Digitally Exploring the world

For the past 5 + years everyday come rain,sun,flood my first human interaction of the day is a happy smiling face. I am taking about Gangaamma , the lady who comes to clean my house. She is one such woman, who seems to be ever smiling whatever she might be going through. She is one of such woman that runs quite a few houses. Belonging to a village in karnataka, she was married off at the age of 12 and had to move to the city 15years back in search of work. In the last so many years she worked as a labourer lifting stones for new constructions and has been working in the same houses as a maid last few years. She has 3 daughters and a husband who hardly works the usual story of the poor. She slogs it out in a bunch of houses to be able to pay for the basic needs and educate her daughters something she never had the opportunity to do. She also takes pride in not having asked her daughters to work so far. Sometimes when I feel low about so many things in life , I remind myself of the ev...

I got my first pair of waterproof hiking shoes last week and boy wasn't i thrilled. I had been wanting one for a while but since i was heading out during the weekend, i just took an impulsive decision that I had to get it this time . I walked around last Friday and found tons of washable ones but couldn't find a waterproof one in all the big shops but a small adventure shop not to far away had this pair of La Fuma shoes.. I have hiked in wet washables shoes during monsoon before and it isn't the most comfortable walk if one knows what I mean ... Somehow right from my schooldays shoes have always fascinated me . I still remember the day and the joy when I received my first pair of imported tennis shoes. I actually wore it and slept that night :) . You must be laughing reading this !! Oh what a difference it made compared to the power shoes I had worn till then .. Listening to Knopfler's Quality Shoes

As I sit down to pen a few lines, I am suddenly transported to my childhood days subconsciously and start to hum this song .. ... "Climb every mountain, search high and low Follow every by way, every path you know Climb every mountain, ford every stream Follow every rainbow, till you find your dream... ... " Work and other happenings around me had put a break to my short trips for the past few months and it was only last weekend that I headed for a short day's hike to the Brahmagiri hills (near Coorg) organized by the youth hostel folks . Almost a dozen of us from various cross sections (not all were the IT type) got into the tempo traveler already booked on a cloudy saturday afternoon and were greeted with heavy showers as we headed out to the Sreemangala govt guest house . After a quick dinner on the way and a good night's sleep we were all ready early sunday morning for a 20kms trek . The trek started once we crossed the Irupa falls, the initial stretch of 1.5km...

Bumped into this wonderful documentary shot with a borrowed camcorder by Sushmit Ghosh Bullets and Butterflies traces the journey of a handicapped street child and a biking enthusiast from the bustling cityscape of Delhi to the serene hills of Himachal Pradesh. The journey starts from a promise made during a fleeting conversation and reaches its fulfillment in an unforeseen, bizarrely deep understanding between the odd pair. Watch the entire film online (39mins) More films here

Heard this song recently when I went home. Brought back all the memories of the good old school days and the vinyl record .. Enjoy!!

A day in the life of Sodnomdorj, a Mongolian herder.

A couple of month's back I was reading Jung's 'Man and his symbol ' and a cousin visited me from Seattle and he had picked up the same book from the US and was reading it at that very moment.. Jung Synchronicity I suppose!! We later started discussing and found another author 'Lubicz' who had spent a considerable time researching on the symbols and Ancient Egyptian Anthropocosmos Man and his temple. Some incidents in the past week took me back to the books and I found these interesting videos on the same subject today.. Watch on .. 2nd part here

THE PLEASURE OF FINDING THINGS OUT was filmed in 1981 and any Feynman follower :) if I may so ,would simply love to hear him speak about the joy of discovery . Rest of the videos here: part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4 part 5 Talks on light

Thanks to a friend's recommendation , watched a wonderful film by Wong Kar-Wai's ' In the mood for love' . Loved every bit of the film , a movie that shouldn't be given a miss !! Was a bit surprised to see the use of Spanish songs in a Cantonese film but loved every bit of it. Here's one of my favourite, Nat King Cole's ' 'Quizás, Quizás, Quizás' ( Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps ) And the lyrics here

Written a bit late( thanks to tons of work) , but nevertheless!! Last month I headed for a break to the north eastern parts of our country and yeah this time it wasn't my usual solo backpacking trip, but one with my mum. The last trip I had done with her was to Sri Lanka in 2005. It was my first trip to Assam and Meghalaya , though for my mum it was her 3rd visit since my dad was posted in the NE more than a decade back.I was busy with studies/work and never made it to the NE. The first place I wanted to visit when the thought of NE struck me was Arunachal Pradesh but with my mum having high altitude sickness I decided to do Assam and Meghalaya only and leave the Arunachal bit for my solo travels. North East is still quite green but from the people who have been living there and from what I read , it's already lost 50% of the green cover in the last 20 years. Quite a few reasons behind it the main of course being human encroachment. I found random constructions happening aroun...

Guwahati: Armed with the map of assam and no fixed plans in mind, we spent the first few days at Guwahati. It was my mum's first unplanned backpacking kind of trip with me, where we had no fixed travel plans and travel meant using the local buses, which wasn't always the most comfortable!! We were invited over for special bihu meals (had some really yummy food and sweets) by my parent's friends. The stay at Guwahati took me back to the growing up years-small towns,well planned british colonies with red cottages and huge gardens,and surrounding hills.We were staying in the Railway guest house there!! The primary reason for spending a few days at Guwahati was to visit ' Parijat Acadamey " . Parijat Academy, is a school for children of families with low income, living in Pamohi and three adjoining tribal hamlets on the outskirts of Assam's capital Guwahati. My mum had come across an article in the Outlook Mag in 2006 and we had been only,helping out financially ...

Meghalaya in Sanskrit means ' Abode of the clouds' . We reached Shillong on a really cold and wintery evening . We went there in search of clouds (though it wasn't monsoon time!!) and was lucky enough to catch it cloudy and misty . The trip to Meghalaya was more of a relaxing one . We checked into the Army Guest House , lined with a couple of nice cottages and relaxed after a bit of tough backpacking trip across Assam. I don't know how it works out but this happened to me for the 2nd time (the last time it was watching the French Open Final between Nadal and Federer at Krabi on my backpacking trip across SEA, the first TV access in 3 weeks) that I got to watch some wonderful tennis matches while traveling , not having read the newspaper or had TV access for couple of weeks and suddenly switching on the TV and Volla the floodlights were on !! Watched the semis and finals where the underdogs Novak,Tsonga overcame Federer and Nadal and my favourite Novak eventually tak...

One of my old favourite's:

On the last Friday of 2007,the new year weekend, I wanted to head out of the city to a quiet place away from the madding crowd, away from the media hype, away from the usual Bollywood music blasting all around that led me to ask around and found two of my team mates wanting to head out. We thought of going for a trek but the couple of options we thought of didn't seem feasible with the last minute decision and with no tents/bookings in hand. We took to the road in my good old car and headed to Hampi since I knew we could find some place to stay for sure with all the options available having spent my last year end there. On the way, we took a break for lunch at a Dhaba at Chitradurga. The drive on the NH from Chitadurga had stretches of windmills on top of the hills around and sunflower fields to give us company.We reached the river side just before Hospet in time for a beautiful sunset. Hampi : It was dark by the time we reached Hampi , after maneuvering through the dark and na...

Having read the book by Khaled Hosseini and loving every bit of it , seeing it on big screen ( I mean a 17 inch computer :) ) meant going in with a bit of prejudice. However, Marc Foster , the director of the film does justice to the actual story and his interpretation on big screen is a must watch. Both the young Afghani Child actors who portray Amir( Zekeria Ebrahimi) and Hassan (Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada) in their growing up years do a fabulous job. The cinematography is awesome with the hard stark mountains of Afghanistan (for a while I was transported to Spiti and Ladakh in India) though from what I have read most of it was filmed in China. It also has some wonderful village and market scenes and specially for someone from the Indian subcontinent you can live the scenes. Also loved the kite flying sequence. Don't miss the movie, one of the really good ones coming out of hollywood ( dreamworks production) in the recent years. I am not writing about the storyline since I gue...

Watched a thought provoking movie "When Nietzsche wept" the other day based on a book by the same name. It's a fictional piece of work that deals with encounters between real historical figures- Friedrich Nietzsche, the philosopher, S igmund Freud and Dr Josef Breuer, founders of psychoanalysis. I have always been fascinated by the workings of the complexity of the human mind that has led me to the works of various philosophers and psychoanalysists including Nietzsche, Freud, Jung etc. I haven't read this fictional book, but nevertheless, I loved the movie script that was taken from Nietzsche's books. The story delves into the lives of these personalities and the director must be credited for doing a wonderful job in portraying a difficult subject . The story starts with Nietzsche, one of the greatest philosopher's of all times, on the brink of suicidal despair, while the renowned doctor, Breuer, is in the midst of a mid-life crisis that plagues man wit...

It had been over 2 months since I had left the city and was itching to head out of town. Being a long xmas weekend and the last minute decision to head out meant finding no place to stay for a overnight trip. I messaged a few team mates on a Saturday morning and they agreed to hit the road in my car the next day. We decided to just drive down someplace outside city limits and head back at night. We started early sunday morning and headed to Muthathi , about 90 kms from the City. The best way to reach there is Kanakpura Road->Sathanur->Turn left and drive towards Muthathi. You drive through a nice green belt across the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary and if you are lucky you might just see a herd of elephants ( we weren't so lucky !!). As you drive along with the forest surroundings, the river reveals itself every now and then , hidden behind the green shades. We crossed the Jungle Lodge's Cauvery Fishing Camp (a good place to stay but requires prior booking) and stopped besi...

Joan Baez's rendition of 'Stand by me' Lyrics : When the night has come And the land is dark And the moon is the only light we'll see No I won't be afraid, no I won't be afraid Just as long as you stand, stand by me And darlin', darlin', stand by me, oh now now stand by me Stand by me, stand by me If the sky that we look upon Should tumble and fall And the mountains should crumble to the sea I won't cry, I won't cry, no I won't shed a tear Just as long as you stand, stand by me And darlin', darlin', stand by me, oh stand by me Stand by me, stand by me, stand by me-e, yeah Whenever you're in trouble won't you stand by me, oh now now stand by me Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me Darlin', darlin', stand by me-e, stand by me Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me More of her songs here

Joan Baez at her best :Enjoy! Lyrics: May God bless and keep you always, May your wishes all come true, May you always do for others And let others do for you. May you build a ladder to the stars And climb on every rung, May you stay forever young, Forever young, forever young, May you stay forever young. May you grow up to be righteous, May you grow up to be true, May you always know the truth And see the lights surrounding you. May you always be courageous, Stand upright and be strong, May you stay forever young, Forever young, forever young, May you stay forever young. May your hands always be busy, May your feet always be swift, May you have a strong foundation When the winds of changes shift. May your heart always be joyful, May your song always be sung, May you stay forever young, Forever young, forever young, May you stay forever young. More of her songs here