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 

Monolith

Unplanned trips do really make you feel that you are still living life. Last sunday, Hari wanted to have lunch outside (escape from my cooking). After lunch, we found the Chennai weather exceptionally good. Hubby dear wanted to ride on ECR in bike. Tired of saying no to his chinna chinna aasais, I said ‘yes’ for a change, and off we left, without even our two wheeler papers, to ECR. Without a camera or handbag, dressed up only for the neighborhood lunch, we rode on and on, filling petrol for a lump sum 500.

After we had gone a while, I thought we’d go to muttukkadu and take a boat ride before we return. Hubby dear said yes, but decided to ride past it, only to suggest that Mahabalipuram was now just 20 kilometers away. I nodded naughtily, and the journey continued. It was 4 PM when we reached Mahabalipuram. We had planned many times to visit this place, but never made it. I remembered school days, and the only tour I had made to Mahabalipuram earlier. I recollected how we covered ourselves from foreigners’ cameras, as someone warned us. At that time, I had no clue I would ever get married, get settled in Chennai and come back to the very place on a Sunday evening on a random picnic!

Our first stint was to sit on the lawn and chitchat on memories and passing tourists. What else would we care for- casual tourists with neither a schedule, nor a camera. Then, we explored the five rathas, marveling at the the monolithic sculptures and life-sized elephant statue, and giggling at the variety of tourists posing non-stop in front of the elephant. After buying icecreams for a huge price, we ambled to the Mahisasura Mardhini rock, only to give away our icecream to an eager monkey. Monkey was not as eager though, to share photo space with hari on our mobile camera.

Wind was amazing as expected, at the top of the hill. We climbed down the rock to visit the lighthouse. I was stung on the way by a red ant, or a beetle maybe. Hardly did I imagine that the little beast would hurt and itch me for the next 72 hrs! The visit up the lighthouse was not exactly interesting, though we could get some view of the city. We had to wait our turn to come down the narrow passage following an old, not-so-abled aunty.

We had a cup of buttermilk, only to find out we didn’t have enough change. We passed our Rs.7 instead of Rs. 10, grinning at the indirect curses from the vendor woman. Next we went to what was marked as a temple, although we didn’t find anything like a temple. At about the height of the first floor, there was a pillared construction, with the width of a “othayadi paadhai” (Imagine the edges of a rectangle). Hari walked it up promptly, inviting me to join. I took the first few steps on the structure, before fear gripped me. I didn’t have much choice, now that I was on the way already. The more I got scared, the more I felt like slipping down and vice-versa. Being adventurous naturally, I don’t remember having many such scary moments in the past. Perhaps marriage has done damage to my guts. I finally walked back to the starting point, dutifully holding Hari’s hands, as though that would save my life!

After a little more wandering in the rocks, we got ready to leave the place. We stopped when we saw a crowd gathered around a hill. What held their attention were a mom goat and her kid, struggling to reach out to each other. The kid goat had strayed off and somehow slid down a slope. It was now trying to rally back. Mom was making desperate sounds, not knowing a way to help. As we were watching, a few more goats ran to the place, as if to show their support. Hari positioned himself down the hill, to catch the little one just in case she fell down. The kid balanced herself by bending her fourth leg, and after a few tense minutes, she magically reached up. All of the gathered crowd encouraged her with applause and dispersed with smiles. She stays on in memory though, as if a symbol of nature’s desperation as well as its own grace and self sustainability.

On the way back, we admired some beautiful humongous sculptures kept for sale. We then saw a cow killed by a passing vehicle and sympathized . The animals have learnt to cope up with nature, but probably not yet with man’s endless inventions.

what an effortlessly eventful day it had been- a lot of encounters with animals- some bad and some good. But what stays is the nicety of the memories, the freshness of new lovers we found in ourselves that day.

Song of passion

There’s a song in me
which sets my rhythm
and keeps me on track

It tunes my blood
to get set ready
for the first ray of sunlight

When I get wiped out
It stirs my spirit;
vibes “Just don’t give up!”

When moments get tough,
It soothes my soul;
Whispers “Wait for your time”

A small win here and there
I hear it melody
“Way to go!”

I stare at the blank wall
It breaks the monotone,
hums “What’s in store next?”

The world gets dark,
as I shut my eyes;
the song never dies

It sings lullabies
into my ears
“Dream big. Rock the world”

Now, that’s my song
I’ve turned on loud
You tune it in, let’s resonate

“One day, we’ll make it big”
“One day, we’ll make it big”!

Dumb Charades

There are some days when happiness and dissatisfaction occupy you at the same time. Those days give you a strange feeling of restlesslness. Today was one such day. Work at office usually keeps me busy. Yet I make it a point to make myself a part of any fun events that my company has to offer me. So today when we had the women’s day celebration, I was there in time. My teammates’ have an interesting coolness quotient- they find it cool to boycott just anything which does not fit into their regular idea of a day at work. So, I went alone. All others had come in gangs. I felt awkward about being in a fun event all alone. But I didn’t regret it, it was not the first time either.

There was only one girl in the whole crowd who I really knew- Richa. Infact, I had come to know of her when I did anchoring for the talent council two months back. (Goes to say that almost anybody I can meet at fun events in my office would only be known to me through another fun event). The first event was the musical chair. I braved 3 rounds. But unluckily, I was in the back of one of the smartest girls in the group- Richa. When it came to her vs me, I came out in the fourth round. My musical chair continued for a while, as the audience chairs had been taken for the game.

Then was time for dumb charades. Dumb charades is one game that really excites me. I was zealous and asked “what kind of dumb charades?”. The organizers told “Hindi movies”. Isn’t that enough to turn me off? By that time, Richa herself invited me to their team. (I was a little surprised given that we don’t really know each other that much, but when it comes to silly guts that many girls surprisingly don’t possess, I am usually remembered- and I guess the anchoring would have given her that notion). But I told them that I don’t know to either guess or act Hindi movies. (Hey you, I can understand and even talk hindi that can make a native hindi speaker hang, but Hindi movies- no, not really).
Some argument from me and a couple of others persuaded the organizers to allow English and kannada as well (not that I know many English movies, but with years of childhood practice, atleast I can enact them). But now, I didn’t have a team. Finally I found a couple of more girls who wanted to play- one Hindi and one Kannada. My persuasion worked and they settled for English. I am usually popular in the acting side of dumb charades and so I chose that and I excitedly taught my newfound team umpteen number of symbols. Finally we got to play. The first round was easiest- “face off” was the movie and we got it in 6 seconds (ofcourse, we were the fastest). The second round was hangover. I showed “hang”. I managed to show “empty”, but they could not guess “over”. I finally showed them “6 balls in Cricket” and 6 balls make an “over”. We got it in 51 seconds. In the third round, we were supposed to find the movie and sing a song from it. I vetoed it out saying we can’t sing songs from English movies. The song idea was dropped. Next time, they tried making it tougher “Me, myself and Irene”. I even managed the fourth word with a combination of “eye” and “ring”. By this time, the organizer shook hands with me and said my acting was great. The participants asked us to come to the centre of the stage so that they could all see us. (That’s some shameless boasting, but you gotta admit sometimes I can manage good work too!)

They gave “Sherlock Holmes” and I acted it with “Home” and “Lock” and my wise team cracked it. Next, they wanted to make it so tough that they asked suggestions from audience. One girl suggested “Love at the time of cholera”. Now imagine doing this in two minutes, an unknown movie with 6 words and how do you ever act cholera!. My team could find “love and the time of fever-call” (I tried to explain them that it is a fever which starts with “chol” and it ended up like this. Infact, we managed this despite wasting some time asking for a notebook to write down the words they found- the name was too long for them to remember!). We could not make the last word, but this round was only for the three finalists and all three teams had not found their answers. So we survived.

Then came the spoilsport. In the form of cake and samosa. All of us had them and my teammate overdid it with two samosas. She came back from the break pretty late and by that time I had protested to the organizers not to give such long names.
Other two participants had cracked the final round in 23 and 24 seconds. I was given “fifty first dates” for the final round. Wouldn’t that be a cakewalk? Infact out of all the movies I enacted, this is the only movie I had seen and one of my all time favorites).

I tried to show “fifty” with five in one hand and in my other hand, I joined my thumb and index finger to show “0”. The audience had found the answer by then. My team came up with a brilliant “O-5”. I gave up and tried the second word. This should be easy. I had given the specific example to my teammate earlier that if I show “1”, guess “first” etc. I showed “1” finger, my teammates came up with “one”, “oneself” etc. I persisted asking them to tell something like “1” and my teammate came up with “2”. (How brilliant, if I wanted to show “2”, wouldn’t I have simply shown two fingers!!). The two samosas were really doing the talking now. I tried to indicate coming “first” in a running race. They came up with “run” etc. I switched to the third word “dates”. I had told them earlier that if I show the watch, try guessing date, time, etc. It didn’t work, and I could not successfully show them a calendar too. They guessed “five point someone” and I finally gave up. The stars of the show ‘gave up’, because the cakes and samosas had overtaken them!

The organizers felt so “sorry” for us that they managed making up a third prize on the spot with chocolates. The winners and runners-up took home some crockery sets. (Incidentally, the winners had cracked the first few rounds almost at the verge of time-out). It was difficult for me not to scold my teammate who later said her favorite movie was “50 first dates”. But you can’t really scold a stranger, can you!. But her own friends saved me the trouble by scolding her themselves. I was glad when we came so close and really sad when we lost in such a silly way. But if I think about it more, I didn’t have teammates in the first place. What if I never found them, even if I did, what would have happened if they could not guess, lets say “face off” or “hangover”. That’s how the optimistic side of me consoled the “It’s an unfair world” side of me!

On an indirectly relevant note, one thing really bothers me. Why is it that a lot of us find it cool to simply boycott participating in competitions, meetings etc. I did that grave mistake in my childhood and missed so much fun. I do it even now at times. Sometimes, it’s due to peer pressure. For example, putting a project call on mute and gossiping on our own. I think it’s part of our culture. I am just wondering whether people from other countries grow up with the same attitude??!

peraanmai- watch in theatres

When I watched nadodigal a couple of months back, I was glad that such no nonsense movies are coming in Tamil. I always love it when surprising movie packages come from lesser known directors- five star, azhagiya theeye, kalluri for example. A recent movie that makes me really proud is peraanmai. I had watched some scenes and thought it's going to be different from the usual movie. But it was much more than that- A wonderful and informative package covering so many aspects- patriotism (not the usual vijaykanth patriotism!!!), tribals (It was really nice that the director had touched a largely unexplored subject), space science and even the cute giggle of girls. I have never written movie reviews so far and nor am I going to write one today. All I want to tell you is please watch this movie in theatre- we really got to encourage and support such different and sensible scripts...

A poem on global warming

I've always opined that we haven't given serious thought about global warming. The news about the international conference that's going to happen at Copenhagen made me think more seriously about it. I found out so many facts that I had been blissfully unaware of. For example, did you know that ten of the hottest years in record are within the past fifteen years? Isn't it time we act, to save us and our children from a living hell?


A small poem that I wrote in dedication of this cause:


The day I came alive, the world was warm and cozy;
In days that came again, the earth is hot and crazy.
When I was a kid, the hills were full of ice;
Then it all melted, now it’s not so nice…

In years just bygone, floods and droughts were rare.
Now they come so often, yet no one seems to care…
All microbes that harm, they grow because it’s warm;
My earth has lost it’s charm, why should I still stay calm?

With every tree that’s felled, there’s more CO2 in the air
Let’s plant some trees, and use papers only when fair
Let’s recycle all we can, it makes our land cleaner
A little care here and there, can make my earth greener

Plastic bags and bottles, real killers they are;
Let’s carry our own bags to shop, and make others aware.
Take the bus, try car pool;
You’ll find it really cool!

TV, computer, even lights, switch off when not in use;
We won’t take them for granted, they heat our earth profuse.
Let’s shun the coal, let’s go solar,
High time we make our earth cooler…



If this poem kindled some interest in you, you can read more by browsing through www.greenpeace.org