SILENT VALLEY

DAY 2

Planners as we all are, it had been decided the previous night that we shall leave our hotel by 0700 hrs as the forest opens at 0800 hrs (considering one hour traveling time to reach Mukkali). But laziness took its toll and our early start went down the drain. To add to our misery, we had to wait a while to get a bus to our destination as only private buses ply between the two spots, thus losing nearly two hours in the process. 

Mukkali Town

Once in mukkali, we went to the forest dept. office, confirmed our booking and got the permission and tickets (an easy task if you have booked your visit on a prior basis, else it being a govt. office you can very well imagine what might happen). Moreover, private vehicles are not allowed inside the national park and therefore one has the option of either hiring a jeep or catching a bus . But, the buses only ply when there are at least ten to fifteen passengers, thus we had to take a jeep which as we were only three turned out to be a costly affair (but thinking about it now I feel it was totally worth it). However if there are six to seven people then hiring a jeep is the best option.

View of the Valley

Since we hadn’t had our breakfast we searched for an eatery nearby and with only one option available we marched in. We ordered dosa (a south Indian delicacy) as it was the only available item, but I must confess it was accompanied by awesome sambhar which fulfilled both our stomach and soul. As any breakfast is incomplete without beverage, coffee was ordered but it turned out to be a disappointment since it wasn’t filtered and crushed beans were lying at the bottom (authentic but not tasteful).

Into the Wild

And we began with our forest ride… Hardcore dense forest was further fifteen kilometers from mukkali, the road till that point being accompanied by coffee and cardamom plantations and one tribal habitation. The road was definitely a turnoff as it was made out of gravel, stones and clay thereby a very bumpy ride and hence; dancing of our internal organs could easily be felt. But soon enough our journey became alive, as our driver showed us an endangered species which is found predominantly in silent valley park of Nilgiri range in the whole world. Now, even though it was just another monkey namely lion-tailed macaque but the extra information made it an exceptional experience. And what proved to be an icing on the cake was the fact that the jeep behind us missed this opportunity (yes, by the time they came, these guys were gone). By this one must infer that we were lucky enough to be present in the right spot at the right time and nothing else (I really feel sorry for the jeep behind us, :P)

A tiny fall en-route to the Watch Tower

Rain Harvested Road

And this is where things got interesting as we were attacked, well…mainly myself (NO, the macaques didn’t and neither did the other jeep guys). In fact full credit must be given to the attacker for the clandestine activity it started pursuing. Our driver showed us one of such a long and slimy creature and pointed out that we must be beware of these mischievous wrecks who suck out quite a lot of blood without giving a hint to the host.

My enemy 'Highlighted'

It was only after another hour that I started feeling something in one of my socks and immediately took it off to reveal, a black creature which had grown manifolds in size owing to my blood. Another one got exposed once we reached the forest dept. back after completing our trip (around two hour lunch for the predator) and another one while I was in shower (nearly four hour meal for this one…and it really grew in size) once we were back at our hotel. What is really an irritating thing is that these things attach quite firmly to the body and it is pretty difficult to get them off, but by the time I had to take out the third one I had become reasonably good at it. It is funny that many people get this done medicinally as well and it’s popularly known as “LEECH THERAPY”, hence in that aspect I could say I got a free one. But I prefer it calling as “Attack of the leeches”. 

Now, if you are interested to know more about the therapy and its benefits here you go: http://www.leechestherapy.com/benefits_and_effects.php .

Watch Tower, Yes! can go to the top

Getting back to the story and silent valley…there was a beautiful hundred feet tall watch tower (main attraction beside the macaque) which could be climbed upon. As we reached the top we felt like we had entered a whole new world as it was purely magical. With cold breeze flowing in at great speed, mountains covered in a thick green coat and white clouds snuggling around magnificently amongst the peaks, it was a sight I shall remember forever. We were fortunate enough that are camera batteries didn’t die out before it was captured digitally and thus some of the best moments shall live with us forever.

View from the top

 It was a reluctant moment when our driver asked us to come down from the tower as it was others turn to go up there, and we had to obey. It was time I had to leave my ‘Neverland’ and come back to reality, and so I did. Following this, we went for the river Kunti trek which was approximately a three kilometer one. While trekking to reach the river most part of it was completely under shade i.e. tree cover was dense like a canopy and only a few sunlight beams (Tyndall effect-if I remember correctly) could pass through it (really an amazing forest walk). There was a bridge as we reached the river but even though we could walk on it we weren’t allowed to cross it as the other side came in reserved forest area (closed for tourists). Thus we spent some time admiring the river and the sounds it made as it crashed into giant stones. After exhausting camera battery entirely we headed back to mukkali and thereafter our hotel which was in mannarkad (a total of forty kms). 

Ishan's Iron Fist

We took our luggage and checked out at four pm (It was a 24 hour accommodation and not 12 noon checkout which we had confirmed the previous day). We searched for a different restaurant to have lunch and had an all Chinese one (they weren’t serving south-Indian…see the irony). Thereafter we headed for Palakkad wherefrom we had planned to get to our second destination namely Munnar. But, there wasn’t any direct bus and thus we had to perform a break journey and we headed to Trissur from where we believed we could easily find a bus to Munnar the following day. After some difficulty we were able to locate lodging in Trissur and as it was already dinner time we headed in search for a nice place. We checked out three places but they all disappointed us and so we kept our search on, never giving up our hope. Call it destiny or luck we finally bumped into a remarkable dining place with ambience in the shape of a ship. Going by its looks we took a seat and ordered north Indian food (worrying whether jo dikhta achha hai who hota nahi hai). It took some time for the food to be served, but it was really delicious as we devoured it. All in all it was a great meal and we headed to a nearby bus-station to gather some intel after paying the bill. 

River Kunti

Here we got to know that only two buses ply to Munnar, one leaves at 0300 hrs and the other at 0700 hrs and after two days of getting up late we knew none of them was a viable option for us, hence a change of plan was in need (thank GOD! we didn't become over-ambitious). It was decided that a break journey shall be performed in order to reach our second spot, which got seconded by another plan which too, took its root spontaneously. Ravi had certain information about a waterfall which was en route to Munnar from Trissur and so it was planned to see this fall first thing in the morning, spend no more than two hours there and proceed to the next location thereafter, and we went to sleep. 

An eventful day is done with…

Photogenic Kerala

DAY 1

Booked were our tickets a day in advance, for  a journey that would take us seven hours to reach our first destination. This is how it proceeded on “THE DAY”.

The TRIO...[courtesy Driver]

In order to catch our age old Kerala Express that departs at 1115 hrs (everyday) we had decided the previous night; to leave college campus latest by 0830 hrs. This decision was related to next day’s lunch as we never wanted to eat another of those dreadful Kerala Express’ meals, when a better option namely ‘Sharma Dhaba’ was available whose ‘aloo paranthas’ are definitely worth consuming any other day. Hence the plan was set. But as lethargy had set in after lying useless for about a month it wasn’t easy to get on track that easily and thus an inevitable delay (right in the beginning of the trip…).

Luckily to our rescue came our college transport as one vehicle was going to the city (Yes! You read it correctly…the city, my college is located in the lush green abode of western ghats and as far as twenty kms from the city…a subtle way of saying it’s an isolated place). Coming back to the topic at hand, this vehicle saved us nearly half an hour which had been compromised due to lethargy…(which now seems was totally worth it) and we got to chat about our trip to our driver who was a helpful and considerate keralite (a usual trait I have witnessed over the years). It was only because of this guy that we got to have the paranthas we so dearly longed for. Thus, we got them packed went back to the station and waited for the train to arrive. 

Our train departed fifteen minutes after the scheduled time (considering the fact that Trivandrum central is the station this train starts from) and hence the journey began. Did I mention where we were going to, till now… (To eliminate the suspense, keep reading, ;))

Tar-less Silent Valley Forest Road

First target of this trip was an evergreen rainforest which is popularly known as Silent valley National Park but isn’t quite popular and that is what makes it a perfect getaway. It is a peaceful, serene and quiet place with almost no human habitation (how an ideal forest must be…). For more information about this place refer- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Valley_National_Park.

After spending a few hours in the train watching evergreen and picturesque Kerala we did get bored and wished to reach our destination Palakkad ASAP. Thankfully, even after a 15 min. delayed departure we arrived at our destined destination (Palakkad/palghat) just five minutes late, wherefrom we had to take to bus to reach a small town namely Mukkali. Forest department is located here and it issues tickets, transport (cannot take your own vehicle,:P) and permission to visit the park (And Yes! You need to book your visit in advance via phone and e-mail, which we did a couple of days ago). Here is the official website in case you are planning as well- http://silentvalley.gov.in/dayvisit.html. But let me get back to this later.

A cloudy Day-2

 As of now, we three were standing at a bus-stop after a little snack which we had at a local shop (there are a lot of snack shops, up and running near the railway station, and I must admit their local namkeen items that we tried were pretty delicious). Getting back to the journey… we had inquired through internet and confirmed with the locals that first we had to take a bus (either private or KSRTC, as both ply) to Mannarkad (30 kms from palakkad) and then another one to mukkali (another 20 kms). After waiting for some time one bus finally showed up, frequency of which as per the localites is around fifteen minutes, but in the evening time I suppose it could well be 25-30 mins., catching which we finally reached our intermediate spot.

What no one told us was that buses don’t ply to mukkali from mannarkad after 8 p.m., since it’s a hilly road with many hair-pin curves and therefore a bit risky. We had booked our accommodation with the forest department too, but due to lack of this information we had to cancel that booking and find lodging in mannarkad itself, which was a tiresome activity. Two to three hotels and a couple of eating joints more or less exhaust this place (although even that seems a big number for the kind of place it was). To our surprise chinese and north Indian dishes were available at the restaurant where we had our dinner but unfortunately one curry we ordered had dominant taste of coconut and therefore was difficult to process. Nevertheless hungry as we were, we consumed and went straight to bed after checking in a hotel, the only decent available option given the circumstances (with primary consideration of a clean toilet with a working flush system).

A piece of advice to every traveler, when you are going to isolated places…before checking into a hotel kindly check the entire room-electrical fittings, definitely the bathroom and don’t forget the flush, cause you never know.

This is how eventful/less first day of our trip was.

Ravi showing clouds the way

 

A few pics of the following day, as a teaser to the next post...   

7 Day Account Of PhotoGenic Kerala

Silent Valley National Park

What took root as an idea once I completed my graduation (yeah! yeah! It sounds cliché, but nevertheless…) eventually became a reality pretty soon. Wondering how ‘eventually’ and ‘pretty soon’ can be clubbed together, well…in this case they can; justified as follows. Studying in God’s own country Kerala for four years and never once had I absconded to any tourist spot of this state (with an exception of a trip to Wayanad, one to Ponmudi and another to kanyakumari, but they are a  different story altogether) and many a times being questioned by relatives as to what all places had I seen, it always left me thinking…Why haven’t I? Hence, these thoughts themselves culminated into an idea over the years, and I hoped that someday it should remain a dream no more. 

Clouds amidst the Western Ghats

Then… after graduation while we all lingered in the campus waiting for the centre allocation to get done with, a window of opportunity opened up which needless to say was utilized efficiently (a subtle way to describe how useless time had become with nothing left to do except waiting for the seat matrix to arrive).

Thus realizing that our counseling was no way going to happen in the near future, but with an element of doubt that it may happen soon enough, the trip was planned and the plan was executed. While the plan itself took a few sittings involving discussions on where to go, for how many days and what would be an estimated budget (an indispensable portion of every trip) things finally began to seem clear and ended with (jo hoga dekha jayega, chalte hain). 

Athirapally Falls

To our surprise, we kept pretty much to the original plan and the portion which wasn’t followed added to the dynamism, thrill and spontaneity of the trip…few essential elements that must be present in any adventure or what you say when your strategy isn’t implemented successfully. Nevertheless, it was a fun-filled and energetic adventure which drained us physically, mentally and financially.

And here is how it went…

In a nutshell, this journey is spread over seven days spannig two states; majoring five tourist destinations; with a distance traveled over a thousand kilometres while displacement remains zero (if you know what I mean).  Wow, I never thought all that could be told in just a sentence, if you don’t think either READ ALONG…

Munnar Tea Plantations

Disclaimer: - In no way should this blog be considered as either positive or negative publicity of Kerala. This blog has been written for every person who has a traveler within him. I hope my experiences detailed in the words to follow shall help one and all who plan on visiting Kerala and stop them from committing the mistakes we made and help them in having a wonderful God’s own country’s experience (some of the information provided won’t be available on the internet…so keep reading, for thy own enlightenment). 

Some glimpses of majestic Kerala (clicked by us) have been attached to enhance visual experience of reader...

TO BE CONTINUED  ... FOR SURE

ONE LIFE TO LIVE

Thinking as to what I want from my life, many thoughts plague my mind of which an essential question is what is money’s value in life? What do I seek from money...?

Is it a medium for me to live a satisfactory life where only physical needs are fulfilled through money examples being bread, clothing and shelter, or is it a medium which satisfies my emotional requirements like happiness, respect, love and other things.

Since the first definition is quite conclusive and needs no further explanation, I would like to elaborate more on the second chain of philosophy with the help of an example. Let us say, today Mr. Beta (software guys could understand more of the name) has certain amount of money through which he can afford a CRT colour TV, three to four sets of unbranded clothes semi-annually and a monthly trip to a moderate restaurant but still isn’t satisfied and feels emptiness within, which he assumes can be fulfilled through earning more money. And so, he works hard, lives in mental and physical stress pushing himself to his extreme in order to land himself a promotion and needless to say a pay hike. And so he does. Some time has passed, and our dear friend Beta has accomplished this feat. Now he has enough to afford a forty inch LCD TV, four to five sets of branded clothes the likes of Louis Philippe, Armani and Polo (NOT advertising these brands, just wanted to make the scenario more realistic) quarterly and a weekly trip to a five star restaurant...but, but, but...the void still exists. Of which! He was so certain could have been filled with more money just did not happen. Then what must he do? He must earn more because obviously it is money which shall fill the void. So this iterative process continues wherein he works himself exhaustively to earn more and even more. Then one fine day he realises, that he has enough to buy the most expensive of apartments, the costliest of electronics and cars, capacity to wear a brand new garment everyday and eat out at any place in the whole damn world. (Usually, in doing so much one becomes old...so let us assume our hero has accomplished all of this by his mid-thirties and is filthy rich to the extent that he can be called Mr. Alpha now, with much time to spare.) 

But has that void been filled? Still confused he forces himself into believing that yes, he is satisfied with his life and existence, but deep down within he misses something dearly. It is only then that he begins to realise maybe money cannot satisfy his every need, maybe it cannot buy happiness or the thirst that he has.

Then what can? (Because he desperately wants to fill the void)...In the whole process did he ever consider what the void actually was and the ingredient that could fill it permanently? Was it his emotional needs that money could not satisfy, or was it something else...?

If it were money being perceived as a notion that could satisfy him emotionally, I believe it has to be a grave mistake as there is no limit to how much one can earn and spend or rather no limit to the thirst that one can develop for satisfying his needs like respect and joy through money.

Then what must one do? I think that there exists a “LINE” (which must be defined clearly by each individual) separating the important from the irrelevant, which explains how comfortable you want your life to be and that what you seek can be fulfilled within its limits, else the thirst can never be quenched.

If you figure out where your LINE of existence is, more or less you have figured out your life and what you dearly desire and seek.

But it is the hardest of tasks as you will be influenced and corrupted by the lifestyles of your friends and neighbours, how the society thinks of you and numerous other second rated things we usually give more importance than they deserve. To conclude, a message: “figure out what you really love in life and the important stuff that matters because that is enough to live a lifetime since it is only one lifetime which is this one that you have got. LIVE IT COMPLETELY”

FEELING TIRED

Very recently I heard an interesting phrase “tired of enjoying” and couldn’t resist myself from plunging into the mystery of finding its meaning. And so began the journey of unravelling its inner meaning.

The first thought that pervaded my mind was whether this hypothetical situation can ever arise in the real world. Wait a minute! If I am exclaiming it as hypothetical, then how on earth can it ever become a reality? But yet it did come true in a friends’ life and that is how I came to hear of it. So what it suggests is that even though what I define as hypothetical for my case it can actually be a reality for someone else. This indicates how different we all humans are even after being structurally similar, with our mind working in wondrous ways making it one of a kind. Every situation is dealt uniquely by every individual in order to converge at a result which may or may not be the same in a given scenario. So one of the conclusions I could draw was that we all have different temperament levels, different responses to emotions and situations, which made me feel freshly original in my own self.

Continuing with the thought process I was able to deduce another meaning of this beautiful phrase which proceeds as follows. In this life we all get tired at some point or another of something or another. But why in the first place do we get tired at all? I feel, it is only when one gets abundance of a particular thing, he feels exhausted. In different words what I insist is the fact that we all get tired of living a monotonous life wherein there is plenty of one particular entity which can either be “working”, “playing”, “studying” or in some cases “enjoying” (which I believe would be a rarity). So now that we have a clue as to why we feel tired there must exist a solution as well, which is quite evident from the deduced hypothesis that has been presented. If we get tired because of one thing then it is extremely important to not do just one thing and pursue a multitude of things. This is where another wonderful word “balance” comes into picture, which explains why it is important to not just mix various food nutrients in your daily diet giving you a balanced diet, but leading a “balanced life” which by definition means living through various activities. We must practice many activities and allocate time proportionally to each and every one such that an extreme condition never arises.

But did you really see what I did there! Let me explain if you were just skimming through the text and not thinking while reading. The usual conception of feeling tired is defined through the words “busy life” i.e. if one leads a busy life, keeping no time to one, one feels tired. And I on the other hand proved (I like to call it proved) it’s quite the contrary, and leading a busy and eventful life will never make you feel tired. But if seen from another angle the usual conception seems to be vague because it doesn’t define "busy" accurately. What I mean is that if that busy means busy doing one thing then both our conclusions match else they do not.

This presents another fascinating fact about our perception of the world which is “How superficial our conclusions are” and there is a need to put in great effort to restructure our conclusions of life by putting in a sincere effort, by thinking...

And all these words came to life because of one phrase “Tired of Enjoying”, which I am thankful to.

Water, Water Everywhere

And not a drop to drink...

Samuel Coleridge brilliantly presents a dilemmatic situation (reference-Ancient Mariner) roughly two hundred years ago, and governments today use it to mislead their innocent people every other day.

Yes! I am referring to the predicament of widely acclaimed “water scarcity”. We the people are forced to believe that water indeed is a scarce quantity. There are advertisements, there are hoardings and there are public awareness programs initiated not just by the governments but NGO’s and many others. And as the awareness grows, this mantra spreads like an epidemic to every part of the world, to every corner of our brain. Even the educated fools (including you and me) blindly start believing the fact that water is indeed a scarce quantity. You might already be thinking what nonsense am I talking about, water is definitely scarce. But is it?...

According to scientific data nearly two-thirds of earth that we abode is nothing but water and a famous law states that all matter is essentially conserved (considering Earth mass in our case). There even exists a water cycle which maintains a balance in the world. Thus if water were to become scarce both this cycle would be dying out and mass of water on earth would be decreasing, which I don’t believe is the scenario. Water is a resource that is abundantly present and can sustain ever growing human population for next hundreds of years to come. Hence, start believing that water is not scarce but definitely precious and mustn’t be misused.

Then why cry, why this sham? It is because economies of today run on the fundamental power of scarcity. Those of us who have studied economics would know that only if a resource is scarce (and has a market at the same time owing to its multi-utility property) does a person get to sell it and make profit out of it. Thus if one is able to convince you that a particular item is scantily available you wouldn’t hesitate a bit to loosen your pocket in order to buy even a meagre amount of it. Our subconscious mind will be constantly edging us that we have to pay our hard-earned money (in most of the cases) to the ones who are providing us the privilege to consume that particular scarce item. And there it is... exploiting this philosophy by proclaiming that water is scarce, people (government and the multi-national companies) are successful in selling us a resource which is indeed not SCARCE. Imagine if they started selling it to us and we knew that it was abundantly available in the world, would we ever buy it? Never. A hundred years ago if Bisleri and Aquafina were to come in the market there would have been no takers. But today they are multibillion-dollar enterprises. This all is part of an endeavour wherein the purpose is to extract every penny you have (and wish to save for the future) to be given away on the daily necessities which definitely you cannot live without. In this way these people have confirmed a never dying-up source of income for themselves. And we, we pay for bottled water, we pay for using water to bathe, to cook, to wash and what not. All in all, we don’t give a damn whether or not we should actually be paying for something that is even worth the effort.

You know what... if we continue to live in this state of oblivion, the time is not far when we shall have to pay even to breathe an ounce of air. It just needs excessive propaganda and a few cunning minds, and another scarce quantity would add into our list of daily buying needs. And doomed as we already are we would buy it happily and live merrily, watching the world with closed eyes.

To be continued...

Life as we live...

I feel terrible for not being able to write anything for so long. I certainly have many excuses to defend myself from not being able to write but whom shall I dupe with those elaborately carved sentences?  Myself! What a shame.

We humans are just so good at finding ways for not doing what we are supposed to do and to top it all we frame “explanations” just to console our own conscience. We justify our actions to ourselves without thinking as to what we have done actually. In this process of fooling ourselves we get so engrossed or rather become so good at it, that after a certain span of time we don’t even feel the urge to justify our actions to the spiritual inner-self. This indeed is that state which must not be attained, but if attained one must try hard to reclaim oneself from damaging his soul further.

Now that is what you call deep thinking!!!  But every word I wrote is true to the core and the situation too applies to many of us if not all. Every one of us has a natural tendency to procrastinate the work assigned by the higher authorities or even what we ourselves initiate to do.

And so it goes... we either blame the authorities, the situation, the time and whatever it takes to not take the blame on ourselves. But never for once do we even contemplate the thought that we too are at fault and in fact more at fault than anybody else.

This attitude is what needs reformation and until we remove this embedded system from our processor we won’t be able to lead a contented life. The function “As always we shall delay and never shall we repent” needs to be deleted, in mathematical language it needs to be multiplied by its inverse in order to yield unity which is definitely less harmful than the predecessor.

Let us try to bring about a change in our ideology and implement it in reality. It is here where the catch comes into picture. This change that I so easily talked about is not at all easy to bring about in practical life. But my friends that is what life is all about, challenges that push you to the extreme. But believe me once anyone takes this road to transforming oneself, he shall never look back and neither will he grumble anymore about many of the things (definitely there must be some grumbling and fighting else the flavour is lost).

I hope I haven’t bored the reader, but if you have actually come this far then probably you must have found something worthwhile in the words that I just assembled. I wrote “assembled” as I believe that all the world’s knowledge exists within us, but in the form of a puzzle which needs to be solved. And the beauty of this puzzle is that there is no one way to solve it and there is no one result that you may obtain. Every time you try solving it you shall discover a new possibility.

Discover!!! The world dwells within us.