Honnemaradu Trip

Place : Honnemaradu (Sharavathi Backwaters)
Date : 20’th and 21’st Jan 2007
Participants: Praveen, Jatin, Harish M,Sandeep Sreenivasa,Naveen,Manish,Harischandra,Srinivasan Prakash
Girish RH ,Sreenath ,Praveen
Activity: Water sports & fun
Total distance covered : 900 KMs.
Total cost : RS :1000 per head to Honnemaradu 2 day activity +Transport (Around 1700 per head)


'Honnemardu' is supposed to be a village submerged under the Linganmakki reservoir in Shimoga district.Just 10 KMS before reaching Jog Falls, you should take a deviation from Talaguppa and travel for 10 KMs to reach Honnemaradu.

The reservoir is some 80KMx50KM and you can see water until your sight gets lost. The water is pretty clean and left virtually untouched. Nowhere will you find traces of human interference especially of plastic type of interference.



Sun Rise at Honnemaradu


View of Honnemaradu



View of Linganamakki Dam from Honnemaradu

Our Team

After an initial 'how to use' session with life jackets, we were on our own swimming to a nearby island, of course with our jackets on. I had never ever realized the convenience/ importance of a life jacket until then. You can literally float without any effort and that was the reason for all our faces getting tanned. For some of the guys, it was the first time experience with swimming. After swimming for 2 hrs, we had a heavy lunch followed by sound sleep.

Swim to Island with Life Jackets

Evening time was 'Coracle' time. 'Coracle' is a big round tub like thing with seats. Two people row it and it was a good first time experience with a boat:) We went to a nearby tiny island for the night's stay. We pitched our tents, collected firewood, make the campfire, had food and chatted, sang, danced away to glory. After dark, we could see the beautiful lit Linganmakki Dam. It was a sight to watch (though our cameras could not capture it).

Coracling to the Island

Coracling to the Island

Pitched tents to spend night in Island

Campfire at the Island

Sunset at Honnemaradu

Next day morning we coracled back to the mainland. There were heavy winds blowing and we had to coracle against the winds / tides and after much circus we reached the Mainland.But few of our collegues were still struck in the Island, so myself with the instructor and my friend coracled back to the Island and got our friends back to Mainland. Coracling against the tides is pretty difficult, infact one of my friend’s coracle toppled twice near the starting point itself.

Next in store was 'Canoe'ing. Canoe is the normal rowing boat. We Canoeyed to one of the Islands and returned back. Canoeing was the best part of the trip for me.

Canoeing to the Island

Canoeing to the Island


Next day morning we coracled back to the mainland. There were heavy winds blowing and we had to coracle against the winds / tides and after much circus we reached the Mainland.
But few of our collegues were still struck in the Island, so myself with the instructor and my friend coracled back to the Island and got our friends back to Mainland. Coracling against the tides is pretty difficult, infact one of my friend’s coracle toppled twice near the starting point itself.
Next in store was 'Canoe'ing. Canoe is the normal rowing boat. We Canoeyed to one of the Islands and returned back. Canoeing was the best part of the trip for me.

After finishing all the activities, we returned back to Bangalore on Monday morning by 3 AM.

It was a nice experience, different and adventurous compared to all the trips / trek i have done in the past.
But if u are looking out for luxuries, then forget, Honnemaradu is not the place for u People. We literally have to do all things by ourselves, wash dishes, carry our tents, get firewood etc etc...............
No Music / cigars / drinks/ non veg and plastic are allowed in Honnemaradu.Food and accomodation is pretty bad, but it is worth a place to visit and experience all the activities........

Do’s:
Carry Paper plates, plastic cups, some snacks, sun screen lotion,2-3 pairs of clothes, towel , Blanket, toiletry, plastic cover to keep drenched clothes

Don’t’s:
Do not carry Cigarette, drinks, non veg food

Recommended to go in a group of 8- 10 people.
Recommended that you have your own transport, else you will be required to walk for 6 kms from Talaguppa to reach Honnemaradu.

Best time to Visit: December- January.

Route From Bangalore : Bangalore->Tumkur->Birur->Shimoga->Sagar->Talaguppa->Honnemaradu
Distance : Around 400 kms from Bangalore.

Book for this water sorts activity atleast 2 weeks in advance

For bookings, Contact:
Mr. Swamy, Ms. Nomita - Adventurers
The Adventurers
142, 69th Cross, 5th Block, Rajajinagar,
Bangalore INDIA 560 010
Phone: 91-80-3305508 or 91-80-3409712


Links to Snaps:

http://in.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/pravin_c_h/album?.dir=/1f9fscd&.src=ph&.tok=ph_iO_FB_6wlradD_

http://picasaweb.google.com/sandeep.shande/Honnemardu

Related Links:
For More details on Honnemaradu, visit
http://www.dudseascrawls.com/node/2370/print
http://www.dreamroutes.org/dreams/nithin_honnemardu.html

Hard Facts of Life

Hard Facts of Life
Its Saturday evening, I returned home after spending time with some of my friends. Have lost interest in Cricket world cup after another bad performance from INDIAN cricketers has almost put them out of the world cup. Only a miracle can make INDIANs proceed to the next stage and hoping that the miracle happens.

So I got a thought of writing something on few things that all of us face sometime in our life. First I am translating a famous kannada saying, which says that people may go any extent to get the 3 G’s, which are Girls, Gold and Ground (Land).We have seen so many wars, deaths for money, land and over girls. The first 2 thing’s :Gold and Land are the things which people may earn by their hard work and few people will be lucky enough to get it from their ancestors .But the 3’rd G (Girls) play’s an important role in a persons life, which only few lucky people get. You can hear a lot a great people saying that their Inspiration was their Mother or Wife. Women play a very important role in a mans life, as a person spends about 75% of his life with Women. It is mainly with his Mother till he gets married and then his Wife. Not to forget sisters, relatives and friends. Mother infact is considered equivalent to God.

Now I will come to the interesting stage in a person’s life, where he gets attracted to someone of the opposite sex. It can happen when a person is in his schooling, college or during his professional life. This is one transition in a person’s life which cannot be understood or described, as these thoughts vary from person to person.
Few questions which arise in the mind are:
1. Why does someone get attracted to someone?
2. What character in that person makes you get attracted to that person?
3. Is it something that happens without your knowledge?
4. Is it a feeling that cannot be controlled?
5. Does everyone at some stage in life get these feelings?
6. Will everyone be successful?
7. When do you face problem in deciding how to proceed with this new relationship
8. What will happen to people who fail in these?
9. How should I handle these situations?
10. Are you going to hurt the sentiments of your family members due to this new relationship?
11. Is the so called new person who just entered your life more important than your family members?
12. Can you go against your family members in order to build this new relationship?
13. Can I come out of this situation or should I continue.

And many more questions like these arise in our minds. Let me try to address few of these things in the way I think
People get attracted to someone, as it is Nature’s Law. Opposites always attract. It is very important for continuation of Life cycle.
People get attracted to someone by their beauty,character, personality, looks, intelligence or money. In some cases you cannot explain why you got attracted to that someone. There is no age bar or caste bar for these emotions to get developed.

Human mind is very tentative. You easily get attracted to something in an easy way. For example, you may like some movie song so much that you listen to the same time at least 10 times a day and even then you feel like listening to it again and again. The same thing applies when you get attracted to some person. You feel like seeing that person always, talking to that person and spending time with that person. If you re enjoying the company of that person and you just want that, then there is no problem. But we face problems when we try to possess that some one. We want that someone only for ourselves, that is when you are in deep trouble.
You may have some feelings for that some one, but does the other person also have the same feeling. If yes than what are the problems you may face if you go ahead with that relationship. There are so many questions and problems that you should face and overcome.
If the other person does not have the same feelings, then what do you do.
If you have some feelings for someone, how should you proceed and approach that person.
Before you proceed what are the things that you would like to know about that person.

I always feel that the best way to approach a person to whom you are attracted is through some common friend. You approach that person, make friendship with that person and know that person. Friend ship should be the beginning of any new relation ship. After becoming friends, you can understand that person very well and if you feel that there are some feelings even in the other persons mind, then go ahead. If you come to know that there is already someone in that person’s life then there is nothing wrong in continuing the friendship.

I remember a good caption for this situation
“When two friends fall in love, they know that they are made for each other
But when they fall apart from love, they realize that they want to keep each other forever.

Before you approach that person and think of committing to the new relation ship, I always feel that you should ask yourselves few questions.
What do you do if the person you approach, reject your proposal.
Are you fully committed to that new relationship?
Will this new relation ship be accepted by your family members?
If your family members do not accept this new relation ship, then can you hurt their sentiments and continue the relationship.
Is that new person who just entered your life more important than your family members, who have brought you up over all these years?
If your family members do not like this relationship, then do have the mindset to break relationship with them for this new relationship.
Is it possible for you to forget the new person and bring your emotions under control?

I have always felt that this is a state of mind, which a person can overcome by struggling a bit. You just need to get yourselves involved in some other activities and stop thinking a lot about this new relationship. There are many people who live happily, even after loosing their loved ones in accident or in other means. They will be in depression for some days, but time is a good healer. It will help you recover from any disastrous situation. So I feel sorrow for people who commit suicide or harm their loved ones, when their love fails. How can a person end his life or hurt the person whom they loved , when his love is rejected. If you have truly loved a person, then there is no way that you can hurt that loved one. Even by ending your life, you are not going to achieve anything. You are only going to bring sadness to your family members and loved ones. You should always face these situations and overcome victorious. This can be done by sharing your feelings with your friends or someone close to you. Get yourselves involved in some activity. Cultivate some habits to make sure that you are always involved in some activity and that you spend a lot of time with your family members or your friends.

I would like to share another good message which i had received:

When we were kids we were eager to grow up, to fall in love. Now we are grown up and now we realize that wounded knees were much better than broken Hearts.

Love is a great feeling, which infects every person at some stage in life. For someone it ends in a life long relationship, for some persons it just remains in their heart and for few unlucky persons, it breaks their heart. In any case we should never forget our values, culture and importantly we should not end up hurting ourselves, our family members or the person who accepts/rejects our love.

There were so many points which I thought of mentioning, but I finally ended up writing only this much. This is one topic where you can go on discussing and still you feel that there is lot more left to discuss.

“Love can make you happy, but often it hurts.
It is only special when you give it to someone who is really worth to it.”

Final Thought:
“Life is a journey where you meet many on the way,
Some may come near your heart and some may not:
But never be emotionally involved,
You’ll never know when you have to walk alone”

Your comments are most welcome.

Delhi Trip

Title : Delhi Trip
Place : Gurgaon , New delhi
Date : 18’th February 2007
Participants : Harish.M, Arun Kumar Koduri, Rajesh , Sajjan (Cab driver)
Total Distance Covered : 110 KMs.
Total Cost: 450 per Head.
Start Time : 9:45 AM , 18’th February 2007 from Gurgaon
End time : 9 PM , 18’th February 2007 to Gurgaon

Hope that u r all doing good...i am fine and doing GR8 over here at Gurgaon.....
The work schedule is bit hectic, but it's manageable.
In our tight work schedule, we took a day off, that too on sunday from office work and visited few places in Delhi.We booked a Cab and left in early morning by 9:30.
It was 3 of us, Myself, my colleague Arun and a fresher who had come from Bangalore for Training.Fortunately for us, even he joined us, else the expenses would have been a bit more for only 2 of us.The fresher’s name is Rajesh, just landed in Gurgaon on Saturday. He enquired in the Reception of our Hotel and contacted me. Since he was also from Karnataka, precisely Near Mangalore, it was easy going with him.

We first visited
Qutab Minar: One of the beautiful monuments in Delhi. I wonder how they built such a tall monument in that period, when there were no cranes or any sophisticated devices................


Qutab Minar


Qutab Minar : Near View



Qutab Minar

Qutab Minar

After that we Visit India Gate: A monument built in remembrance of our Great soldiers who sacrificed their lives in the Afghan war...........It is a place that i feel every Indian has to visit once in their lifetime. Names of Soldiers who had sacrificed their lives are engraved in the monument.

INDIA Gate

Flower Decoration at INDIA Gate

Then we visited Rastrapathi bhavan and Parliament house.

Rashtrapathi Bhavan

Rashtrapathi Bhavan

Rashtrapathi Bhavan

We then visited LaL Kila or Red fort, the name is coined as it is Red in colour.....
It mainly has 3 museums giving detailed description of our Freedom fighters, main events and war's fought with the British and speeches of Netaji, Gandhi etc.
It has beautiful Marble palace and halls the emperors used for some discussion and for stay.......
It was an amazing place, but unfortunately we had to rush through the museums and even had to skip one of the museums to make sure that we cover other places.

Lal Kila (Red Fort)

Lal Kila (Red Fort)

Next we visited Birla Lotus temple.It has a Huge prayer all, where people of all religions can pray...It has an outer structure built in the form of Lotus hence the name................It has a huge prayer hall inside, with good seating arrangement...with Marble flooring.............and a beautiful Garden outside

Birla Lotus Temple

Birla Lotus Temple

Next we were going to one of my Dream places, which i was planning to visit from a long time and the destination was the marvelous Akshardama Temple.
I had seen the photographs of the place in one of the mail, some 2 years back and had decided to visit that place once in my lifetime.
Akshardama temple is a temple spread across a large area, having very beautiful art work.Unfortunately Camera's are not allowed inside the Premises.so we had to satisfy our selves by taking some snaps outside the premises of Temple itself.It has a main temple surrounded by beautiful carved sculptures.The temple interiors has beautiful art done in Marble.The exteriors of the Temple is also very very beautiful.2 eyes are not enough to see that art work.

Infact we were planning to Visit Agra, but since it is some 250 kms from Gurgaon, we had to cancel it and then we planned to Visit Delhi, which is just 30 kms from Gurgaon.
We were ruining our decision of not visiting Tajmahal, but after seeing Akshardama temple, we felt that we had made a good decision.
Akshardama temple has a huge premise area great sculpture work,musical fountain and even some Malls.
Do check this link.....
http://www.akshardham.com/

Akshardham Temple

Akshardham Temple

Hoping that we stay here even for few more days, so that we can Visit Agra (Tajmahal) and Jaipur in a weekend.
All these places are near to each other and it’s hardly 60 kms to cover all these places.You can book a cab and cover all these places in a single day.
Have a nice time and if u get a chance, do visit Akshardham temple.

Agra & Mathura Trip

Title : Agra and Mathura Trip
Place : Gurgaon , New delhi
Date : 25’th February 2007
Participants : Harish.M, Arun Kumar Koduri, Rajesh ,Mahesh Chauwan (Cab driver)
Total Distance Covered : 500 KMs.
Total Cost: 1,150 per Head.
Start Time : 6 AM , Feb 25’th 2007
End time : 11:45 PM , Feb 25’th 2007

After Visiting places in Delhi in the previous weekend, we were planning to visit Agra in the following weekend, provided our work and Time permits...........
I started gathering information about Agra and the places in the vicinity of Agra which can be visited in a Day.
We spoke to few of our Gurgaon office colleagues to gather the Information. Most of them said, that they had not much idea, as even they have not visited the places. One of our colleague guided us to another colleague (Yajuvendra), who had being to Agra at least 5 times........so he provided us some good information......My friend Arun was feeling not comfortable about me going around and asking people about Agra and other places.....So i said Arun, that we should not really feel shy or bad to ask the localites about any information, and according to me the Localites can give you good information....So always ask someone who had visited the places, if u want good information.........

Yajuvendra said that it is better that we book a Cab an visit Fathepur Sikri first and then reach Agra by 3 PM and Visit Agra Fort and TajMahal....He even informed us that we should take a right turn at a place called Farah , some 40 kms before reaching Agra to reach FathePur. even he warned us that there will be many frauds, who will try to take some money from u in Fathepur , saying that these are guide charges, entry fees etc.........He said us strictly that we need not pay a single pie to anyone in Fathepur Sikri.

Even i called up one of my Bangalore office colleague (Vijay B), who had been to Agra and he said that the best mode of transport would be to book a Cab. He also informed us that we can visit Mathura (Birth place of Lord Krishna) on the way to Agra.

We thought of the different possible modes by which we can reach Agra. Cab would be costly, it may cost us around 1300 per head (As we were only 3 of us). We had a look at the Railways, it was indeed very cheap. Just RS: 56 for one side journey.............But there were many constraints using Railways....
First, Railway station is located at a distance of 35 KMs from Gurgaon. To reach there are no direct buses. We are not very much familiar with the place and a Cab would charge u somewhere around 450 RS to drop us to Railway Station.
Secondly, we may return back to Delhi Railway station by 10:30 Pm. so reaching back our Hotel at that time would also be costly and very risky, taking into consideration that Gurgaon is not a Safe city....
Third, if we take a Train, how do we commute locally in Agra. May be we should book another cab or an Auto in Agra....In such a case we cannot visit Fathepur or Mathura..........
Finally, we were not sure whether we will be able to go to these places in the weekend. So we cannot book Railway tickets in advance....

So we just made a thorough research about the place, railways and even with few Travels and gathered information.........

Things were not seeming to go our way...Infact till Saturday 9 PM, we thought that our plans to visit these places would not be possible.......But luckily we asked our Manager whether it was required for us to come to office on Sunday. He replied by saying that we may get a release only by Monday afternoon and he suggested us to visit Agra. Wah kya baat hui ...Mariz ne chaha Doodh -Chaawal aur Doctor ne bhi salaha dhi Dhood Chaawal kaane ki".......Humari man mein yeh bhaat haayi, ki Aapne ne tho humari dil ki baat kah diya.........

So now our Enthusiasm was increased and we thought of checking Railway tickets availability. Unfortunately not even a single ticket was available. On Friday when we checked there were 700 tickets available and on Saturday night every thing is filled up, which made us wonder that how many people Visit Agra in the weekends.......
So I checked with the Fresher (Rajesh) who had accompanied us to Delhi, to check whether he was interested to join us. I informed him that it might approximately cost us 1300 per head.
He said he had no problems. We even tried to pull in one more person, as 4 of them can be easily accommodated in a Cab. That would bring down the expenses to atleast RS: 1000 per head. But one Friends, who had accompanied us from Bangalore were busy with work and given the short notice, we could not find one more person.........


So we went ahead and booked a Cab by around 9:30 PM on saturday. We were planning to start from our Hotel by 6 AM. On Saturday we reached our hotel rooms by 11 PM, kept the Batteries for charge, packed up some eatables (Bananas, Rava Unda and mixture(which i had taken from Bangalore))...........

Sunday morning we woke up by 5 AM , freshened up , packed up the eatables, Camera, MP3 player and started by 6:10 AM.

We took the Faridabad->NH2 from Gurgaon and reached Mathura by 8:30 AM. We did not visit Govardhanagiri (Lord Krishna had lifted a Hill and given shelter to all people when the place was flooded by heavy rains),as we have to take a deviation and travel around 27 KMs to reach that place. We even did not visit Brindhavan (Place of Radha's stay). It was about 7 KMs deviaton from NH2 highway.
We visited Krishan Janmastal (Place where Lord Krishna was born)........We need to take a deviation from NH2 and travel for 2-3 Kms to reach this place. This place is heavily guarded by Police personnel, as it has a Mosque attached to it on the other side. We got an impression that a portion of Temple was converted into Mosque by mughal emperors. So there are heavy armed personnel, to ensure that no Riots happen. We took a snap at the entrance and unfortunately, Cameras or any other electronic goods were not allowed inside the temple. So we had to deposit them in Cloak room and enter the temple.
The main temple has sculptures of Lord Krishna and Radha, and the roofs of the temple are having beautiful oil paintings.............Even there is cell in which Lord Krishna was born....



Mathura :Krishna Janmastala

After visiting these places we started on our journey to Gokul temple (Some 15 Kms from Krishna Janmastala)......

On the way we asked few localites about the route and one of the locailite warned us not to take any Panda's guidance. He said that they will even take off ur shirts.... (i.e. Loot u). While reaching Gokul, we were stopped many times by localites, saying there is no road ahead, or u may get lost. They said that they will guide us if we pay them 10-20 bucks, but we did not listen to their words and entertain them.....
To Reach Gokul we should cross a Bridge built across Yamuna River...People say that Lord Krishna was brought to Gokul via Yamuna River from Jhanmastal on his birth.......
As soon as we landed in Gokul, few localites suggested us to take Pundits, who would guide us and show us all the places. But we started without listening to them. One of the local person joined us cursing the pundits and just guided us to the temple......He insisted us to wave the Julla (Swing) of Lord Krishna and radha... But we were not intrested in that...we started back our journey.. the Driver informed that that if we had waved the jullah, they would have insisted us to pay 250 RS or a huge amount...i.e. how the guides or Pundits loot the tourists over here.............



Yamuna River @ Gokul, Mathura

We next planned to Visit Fathepur Sikri. There are 2 routes to visit this Place. Go to Agra and then travel back to Fathepur or as suggested by my friend, take a Deviation at Farah and direcly reach Fathepur. We asked few localites or Rickshaw drivers and tooka deviation at Farah. From Farah Fathepur is around 40 Kms. We came out of the Busy NH-2 into a remote village side road, which had paddy and other fields on both sides of the road. The road was not so good, but the ride was very pleasant...Cool and fresh breeze, no pollution no jammed roads...................

Just when we were about to enter Fathepur, we were stopped by few people saying that we should pay entry fees....The driver used some filthy words Bose Dk, BC, MC's and said why the hell should we pay this. Then they turned the topic saying whether they needed a guide. We did not encourage them...they started cursing us , saying we will end up paying more money if we do not take them....We were stopped by many of these kind of guides...who will try to loot u...............Being localities, they were not sparing us...so we thought of the fate of Foreigners, who will become easy meat for these cunning creatures.................These kind of people were approaching us at every step until we came out of Fathepur

More details about the Places in Agra :

Sightseeing at Agra - Fatehpur Sikri : The Deserted City of Emperor Akbar literally means 'The City of Victory'.The royal city at Fatehpur Sikri, situated 26 miles west of Agra, was built at the orders of the Mughal Emperor Akbar. Palace of Five Storeys, and the Buland Darwaza, a massive gate which provides entrance to the complex, it is numbered among the finest specimens of Mughal architecture. It is even arguable that Fatehpur Sikri is the greatest accomplishment of Mughal architecture, surpassed only in reputation. Construction of the new ceremonial capital, with its elaborate palaces, formal courtyards, reflecting pools, harems, tombs and a great mosque, commenced in 1571. Shortly after the work was completed fifteen years later, it was realised that there was a lack of an adequate water supply and the pristine complex was abandoned.

We reached this place by around 12 noon, spent some 2 hours visiting the place. There is a Durgah over here and a Palace. We visite the Durgah and the Shrine.I though of not entering the Shrine, but finally i thought there is nothing wrong in exploring other cultures.............and visited the shrine............
The mentality of mine or any Indian of not visiting a Church , Temple or Mosque can be mainly attributed to the way we are brought up....We have been thought that our culture and religion is good. I did my school in in a Christian school, where we had a subject in Christianity, where they used to praise Christianity and condemn other religions, saying it is Idol worship.............So obviously we start developing a bad feeling about Christianity....No Religion tells to praise themselves and Condemn others...Our mentality of this type has to change if we have to leave peacefully and united............................So our youth should be misguided by these kind of preaching’s.....................

We had a long Photography session at Fathepur, taking some 100 + snaps...I realized that the Batteries were not fully charged, so i switched off the Display and used View finder to take snaps, that would ensure long battery life.......We left Fathepur by 2 Pm, had lunch on a roadside Dhaba and reached Agra Fort by 4 PM.



Fathepur Sikri entrance

Fathepur Sikri Fort

Fathepur Sikri Fort

Panchamahal at Fathepur Sikri

Agra Fort : Built by Emperor Akbar, the Maze of Courtyards, Mosques and Private Chambers of the Fort Echoes the story of the Mughal Empire. They say that ShahJahan was house arrested by his Son in This Fort and ShahJahan spent his Final days looking at TajMahal from the windows/ balcony of Agra Fort.Even we were able to get a GR8 view of TajMahal from Agra fort...We tried and took many snaps of Tajmahal from Agra Fort. TajMahal is located just about 1 KM from Agra Fort. The View of TajMahal from Agra Fort is Really Amazing....
We took just around 30-40 minutes to look around Agra fort, the reason that we were not fed up by the Red building and same type of Architecture used in Delhi's Red fort , Fathepur and same in Agra Fort......After taking some snaps of TajMahal from Agra fort, we started our journey to TajMahal.........the Symbol of Love............................

Agra Fort

Taj Mahal : One of the Seven Wonders of the World built by Emperor Shahjahan in 1630. Renowned for its spectacular architecture and aesthetic beauty, the Taj Mahal is also a symbol of enduring love, built by Shah Jehan to house the grave of his beloved wife, Queen Mumtaz Mahal, who died following the birth of their 14th child. That is bound to happen, after giving birth to 14 children, how can u expect a women to be healthy. Was she considered as Baby yielding machine by Shahjahan. May be there were no family planning methods adopted or available at that time, else we would not have got the privilege to see TajMahal.
The death of Mumtaz left the emperor so heartbroken that his hair is said to have turned grey overnight. Construction of the Taj began in the same year and was not completed until 1653.

TajMahal is constructed in Marble and it has a height of approximately a 5 storied building. The Tombs of Mumtaj and ShahJahan are graved inside TajMahal. It has a Lovely Garden at the entrance and same Red fort built around it...We noticed that every fort (Delhi's Red for, Agra fort and Tajmahal ) had a Red outer fort and a White Marble monument inside. The only Difference being that, Tajmahal was a big monument (around 5 times bigger) compared to other marble monuments present in Red fort and Agra Fort.

I still wonder the Power in Love. History say's ShahJahan built TajMahal in the Memory and Love of Mumtaj. Hats Off to such an everlasting Love.....But there are some contradictions, which i feel about Tajmahal. History says that after Tajmahal was constrcted, ShahJahan cut the hands of the Architects, who constructed Tajmahal, so that another Tajmahal could not be built.
How can a emperor do such a cruel act.......the Architects who built such an amazing Monument of Love were maimed, instead of being rewarded....This shows the other Face Of ShahJahan...Love for Mumtaj at one side and the Cruelty and Selfishness on other Face...........The Saying "Every thing is Fare in Love and War" seems to be fully applicable to ShahJahan...............

Monument of Love :Tajmahal

Sikandra : The Tomb of Emperor is Akbar the Great. Built in Red Sandstone inland with Marble. It is a striking sight. We did not visit this place, may be it is not so much famous and even we did not have enough time....

By 6:30, we had covered TajMahal. We were bit exhausted, even our Camera Batteries were drained out, Memory card was filled up with sweet memories.......

For me, Moments are losrt, but Memories live forever.....so i always take a lots of snaps to keep the memories Afreshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

We started back our journey back to our Hotel by 7:30 Pm. On the way we gossiped and had a lots of fun . We even thought of re-coining Haryana to Lal-Yana, because most of the historical buildings are Red (Lal) in colour.....Arun was really Frustrated by these Red buildings, that he decide not to visit Jaipur this time...............So we are now planning to visit Kullu-Manali (Known for it's Snowfall and beautiful sceneries). We always had a dream to visit Snowfall places, so hoping that this Dream of our's comes true.....


But the constraints for visiting Kullu Manali is, that it is located at around 600-650 KMs from Gurgaon. It will take us 2 days to visit the place. So we are not sure whether we will be able to make it up to thia place or not.

Now i am a lot tired man, writing such a huge blog.....................It's time for me to go to Lunch and start my work after Lunch.............Starting the week in a relaxed way by taking so much time to share my experience.......

Hope that i have not bored u by writing such a lengthy Blog.........................
Was missing my Gang during the trip.....Hoped that if my gang was over here, we could have enjoyed a lot and definitely the Cost per head would have been considerably reduced................ :-)

Have taken around 250 snaps and will be sharing few selected ones , once i reach Bangalore.......

When i say snaps, i remember the words....my friends tell me.....It seems that u take Photographs with the intention of making others jealous, rather than for ur self satisfaction......................All Matrimonial Photos (Word used in our gang for Solo photos......)

Holi Festival

Title : Holi Festival
Date : 5’th March 2007
Holi Festival Date : 3’rd and 4’th March 2007.


Holi : The Festival of Colours, which marks the end of Evil....................where people forget all barriers (age, caste, sex, ) and play with colours.....

This time Holi festival was unfortunately on Saturday and Sunday...so the enthusiasm for us was less..............But we were expecting a lot to happen on Friday in our Office............

There was a special lunch which was arranged in our Office cafeteria on Friday, so we checked wwith our local office collegues, whether Holi celebrations will happen on Friday in Office (For us Holi celebrations, meant playing with colours (Gulal in Hindi).....
Our collegues answered that it will usually happen by Friday evening...so we had a discussion among ourselves (Me and my Bangalore collegue Arun), that we should wear and come some Old dress. We even had a discussion on whom we can target anf apply gulal..... We thought few names (Confidential) and thought of applying Gulal on them....and i said that we can apply Red Gulal on fw beautiful Gals over here (Just like Mang bharna), for which Arun gave a excellent reply......If someone applies Red Gulal (Just like Maaang bahrna), then in North INDIA according to their Tradition, the Girls consider them as their Brothers.......Arun seemed to be influenced by me and so he had also started speaking in my language :-) (But there is no such Tradition)..............

Even Holi is the only Festiaval where u get full freedom to touch the lovely cheeks of any of ur collegue / friend and apply Gulal :-)..forgetiing all the barriers......So we had a nice time over here..........

As decided we wore and came some old dress (T-shirt and Jeans pant) to the office on Friday...bur in the office all of our other collegues had come well dressed.....i just felt a bit bad, as i was wearinga T-shirt which i usaully wer as Night dress.....We were working and by 11:30 AM the Holi craze struck our office..There were groups of people entering our cubicles carring lots of Gulal and fully coated in colours.....Initially few of them did not bother to disturb me as i was new to that place...but in this short span i had made many friends and they did not spare me.....They just came around applied Gulal all over and carried on.....Even we got involved applying Gulal to each and every one.......There were few people (Mainly manger level) who stayed away from colours.As it was Appraisal time, most of the people did not dare apply gulal on them forcibly...But there was no such restriction on us, so i went to my Manager and applied a bit of gulal on him.........

Just within matter of few minutes, there was no one in their cubicles..every one was busy playing with Gulal........So a busy office location turned into a play ground within few minutes (i.e. the power of Holi..............)......
All our cubicles had become dirty, colours all around, on the floors, keyboard and every where.......The office boys had a difficult time cleaning the place...It's fun for some and Suffering (Hard work) for others...................It took a heavy tool on the office boys to clean up the place...........

Then we cleaned up ourselves and went for lunch.........the cafeteria was well decorated with more than 400 Ballons, Matkas (Pots filled with Gulal), some posters of Holi and even some Dance performances................

There was a variety of food items awaiting us...To name a few we had some Chats like:
GolGappe : Similar to Paani Poori
Allo tikki
Pappadi Chat
Gunjiya

and then normal food items (Pulav, roti etc).....

We took a Pulav item and a variety of each of the Chat items and enjoyes these food items watching the dance performances.....It was good to see all the people fully coated with colours...........There were more enthusiatic / charming faces and a few dull faces (May be who were forcibly coated with colours............)

By 4 PM, most of our office collegues had vacated, most of them going to their native places........So we just wished them HAppy Holi and continued our work....

We then left back to our Hotel rooms by 11 PM, hoping that more celebrations may happen on Saturday..........

Even on Saturday we cam eto the office in the same old dress, but unfortunately there were not much people in the office...we spent our tme doing some work, chatting with our friends, playing TT and then returned back home...............

On Sunday the actual Holi (Colour spraying ) is played...we were invited by one of our Bangalore office collegue (Sugandha) to her residence in Delhi. She said that they play Gandha holi on Sunday where all thei family members and relatives apply anything (gulal, grease, paint) and enjoy themselves........We did not want to disturb their celebrations as we will be strangers to their family, so we informed that we may not join her........

We woke up by 10:30 in our Hote on Sunday. By then the Trainees who had come from Chennai, bangalore had started making lots of humgama, applying Holi and dancing around....Luckily most of them did not knew about us, so we were spared......we had our Breakfast.......Then the Hotel staff and the Manager gave us a call, asking whether we would like to have Bhang...........Let me give u ppl an introduction of Bhang................

Bhang : Bhang is a type of leaves, similar to Pudhina etc which people mix it in milk and consume it on the ocassion of Holi. Even they prepare Bhajji from Bhang and consume it.....If consumed on larger scale, Bhang makes people loose their consiousness and they tend to do the same task (As told by people, if consumed on large volume, it induces drowsiness, people who laugh keep laughing, who cry keep crying and so on....i.e they loose thier mind consiousness).........So i am using the term "Bhanged"................

It is a common drink in these parts of the world.They say that in every house Bhang is prepared and all the members of the family , including ladies consume Bhang (Exception being small children)


We thanked them and siad that we would not like to have it............By 12:30 PM, we saw few of Trainees staying in the Hotel playing cricket in the small park located in front of the Hotel...even we joined them and played till 4 PM....As we were seniors in Aricent, they did not apply gulal and were treated with more respect............By then the Holi colours had calmed down........we then made an evening walk towards some og th Shopping malls, returned to our Hotel heard few of my all time favourite songs (Anisutte yaako indu, Pal pal dil ke paas, Chalte chalte, Pyar maanga hai tum hi se...............) and then had a sound sleep.........


Today we are seeing most of our collegues still stained in Holi colours, with thir hands still having traces of Holi colours...................


More Details about Holi Festival.............

Holi is celebrated for 3 days over here.On first day (i.e. Saturday), people perform some pooja and burn the putlas of Holika and mark the end of Evil..
On second day, people play with the colours. Usually the word used here is "Gandha Holi", which implies that there is no restriction on what can be sprayed. People go to the extent of evn pouring paint, drainage water , grease etc, hence termed "Gandha" (Dirty) Holi.

Third day (i.e. Monday), it is termed Basada, where People go to the temple and consume previous days food, after keeping it in moonlight.

Hope that i am not Boring u guys by all these junk blogs which i am writing.............


This Official visit is helping me gain some Technical knowledge, make new friends, know North Indian culture , visit the Historical places around and probably making me a Writer :-)......................

ShivaGanga Biking cum trek

ShivaGanga Biking cum trek
Date: 18 march 2007
Participants : Harish,Jatin,Rohit,Ganesh,Santosh,Sridhar & Sudha
Bikes: Bullet, Pulsar, CBZ, CT 100 & TVS Victor
Total distance :140 Kms
Route : Go straight on NH4 Tumkur highway till Dabaspet(20KMs from Nelamangala). Take left turn and travel for 6 KMs to reach Shivagange


View from top : on way to peak


View from top : on way to peak



Steep route :On way to peak

Having some photo session at peak

Having some photo session at peak

Having some photo session at peak

Having some photo session at peak

Having some photo session at peak

Having some photo session at peak

Posing in front of Nandi

Our gang which went to shivagange

On way to peak

At Anthargange

Bandar bhi peeta hai Sprite

Starting point

I wonder who tied these bells : Really Amazing

Shiva Gange View

It was going to be a long weekend, as Monday was an off for our office due to Ugadi festival. If it was not summer, then myself and my friends would have planned for a trip / trek. Usually we do not prefer going out for long trips in the heat. But this time Rohit took an initiative and planned for a biking trek to Shivagange. I was interested in it, as it is a holy place and I had not visited it before. I usually do not prefer biking if the ride is longer, as u cannot enjoy the place u visit due to tiredness of biking. Since this was going to be only 150 kms ride, I had no problems.

The activity was planned to start on Sunday morning at 6 AM. We had decided to meet at Corporation by 6:45 AM. I packed up few things (water bottle,biscuits ,camera and mp3 player) on Saturday night and went to sleep by 2 AM in a disturbed mood after seeing INDIA loosing their world cup match against meanows Bangla. Woke up by 6 AM, freshened and reached Corporation by 6:50. As few of my friends had not turned up I was asked by Rohit to continue to Yeshwantpur metro to give company to Sudha (Rohits collegue). I reached yeshwantpur ,but was not able to find Sudha.Actually i was waiting below the yeshwantpur bridge,where as sudha was waiting infront of Metro. Then we all meet infront of Metro and started by 7:45 AM.Jatin (My college friend) accompaniedme in my bike.

There was lot of traffic in NH4. It took us around 30 minutes to cross Nelamangala. We then moved at good pace ,crossed the Toll gate and reached a Flyover ,where we saw a boarding saying Shivaganga is 6 kms and we need to take the road on left to Flyover .We gave a break there to make sure that all of them meet, discuss and proceed. Jatn had taken out his new digital SLR camera (Pentax K110) to take a snap.He took some time to pack his camera back in the bag.In the mean while all our other friends had left. We also started hoping to catch up with them.We were not able to sight them even after traveling for some 4kms.I asked Jatin to call up Rohit and check whether we had missed the route.Rohit asked us to just keep coming straight. We moved ahead at 80kms perhour, but were not able to sight any of our friends. We were wondering what happened to other friends, have we lost our track. Have they gone a head in search of some good Hotel to have breakfast. We crossed the tollgate exit and I was sure that we had lost track. We called up Rohit again and said that we have crossed the toll gate. Rohit did not have much idea, so he handed the phone to Ganesh (My trek friend) and he informed us that we have gone around 15-20kms ahead. He asked us to return back and take a road going towards Dabbaspet. We were actually required to take the road left to Flyover, move for 50 mts and then take a Left deviation. We had not taken this Left deviation and Rohit had asked us to just keep coming straight. Cursing Rohit, we came back to Dabbaspet and reached Shivagange.

At Dabbaspet u should pay vehicle entry fee of RS: 5,as maintenance and improvement fee.NH4 is good , but the deviation road is not so good. When we reached Shivagange,we saw Rohit and Co taking the steps and going to the Temple. As there was no Mobile signal,we tried to call him by giving him a shout. When they did not respond, me and Jatin decided to have Breakfast and then join them later. We went to a nearby hotel, had Idli and then started our journey.Jatin saw the sparrowsin the hotel ad said that he is seeing sparrows after along time. U cant sight sparrows in Bangalore ,the reason as per my knowledge is that Mobile signals affect the sparrows and hence we cannot find them in Bangalore.

Take road next to flyover to reach Shivagange

While taking the steps on the way to main Shiva temple, there is Harake Ganapati. After few more steps, there is main Shiva temple. The speciality of this temple is that the main Garbagudhi is inside a huge single rock. The other speciality of this temple is that,if u put Ghee on Shiva Linga for Abhishek, u get back Butter. We had heard that Ghee is prepared by heating butter, but we had not heard the reverse. We had a darshan in the temple and meet our bichde sathis. Rohit & Co had waited for us below for some 20 minutes and then started to the temple. Rohit and Co had not done their Breakfast. So they went down to have their breakfast asking me , Jatin and Sudha to carry ahead to the peak.

The first question, we asked Sudha was whether it was her first trek. The reason being that she had come wearing sandals, Jeans jacket, scarf and holding a Umbrella. She replied saying it was her first trek and we replied saying that u have chosen the wrong season to begin ur campaign.
We moved towards the peak taking some break for lassi, juice and Photography sessions, exploring the options of new Digital SLR camera which had an amazing zoom lens.The temperature was high,so we had to take more fluids to avoid dehydration. Luckily u get lots of stalls all throughout the way selling lassi, juice etc.

At one point Sudha asked us how far is the peak,for which I replied saying that is the peak pointing towards the peak. She said that i guess that we should also make it up to the peak. I responded to her by asking whether she was bored of our photography sessions and whether she felt that we were wasting time. She just smiled.(She has a good smile J)

I explained her the necessity of having Photography sessions : First we can have the photographs for our future reference as part of our wonderful moments. I always say that Moments are lost, only memories remain forever and photos are part of ur memories. Secondly it gives us much needed time to relax.


We reached Nandi ( Vehicle of Lord Shiva) statue near the peak. Jatin took his camera from the bag to take some snaps and in the mean time, a monkey took Jatin’s bag and started running. I had to run behind it , wage a war and get the bag back. The monkeys at Shivagange are very ferocious. There are lots of monkeys, if ur bag zip is opened or if u have some eatables in ur hand, then forget it. If you are not carrying any stick/staff to scare the monkeys, then be ready to get attacked by the monkeys. They not only snatch bags/carry bags from you, but also check your pockets for any eatables.
We then took few steps to reach the Peak. In the peak there are 2 Shiva temples and 'Shantala Drop' - a suicide point similar to the Tippu drop in Nandi hills. Queen Shantala, wife of Hoysala King Vishnuvardhana committed suicide here. The drop is more than 500 ft.
We went to the View point, took some snaps and had a spectacular Photo session. Jumping from rocks, pushing the rocks etc……In the mean time , Rohit and Co joined us. We went to the temple, roamed around and planned to return.

An amazing incident happened when we were about to return. A girl was carrying a Sprite bottle in her hand. Suddenly a ferocious monkey approached her. The girl got frightened and threw the Sprite bottle. The monkey took the bottle, opened the cap and drank the entire Sprite. So we said “Bandar bhi Peeta hai” Sprite!!!!!!!!!!!. U can see the snap.


We started our return journey. In the way we had some drinks break and we started pulling each others leg. First was Rohit, who was pulled by telling about his Non Onion food habits. We pulled his leg saying that he orders Onion free Onion Dosa and some old incidents.Ganesh and Co started pulling my leg over my Matrimonial (Solo) photos that I usually take in all trips / Treks. Ganesh went to an extent that he said that I daily send my Solo photos in Good Morning mails to potential Females to impress them. Pull others leg a lot, so I am also used to others pulling my leg, I just smile and respond to their comments.

On our return journey, we visited Olakal teertha, a temple inside a single big boulder of rock. You have murthis of Lord Shiva,,Ganesh and in the back side u have this Olaklal teertha. Olakal is a Kannada word which means manual wet-grinder, manual means one has to rotate the top oval shaped stone manually.
There is a 15 cm round opening, from which you can see holy water (Teertha). There is a saying that people who have sinned more will not be able to touch the water and the water level decreases when they try to touch it. We had to put our hands deep till 2 feet to touch the water. All of us wee able to touch the water, may be we have sinned less :-).
On the return journey we even saw 3 Bells tied to end of a big rock, we just wondered how did someone mange to reach that point and tie the bells. We could not imagine reaching to that point.


We reached down by 3:30 PM and started back our journey to Bangalore. Reached our homes by 5:30 / 6 PM.

For More Details About Shivagange Visit : http://www.dreamroutes.org/southern/shivagange.html