. It was dirt cheap (1320 bucks for 2 days with breakfast. remember this was peak tourist season) and had ALL the facilities like hot water, attached restaurant, and even cable tv. we then got into a local bus to go to Panjim via Mapusa where we had to change buses. we reached Panjim at around 9.30am. We were right on schedule till now! We then bargained with a local person there for a bike and got one for 250 bucks as against the 300 bucks he first quoted. The bike was in a horrible shape(Fuel tank of hero-honda splendor was shaking as if it would fall off!!) and We only later realised that we should have bargained for even lesser :( nevertheless, after finishing our breakfast in a nearby restaurant, we left for Vasco which was a good 30 kms from Panjim and we reached there at around 11.30am. In Vasco there was nothing much to see apart from the harbor, which we tried our luck to enter but were driven away by the CRPF gaurds at the gate :( we also went into the railway station hoping to see the end of the track as Vasco was the last station for trains headed there. We didn't realise that the harbor was further down the station and that goods train ply all the way into the harbor. So after walking some distance out of the station, on the tracks in the hope of finding the end, we returned without finding one and realizing that the tracks led to the harbor :( by now we had given up the idea of going to Margao and Cape De Rama, both of which wud have taken us a good 5-6 hrs to cover to and fro and we didn't have that much time with us and also the bike we had with us was just not worth relying on to cover that kind of distance! We then spent our time going to Baina beach in Vasco where there was some life-guard training/conditioning camp happening. After spending somewhere like 30 mins there, we headed back to Panjim from Vasco. And yeah, we also had our lunch on the way back in Vasco and the bill: just 100 bucks. we were improving!!(But the Chapati's were really good!)

On reaching panjim, we thought we should go to Dona Paulo view point. This place was the one we “least” liked of all the places in Goa. It was crowded to the brim. There were speed water bikes here, but we had exhausted almost all our money to even afford 200 bucks for a ride :P We left this place heavy hearted and went to Miramar, which was a small distance from here. this place was very calm and hardly had few people. and this was where we saw the beach sand shifting due to strong winds like the sand dunes u see in deserts! both of us sat there for some time as we had a lot of time and nothing else to do for the day before we could board our bus back to Bangalore. It was here that Karthik got this crazy idea of getting the bike inside the beach and riding it! cheers to Karthik x-( luckily it never worked as he was not able to find a way to enter the beach with the bike! I'm sure we might have ended up getting kicked out from there by the locals had Karthik's idea worked :)

We then got back to Panjim and returned the bike and collected our bags from the shop where we rented our bikes. We then went to this restaurant near the bus stand for snacks. Had masala pav and coffee; bill - 96 bucks! We then reached the bus stand at around 5.10pm and our bus was to leave at 6.15pm. So we had a lot of time which we spent sitting on the side wall adjacent to the road and opposite the bus stand, watching all the girls there! It was here that i spotted this really pretty girl. She was with this guy x-( here started our story-making session where the main character was this pretty girl, the guy with her- we called him kuruda (as he was wearing those dark glasses at 5.40pm in the evening!), then there was this another person whom we had met on the day we landed in Goa and who was responsible for us spending 300 bucks on auto- we called him chombu (u know why J) and then there was this aunty character who was the pretty girl's acquaintance from god-knows-where and her father and mother(i think), who were ajja ajji in our story! This story had so many twists that we were back to square one in figuring out how kuruda was related to our heroine. The sequence of events suggested that he was her boyfriend :( but then there were a few things that made us think that he cud be her brother as well ;) we were too good in this! and the best part was when we realised that this girl's seat was rite next ours in the bus! I was more than happy to let Karthik take the window seat this time :D anyways, she looked very pretty and that was the point and that was what made our return journey rather interesting! We reached bangalore the next day at around 10.00am, rather early and much against my expectations, and thus came the end of our “unplanned” Goa trip! A very memorable trip it was!

3 cheers to Karthik for this! Maga, u rock, seriously kano!! J

Photos @ http://picasaweb.google.com/karthikhb/GoGoaUnplannedTrip?feat=directlink#