Wayanad- Banasura island resort

I know I did not blog about our blissful Malaysia and Singapore tour. Somehow I felt the photos told the story there. But I definitely want to tell you about the Banasura Island resort in Wayanad. This is our annual tour with Hari’s colleagues and families. It’s a beautiful concept in amazon. I love the company for this. Every year, the company sponsors an annual outing to its employees with families. We usually go for a two day tour to a good resort- one year to Yercaud (Grand continental), one year to poovar island, Kerala. This year, it was to Wayanad for three days.
I’d tell you why I love the concept of the tour. You get to enjoy the tour while a bunch of enthusiastic and efficient colleagues take care of the planning. The whole tour is a suspense trip. It’s a boon for busy families like us ;)
You get to meet your hubby’s colleagues and families every single year and have fun with them. This will not happen without such a concept!
They bulk book such nice resorts that we will never spend so much on a stay when we tour as individual families. Also, you can customize a lot of things with the resort due to the bulk booking. The resorts are so nice, you can simply choose to stay and enjoy the resort, not even go out touring. Even if you go out touring the hotel arranges bus for the large group and you are jolly and free 
Over to Wayanad. We went to Calicut by train. The train route to Calicut itself was so beautiful. So lush green that each scene looked like a wall paper. From there, the hotel had arranged mini bus transportation to their resort in Wayanad.
The entire resort was booked for amazon and rooms were chosen using lots. There was a honey moon villa, twin cottage, naalukettus, luxury rooms and deluxe rooms. We got the naalukettu as a couple who got it in the lots were unable to make the trip. Whoever owns this resort has a true blessing to his credit. I have never even imagined a resort that could be in such a scenic place. Or I had never even imagined a place that is so, so, so, so scenic…. Water, mountains, greenery, what not.. I still could not get it off my eyes.
Naalukettu was surely one of the best rooms. It was a single room with two room sized balconies- one overlooking the beautiful mountains and the other overlooking a beautiful stream of water. The aesthetic antique wood themed interiors with two swings were..well..too much for us..
We had already planned to spend most of this trip relaxing than touring around wayanad. Anyways, the resort was far away from tourist destinations. The first evening, we went to a nearby lake and did speed boating there. Well, nice experience, but nothing compared to the resort itself.
The hospitality of staff was unbelievable. Especially, the manager Binoth was smiling all the time and waiting to accommodate our every request. Other staff were equally polite and dying to help. (I wish they’d get rid off the coconut oil in their cooking though) We spent the evening with bajji, TT and carrom board. After dinner, we had a good sleep.
Next day, we decided not to join the touring gang and spent the day lazing- Hari massaging and me TT playing. In the evening, Hari and I walked through a small green road- typically reminding of the “Road not taken” by Robert Frost. It was most beautiful and fresh with the rain drops. I do not remember a more beautiful place where I have walked. We walked for a while. As everything comes with a cost- we discovered a few leeches on Hari’s leg and on my face. We decided to return 
Night was spent with some guys drinking and us playing dumb charades.
The next day, we walked to the water stream very close to the resort. We passed through the same road we walked the previous evening, but it was only a little less beautiful without the rain drops. A few had opted out of it for fear of leeches. But we decided to brave it this time with salt. There was a small trek down to the stream and man, the stream was gorgeous. Two leech bites on me and one on Hari were removed with salt. It was all worth the sweet sounding rush of water we bathed in. As it rained, the water level and force increased in front of our eyes. Then, the guide advised us to leave the place. We reached back, played some more TT and left the lovely resort.
No one had a heart to leave. The resort was so secluded that the employees had to travel 8 KM to buy even veggies. But what do we care as guests? We could go on forever 

My journey against induced religion conversion

I have Christian friends very close to my heart. My intention is far from hurting them. It is just that I hate the propaganda made by some people to turn non Christians into Christians. According to me no religion is good or bad (atleast, mine is not). It’s just the beliefs you grow up with, the unique festivals you cherish and the moral support the religion gives you at trying times. I see no reason to change religion just for the morals or the particular GOD. So my dear Christian friends, I would request you to please stay away from this blog if it can hurt your beliefs. In case you are curious and want to read on, please leave your comments. So here I was, travelling from Trichy to Tirupur to attend a friend’s wedding. Sitting in an unreserved compartment with my back to the toilet wasn’t an enriching experience, if not for the lady who was sitting next to me. She was this person questioning a lot of college girls about how the world evolved. At first I thought she was trying to sell quiz books, before I figured out she was trying to sell Jesus. The college girls were laughing to each other without being able to express their chagrin. Others on the compartment were annoyed too, but weren’t very expressive. Thankfully, there was a girl on the other side with whom I had become friends during the journey. I was commenting to her for each statement being made by this lady. Lady: “Jesus created oxygen” Me:”Oh is it? We should start planting Jesus instead of trees”! Then the train stopped at a station. This lady and her neice started eating oranges and throwing the peels right on the platform. I was watching this, very irritated. There was another group of illiterate vendors who had joined the ladies compartment by then. So this lady’s job became much easier. But I decided to make her job difficult and confronted her one to one. Lady: “You know why we are brown? Because God created us from mud. Me: “Then why are foreigners white? Lady: “Maybe he created them from beach sand?” Me: Hmm interesting.. Lady: Sun raises and falls due to god. Me: If the whole world is God’s, why sunset and sunrise are at different times in different places? Lady: I don’t know, ask God. Me: You are the one who told about God. Why should I ask him and not you? Lady: (Chooses to ignore) Lady: The world is going to end as Jesus announced. There are wars, earthquakes and diseases. These are the signs of the world ending. Me: But these things happened during the first world war also. How are you telling it is this year? Lady: Different people make such propaganda that world will end this year and that. It is not true. Don’t trust them. It is only this year that world will end. Lady: People pray to Velankani matha. Don’t do that. She could not save her own place during floods (This lady is a protestant and does not believe in Mary worship) Me: The whole world is Jesus’s anyways. So why is he not protecting it from floods? Lady: You know how the world started? God created Adam and Eve. Me: Ever heard of theory of evolution? Lady: You are an educated person, you must not speak such nonsense Me: Wow! Lady: God shed his blood to remove your sins. Not even your own son will do that. Me: If you are hospitalized and need blood immediately, will you ask your son or God? Lady: Oh well, I will ask God and he will send my son. Meanwhile some ladies in the train were giving their support to me from outside. Me: You were throwing orange skin on the platform. People might skid and fall down because of it. Isn’t that a sin you do knowingly? Why do you do such sins and expect god to shed his blood for it? Lady: Oh, I am sorry for that. You are really attacking me. Lady continues her crap about how other religions pray stone deities, trees and even the sun. This, according to her is the height of disrespect for God. People are worshiping the petty things that were created by God instead of worshiping the God himself. She was pleading we didn’t fall to such vicious propaganda. Me: Supporting your religion is fine, but you have no right to defame other religions. Lady: No, I never spoke ill of other religions. Me: The whole compartment in chorus: You defamed Hinduism from the very beginning. We’ve been keeping mum and you are just going on non-stop. You better shut up right now. (yayyyyyy! So here is my success. Atlast I’ve got a whole bunch of women to realize that they don’t have to take crap like this. ) Lady shuts up and moves on to buy watermelons. Another Christian enters the conversation. She comes to me and says, “Girl, you are so intelligent. If only you read bible, you can become a doctor” Me: “Oh, I am already an engineer. Can you get me a medical seat?” (The coach laughs with me) Another drunk Christian man enters the ladies compartment. Now I just keep mum. Few other ladies take care of him “Out you go, this is a ladies compartment and you have no place. We just shut up that lady, we don’t want you here” This lady is a true beliver.. She continues her third innings after a while. Lady: “Because Adam and Eve ate apple, god cursed man that he should shed sweat to get his food and woman that she should suffer in child birth” Me: So unlike God. Why did he punish the entire human race for two people’ s mistakes? Lady: You look like a Christian yourself, aren’t you? Me: Really? I wouldn’t be so pleased.. The lady believed that when she goes to heaven, Jesus will question why she didn’t educate the people on the train coach about him. She was saying that Hindus are people are conviction and when they turn to Christianity, they will get closer to God even faster than Christians. She was saying that there were so many Hindu turned Christians who were leading them at the churches. The lady was shut up for the third time, by all women now. It was time for me to get down now. I handed over my responsibility to another bold woman on the coach before I got down. The lady blessed me and said that I will soon get Jesus’s blessing. Eagerly awaiting that! My original intention was to break the lady’s confidence from canvassing like this in a public place. But she seemed to be so bound to her duty. But I was happy that I could educate so many women on the way that this propaganda is crap and they should do their bit to discourage it. I was the heroine, who played the revolution 