Kodachadri Trek

It's been a quite while since I blogged. Lot of things have happened since then. Lemme put those I remember.

One fine weekend(Oct 8 2005) we planned to conquer Kodachadri.

Approach : Reach Kollur. There are two routes(Via Mangalore and via Shimoga). Prefer Mangalore route since the road is better. From here catch a bus towards Sagar and get down at Kaari gate(nowadays it is also known as Kodachadri gate), and start walking along the obvious muddy path.

Our bus reached Kollur at 7:00AM sharp. From here we reached Kodachadri gate at 9:15AM. From here the muddy path was very easy to cover amidst the mystic silince of the forest. In fact the silence was a bit scary at times. There is a kaka hotel at the foothills. We get "puttu" and idli here. Just eat as there is no other option. I should admit it was tasty.

From kaka hotel, it is just non-stop trekking uphill, thanks to ravenous leaches. Slow down a moment and there will be a pack of leeches climbing shoes in search of exposed skin to feast on our blood. However there are clearings where we can take some rest(leeches can not live here as there is not much humidity in clearings).

We reached Kodachadri at around 2:30PM. Here is Adi Mookambika temple. The place where
mookambike killed Mookasura. There are some houses here where we can stay. They charge some Rs.25 per night. They also provide a mat and a blanket. No need to carry all that stuff.One advice here : Ask for Bhatta's house. There are many outsiders who are in the same business of giving shelters to pilgrims and trekkers. They give very bad food.

After taking bath and having "bad food" we went to the top of hill, which takes about 30min to reach. From here we can see Kollur on the west and Lingamanakki reservoir(Sharavathi river - Jog falls) on the east and thick forest everywhere. Sunset was picturesque. They say one can see glimpse of Arabian see from here. We were not that fortunate.

Morning we woke up early to see sunrise. We climbed the other hill(somehow reached top in darkness). On the way there were lot of bisons. They were agitated to see us and were breaking trees in the forest. It was really scary. Had they(bisons) charged we had nowhere to run. Sun rose amidst clouds. It was not great except for the cold wind that was trying to blow of our blankets.

We headed back to our bus stop after coffee at Bhatta's house. We reached kaka angadi at around 10:30AM. Trekking downhill was very quick.

On the way back there was a resort kind of stuff called eco village. It was owned by ISKCON. A worker there told many ISKCON devotees come here and they visit kodachadri and "arishina gundi falls". This falls thing was a lot interesting because I had read about it before. The guy told it was just an hour walk in the jungle. Another hour walk will take us to Kollur. It sounded OK to us. We hired a guide to take us to the Arishina Gundi Falls.

It is the journey unforgettable in my life. For the first time I wanted to die. One hour walk seemed to be a never ending walk through forest, earth was covered with dead leaves where live millions of voracious leeches. I just walked with all my energy. I could not do anything but see leeches crawling on my shoes and tens of them had already started feasting on my blood. I wished I should rather die than being a prey to these blood-thirsty leeches.

Finally reached waterfalls(one has to climb down a lot to reach falls). It appeared that, there was no sign of a human being visited this place in recent past. I got rid of all my fatigue once inside water. The place was worth the effort. It was a picturesque place. I wanted to spend rest of my life here. Because just after the rocks(near water falls) are the predators waiting for me.

The way back to Kollur was better because we were walking on a jeep trail. Finally when we reached main road, it was written on the board "Kodachadri trekking trail - 8 kms". The one hour walk turned out to be 8km trek, some portion of it was through think jungle with so sign of a trail.

Rest of the things went smoothly. Someshwara beach was soothing. The journey back to Bangalore would have been another adventure thanks to timely coordination of KSRTC staff.

Gone are the days...

When I was cleaning my room, I found these photos. It reminded me of my college trip to Shivana Samudra and TalakaDu, in fact my first trip with friends(don't laugh). Gone are the days when we had no worries, no responsibilities. I used to enjoy those long bus rides and traffic jams.....

All of us friends used to meet everyday, even on weekends during our project days. Only thing we didn't have was money(At least I didn't).

Now what has happened to us? Everybody is busy in their own problems, projects.... I never imagined our future was going to be like this....

Yet another comback!!

Hmm.. What a coincidence!?!? I am back exactly after a month...

There was nothing great happening in the past month except that I had been to Sri's home last week. Had a good time and watched two movies.

Yesterday I got a mail saying I have been selected to do MS from IIT Chicago, of course sponsored by my company. Don't know if I can succeed in this. Anyway exactly after 4 years of separation from studies, exams, I feel it is good. Let me see how far it goes....

Yet another week(end)

Yet another week passed. There was nothing great in this week. Couldn't meet any friends. No movies, No blogs, There was no blogs from others too. Dunno what they are busy with.
I did a little modification to my blog looks, and I know I have fine tune it still.

Hope the coming week will be interesting!!! All the best for me.

Team Building Outbound to Golden Palms

It had been long pending, our team building outbound, because of various reasons. Finally it materialized on Wednesday, 24th Aug 2005.

The place is Golden Palms Spa and Resort. It is very huge and well maintained resort. The cost is equally high. Totally it was full of joy, our chance to rag new comers to the team. We played some HR kind of games and cricket, squash, carrom, TT.

I tried some close-up shots of flowers and photos came really nice.

We are first to finish this pyramid

A Group Photo!!!!

Bee has just come of the flower!!!!

I liked this walkway very much!!!

Varamahalakshmi @ Home

This is the photo of Varamahalakshmi @ my home last week.

Long(Quick) Weekend

Last week was very quick. So was the weekend. It was long weekend for names sake, though we had 3 days holiday. I spent all Saturday and Sunday browsing at home. Monday Sridhar and I went to watch Mangal Pandey. Yet another time fate proved it. We can't watch a movie so easily. For second time we came back without watching a movie.

We didn't get tickets at Urvashi, next show at Swagat was at 3:15. So thought of going to Lal bagh flower show. For our unfortunate fate, about a lakh people visited flower show on that day. It took about 15 minutes for us to reach Lal bagh main gate from Urvashi on bike(We could have walked twice up and down), then decided to buy some DVDs.

At least we could do that. Bought a couple of DVDs. As usual I didn't watch any of them. They are lying on my rack now. I hope to watch them this weekend.

Quandaries at social gatherings

I hate social gatherings. I avoid such gatherings as much as possible, because I can not stand the questions and opinions people have about software engineers.
Whenever my grandfather and uncle get chance, they keep bragging about me to everybody. I can't stop them, because I think it makes them happy. But people who listen to such boasts can't buy in all these boasts. They seem to take vengeance on me when I happen to be a victim to be present at such gatherings.

First question I get is, "yaava company, EshTu koDtaare? nim thatha tumba hogaLta idru" (Which company, How much do they pay? Your grandpa was bragging about you). Their tone will be in such a way that I have committed a terrible sin and I should be punished.

Some people even try to predict future if software engineers, they say this boom will not lost, it ca not sustain for more than 2-3 years, china will overtake .... bla bla bla

I wonder what is my mistake for all these. I guess it is the case with most of us. Don't know when our elders understand not to be like this with us.

Broadband

Hmm.... it is quite some time since I came back. Let me post something...

Well I got broadband connection last week from BSNL. It seems OK. Decent speed but download limit:(

There are many reasons for me to get broadband connection....

Internet access is limited in my company. Blogs sites are blocked too.
There was a time when e-mail was Hi-Fi way of communication. Now it has become outdated, almost everyone has blog. People are too lazy to e-mail now. Some say "go and check my blog"....
All these weekends I sit at home watching TV. I thought I would do something different if I had internet. Something useful of course!!!

All these and many more reasons compelled me to get internet. Also since broadband is affordable I went for it.
I hope I will be regular blogger and I can keep up-to-date with my friends too....

There are many things I have to do this weekend. Choosing a proper template to my blog, blog tools, uploading lot of pics and so on.... Good time pass for long weekend.

Finally I am back!!!

I am finally back!!! Blog site was blocked in our office and I don't have internet at home. Oh, how shameless to say I don't have internet access!!! Nowadays, life without internet is like living in stoneage.

Well so many things have, happened in the past 2 months(Since I stopped blogging).... Lemme recollect some...

My site purchase dream was shattered when governament stopped all land registrations :-(
Kiran's marriage, meeting Kar and family...
Lot of work in project
War of the Worlds in PVR(we got tickets at the nick of time....)
Missing trip to Murdeshwar
Finished Harry Potter and the Half blood prince, and its hangover for a couple of days....
Finally applied for VISA!!!

Now, I hope to have returned to normal state. I hope I will continue to blog regularly!!!

Trek to BallaLa rayana Durga

It was thursday, during tea Saravana asked me if I was free that weekend. I told yes. I didn't even ask where we are going and what we are going to do. As usual I came to office on Friday. Then he told me Manju(my ex-colleague) was in his native(Chikka Magalur) and was planning to go for a trekking near kaLasa. Manju was supposed to call and confirm about the plan. He did not call until afternoon. He was not reachable on cell too....

Finally Manju called at around 3:00PM and confirmed that he is coming to kaLasa that night we were supposed to meet him by Saturday early morning. We booked tickets at 4:30PM. It was a semi deluxe bus leaving Bangalore at 9:00PM. The journey is about 8 hours and semi deluxe is horrible for night travel. There was no leg space at all. I hardly slept.

Day 1:

We reached kaLasa at 5:00AM and Manju was having sound sleep in Thotadur yatri nivas. None of us knew what are we going to do. We had take print out of 3 blogs. We decided to follow this:
http://blog.sun.com/roller/page/saurabh_mishra/20040930

We got freshed up and started at around 6:30AM. Bought some bakery items and water. Our starting place is Sunkasaale, some 20 km from kaLasa. There was a bus(to Mysore) which goes via Sunkasaale. The journey was about 50min. and the driver was effortlessly steering the bus on the road full of curves and numerous 180 deg. turns.

There are 2 hotels in Sunkasaale, one can hardly eat anything there. We had idly and sambar(no chutney). Some localites showed us the way to BallaLa rayana durga. It was a road for sometime and becomes Jeep trail after some 2km. We kept on asking people if we were on correct route. On the way we met one Arun(or may be Anil) who happened to have come in the same 9:00PM bus. His home was on the way to our destination. So he took us through a shortcut. It was quite steep trail. We reached his place at around 9:45AM. He also offered us to serve lunch when we come back. From here it was about 1 hour trek to reach the peak where BallaLa raya has built a fort. It was 10:00AM when we left Arun's home. Arun told us to watch out for a clearing where we can see the panoramic view of South Canara and after this view point we were supposed to take a right trail which goes up hill. We found the view point and took some nice pictures. We also got the trail which was going up hill. We didn't take it because it looked very infrequently used.

We followed the same Jeep trail for long and it started going down hill. Manju told it is normal that mountain trails generally go up and down, so we were on right track. Finally we crossed the moutain where the fort was located and still our trail was going down. We reached an estate called "Hori khan estate". We had walked about 3km extra and had descended a lot. There we met a man called Lokappa Gowda, who offered to accompany us to the fort. According to him, lot of people miss the way and he had guided thousands of people to the fort!!! He claims his name has been featured in magazines like Sudha(Kannada weekly). This trail was quite steep full of leeches. I saw leeches for the first time and they deadly. They hunt you if you keep your foot down for a second. Reached the fort at around 12:00PM. The view was ultimate. Top of the mountain looks like golf course. It was luch green fields all around the top and dense forest below. I forgot all my tiredness. There were clouds all around the peak much below us. I wanted to touch one and feel it. We sat at a croner in the peak where a panoramic view of western ghats was msemerizing. Wind started blowing towards us which brought a huge cloud towards us. It was a unique experience when the cloud swept us, I felt cold mist, make everything blur and suddenly it was clear. I don't have words to explain the feeling. One should feel it. I am feeling as it I am flying even when writing this blog!!!

We spent enough time roaming in and around the forest. At 2PM we started back, when a huge cloud was swept towards us. We could hardly see each other. We followed the direction shown by Lokappa gowda and were confident about it. After sometime we realized we are going away from our destination. There were cattle grazing, so thought somebody would be there. But to our bad luck there no human being who heard our shouting. We were able to see the trail at the bottom of the valley, but how to get there. Decided to climb down directly though the forest. After few minutes of descending steep landscape(it was very loose and no grip), we came to a point beyond which it looked to be vertically down. I had to struggle to pull myself up from there to a safer place. Amazing thing is, I was never scared. A stone came sliding from top and hit at my back, that was knocked by Saravana when he slipped. Anyway, it did not hurt me. We left water bottle, bread and some banana there, since it was tough to climb with something in hand. Finally we pulled ourselves up to safer place and decided we will follow the same way, which we came from. But we had walked enough till this place, if we go back to the fort, it would take a lot of time. It was already 3PM. We were supposed to be at Arun's place having lunch at this time!! We saw the house from where Lokappa Gowda had taken us to the fort. We started walking towards the house along the mountain clearing. There came a dead end yet again. We were very close to the house, so we shouted for help. People came out and shouted us to find a way towards our right. There was an obvious trail, which led us to the original trail which we had followed to climb up. We reached hori khan estate at around 3:45PM. From here to Arun's house we followed the same Jeep trail through which we had come in the morning. We were hungry too. Reached Arun's home at around 4:20PM. The lunch was so tasty. I ate twice the amount I usually eat. Buttermilk was so good(with green chilly and ginger), I asked them if I can have some more. They prepared again and served!!! From here the trek down was heavy on knees, but we had to reach Sunkasaale before 6:30PM. After 6:30 next bus was at 7:30PM and it was not regular. We covered this distance quite quickly and were at Sunkasaale at 6:15PM. Had coffee in a hotel. That was my first coffee of the day.

We reached kaLasa at 8:00PM. Took bath and went out for dinner. Most of the hotels were closed. There was a fast food center open. Fried rice was OK. At around 10:30PM we went to bed. I had kept alarm at 5:30AM, so plan was to leave early and walk along the river belt(Bhadra river).

Day 2:

I involuntarily switched off the alarm. It was 8:00 when we woke up. Got ready quickly and checked out at 9:00AM. There was a place called Amba theertha, which was some 5km from kaLasa. It was easy walk and we reached the place at around 10:15. There was not much water in the river but people warned us not to venture into the water as the pull was very strong. Took nice snaps. Decided to go back and leave to Bangalore.

We estimated 10 hour journey because there was not direct bus available till night. Came back to kaLasa at around 11:30AM. People suggested us to take a bus to Kottigehara, from there to Hasan and to Bangalore. Private bus to Kottigehara was boring and slow. Reached kottigehara at around 1:20 and came to know that there was no bus to Hasan at that time. We were suggested to take a bus to Mudigere(which was leaving in 5min!!!). Manju got direct bus to Chikamagalur. Luckily we got a bus to Hasan from Mudigere at 2:45. Reached Hasan at 4:30PM. After having lunch, Rajahamsa was waiting for us. Reached Bangalore at 9:15PM.

It was totally enjoying trip and I will trasure the memories forever. We also have plan to camp on the top of the hill sometime. Hoe we do it sometime.

Details:

There are three buses to KaLasa dialy. Semi deluxe at 9:00PM and two Rajahamsa's at 10:15 and 10:25PM. Journey is about 8hour with a lot of breaks. Prefer Rajahamsa to have good sleep.

KaLasa has a couple of good lodges. Price is also reasonable. We paid Rs.191(including tax!!) for 3 people.

It is good to pack food from kaLasa as Sunkasaale is a small village and hotels are not good.

Total cost of the trip is about Rs.550

Finally Report on my Trip

As I had told in my previous post, now I found some time to post about the trip.

As the weekend was getting nearer I was excited about the trip. I totally forgot why am I going to Trissur. All I was thinking was, Athirampalli and vazhachal waterfalls. Sudin's marriage seemed to be an optional-on-the-way event. Also I was excited to go to my manager's(madam) farm house.

We did not get train as usual. KSRTC buses were available but all were leaving Bangalore in late evening and would reach Trissur very early morning. So we booked Kallada travels which was scheduled to leave at 9:30PM. I reached Madivala at 9:00PM itself. The bus came little late and finally at around 10:15PM I was in bus. It was OK-OK kind of bus. But somehow I was missing a seat belt. I was scared, I would be knocked off the seat. I was little unconfortable all along, but still managed to get some good sleep.

We reached Trissur some 2 hour late because the driver had lost way somewhere in Tamil Nadu. Sudin had already taken care of hotel room booking. It was a very good hotel, thanks to Sudin(Poornima in fact). After taking bath we got ready quickly and rented a Qualis and left to madam's house in Valapad. Driver was quite familiar with roads and took us through beautyful yet narrow roads of Trissur. We were mesmerized by the beautyful houses all along the road. Most of them were newly constructed and each one looked better than the other. Some of them were palaces. I think lot of people have returned from Gulf and constructing these beautiful homes.

We reached Athirampally, after lunch on the way, at around 2:30PM. Waterfall was awesome. I wanted to go to the bottom and sit under the fall. But no one was allowed there. After taking some cool snaps we went to Vazhachal. Here water flows on slopy rock. Here too no one was allowed to go near water. Took some cool snaps and had nice sandwitches prepared by madam's mom. Took some nice snaps. Weather was dramatically changed and became cloudy. It started thunders and lightning. We went back to Athirampally, where there is a place to go near water before the fall. I was not satisfied even after taking so many photos of the same scene. I did not want to miss even an inch of the picturesque scene. But anyway I am not a proffessional. Lightning and thunders were getting more vigorous. It started raining too. We rushed back to our vehicle. There was a thunder, so loud, I hadn't heard louder than that. The thunder was accompanied by immediate flash of light. So I thought it must have struck somewhere very much close. Next day I came to know that, 4 people died because of lightning in Palakkad dist. That was worse.

Then went to madam's house and had a nice dinner. Back at the hotel, I don't remember when I slept. It was morning again. It was Sudin's marriage, the main reason why we went to Trissur. Got ready and had breakfast. There was a shuttle waiting for us, thanks to Sudin. Went to marriage hall. Kerala marriages are very instantaneous. It just happened in a matter of minutes. Lunch was really nice. That's it the Kerala trip was over. Checked out from the Hotel, caught a bus to Coimbatore, from where we had booked our return bus. Also it is home town of Saravana.

Reached Coimbatore at around 5:00PM. Met Saravana's mother and father. Visited some nearby book shop and bought a couple of novels. Dinner was really nice. Saravana's mother is a great cook. Rajahamsa was waiting for us at 9:00PM. I was awaken by the very slow moving bus in lower gear. The bus was crawling on the road passing thorough hairpin bends climbing the mountain. I think it is called madumalai forest. After that I don't know when we crossed Mysore. I can sleep in the crowded, noisy BMTC bus and how can I not sleep in Rajahamsa. So that is the end of this one more un-forgettable trip.

Photos are really great, but I can't post them as all photo hosting sites are blocked in office. Someday when I get internet connection at home or from Sri's home I will try to put some photos. It was little costly for a two day trip, but I feel it was worth.

Kerala Trip II

I am little excited today because tonight we(Saravana and I) are leaving to Trissur to roam around and on the way we are attending Sudin's marriage!!!! In fact it is other way.
OK, whatever it is, I wanted to go somewhere away from work. But I somehow got this cold this morning. It can't stop me from going.

We have been invited to our madam's(my PM in office) house in Valapad. We have planned to see Athirapalli and Vazhachal waterfalls.
Watch out for great Kerala photos and details about the trip...

Chetu's Party

I think yesterday was the most boring day in my life. In fact I did not want to come to office. Somehow I dragged myself to office. India's first innings disaster, further ruined my mood. Meanwhile I got a mail from Chetu, that he had arranged a small dinner get together that night. It was in Woody's.

I thought all of our gang would come. Sri had his exams on Sat and Sun. Kiri and Mahendra live in different part of world. Kar is busy in distributing his wedding invitation(Though he came to the place and left before dinner). So I was the only one left out without any special engagement. I was worried that I will be an odd man in the crowd.

Manju Kiran was there with his wife(forgot the name). Chetu's MS frined Muralidhar(incidentally our junior from UVCE) was there. So I got company of Murali. He had just resigned MS to write UPSC exam. My most of discussion was about UPSC exam. Then Avinash, our ECE batch mate, Chetu's friend joined the group. We had seen each other, but didn't know well. Murali, Avinash and I started chatting during dinner. We discussed everything about our work, where we live and so on. Incidentally Avinash's home was on the other side of the road from my home!!!!

Chetan's father was sitting next to Avinash, he told us the stories about Chetu's bride hunting. It was total fun. We also recommended to get Chetu married soon. So by this year end Chetu will be definitely married. Congrats Chetu!!! His father also told us that some girl is coming to bangalore to see Chetu, the next day. Chetu all the best!!!

At the end, we met Suraj and Vibha(I think it was just a coincidence). So it was all fun meeting old friends and making new ones. It was around 10pm. I had to go to railway station to pick my uncle. I enjoyed the drive to railway station with traffic/crowdless roads with no signal intersections. Hopefully Chetu will upload all photos someday.

Bon voyage Chetu!!!

Historic Meet

Finally it was the day when all of us were meeting. It was 3rd April 2005. Incidentally it was Kiri's b'day too. None of us remembered except Kar. It was the day when all 6 of us, Engineering project team, were going to meet after 3 and a half years. Oh.... sorry it was 7 in fact. Things change a lot in years. There was a new person, Kar's fiancee, Sowmya.

All 6 had never met after college days. Sri and I usually meet regularly. Kar and Kir, I might have met them 2-3 times. I had met Chetan in US!!! Mahendran was almost an alien. I had spoken to him once.

Lot of things have happened is these many years. First of all Kar is getting married. None of us(at least I) had expected Kar will be the first. We all knew it would be Chetu. Anyway, Kar is getting married to Sowmya on May 11th.
Next is, Kiri also followed Kar. He got engaged to Latha yesterday. This too came as a surprise.
There are more things like, Chetan got relocation to US. He is leaving this weekend. Mahendran is finally back to Bangalore. He got an offer from Wipro.
Well, there is a news about Sri, too. But he will only reveal it.

We had all been to Sunny Holiday Village for dinner. We played a game called "Mafia" which was suggested by Chetu. I never got a chance to be mafia. I still don't know whom would I have killed if I was a mafia!!!
That place was so crowded that we had to wait even for bill. We did not give any tips.

Donno when others follow Kiri and Kar. All the best to everybody.

Case of Mondays again!!!

Well, it is monday after all. The most boring day of the week. I had cribbed about it sometime back too. But that was in Phoenix. Now this time in Bangalore.
I have never felt like this before. I have zero interest in work today. Downloaded some 700MB of stuff from nvidia website. Some development kit and demo and all....

Nothing is coming into my mind. I am not sure what I want to do. Probably go to Sri's home and get harry Potter books. That was what I was doing in Phoenix and I used to feel very good after that. Probably that should cheer me up.
There is nobody to ask me what I am doing. Nobody tells me what to do also. I know a day will come when my manager asks me what I did during whole 6 months.

Probably I should think of all the good things that happened during last weeks, rather I should write. Check out the next blog....

Some Facts about Kannada

Well, I am writing this in English. I don't have Baraha at this time, to write in Kannada.

1] Kannada is the third oldest language of India.( After . . Sanskrit & Tamil )
2] kannada is as old as 2000 years.
3]Kannada is 99.99% perfect - logically and scientifically.
4] We got 7 Gnana peetha awards. Look at other languages . . .
Hindi -- 6, Thelugu - 2, Malayalam - 3, Tamil -- 2 ( Second one during 2005 )
5]Shri VINOBA BHAVE has called kannada script as QUEEN OF WORLD SCRIPTS - " Vishwa lipigaLa RaaNi - kannada "
6] So called international language -- English do not have its own Script. English is written in " ROMAN "
7] So called national Language -- hindi do not have its own script.
Hindi is written in
" Deva nagari "
8] Though Tamil has a script, logically it is imperfect -- as common letters are used for many pronunciations.
KANNADA IS AS OLD AS 2000 YEARS, YOU CAN WRITE WHAT YOU SPEAK, YOU CAN READ WHAT YOU WRITE.
9] When " kaviraja maarga was written . . ." kaaveriyimda , gOdaavarivaregirpa ... " by Amogha varsha nripathumga, English was in cradle & hindi was not born at all.
SO . . .LET US HAVE PRIDE IN USING KANNADA "

My long trip

Well, after my Petrified forest trip was petrified by rain, I could not go anywhere after that. This Good friday weekend was coming. It is good that Good Friday comes always on Friday, so it is always a long weekend. From two weeks I was thinking where to go and what to do. All other family guys are had already planned to goto Page and Zion.

I don't think there was any place left around Phoenix that I have not seen. Well I had enough GAS in my car. So I thought of going on a loo..ong drive. I wanted MS Streets and Trips, 'coz it is a very good trip planner. I was planning on a solo drive to 4 corners. It is the place where 4 states(Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico) meet. I thought of using MSN maps instead, it also gives enought detailed information and it is free!! I was all set to go.
Monday night when I was just browsing, I got a mail, from my uncle, saying that my mother was not feeling well and she had been admitted to hospital. Tuesday I asked my managers for permission to go back to India. My tickets for Friday were confirmed on wednesday. So I was on my way back to India on Friday.

I wanted to drive like mad during the weekend, and in fact I was flying like mad. After a very long journey, now I am in Bangalore. My mother felt good, since I came back. She will undergo surgery on this wednesday. Hope everything goes well.

A Green Patch, This is all greenery I see around Phoenix 

Calcite Formation