Whims published... It's not an expert's opinion, It's not an online diary, It's not a web journal... It is just my whims published

Highlights of the Hampi trip:

• Reached Hospet around 7 AM on SAT

• Got to know the rooms were not available in IB of Hospet [this acco was recco'd by Shilpa]

• We spotted Udupi KrishNa bhavan and waged a war on it [read breakfast]. Brain started functioning after we exited from the battle field. Left to Kamalapur which is 4 kms away from Hampi

• Booked a room in one of the ‘cheapest’ lodges der with just manageable facilities to stay. Freshened up and left for Hampi

• Hired 5 bicycles in Hampi Bazaar and headed towards Queens Bath, Mahanavami Dibba etc

• Stopped our bicycles near KrishNa temple, BaDavi Linga and famous Lakshmi Narasimha

• There were many places around Queens bath and Lotus mahal worth spending some time upon

• Peddling dint bother until we marched towards Vitthala Temple which is 10 Kms from Queens Bath. This was the longest stretch to peddle. We found many tourists on hired 2 wheelers but bicycles. We were the crazy minority who dared to peddle till Vittala Temple. We could not try our hands on musical pillars as some renovation work was in progress

• Hard saddles weren’t nice on our soft bums J, thighs also started complaining on the way back from Vitthala temple

• I suggested the next destination as Mango Tree restau. All nodded their heads. We peddled back to Hampi Bazaar

• We walked along the shore of ThungaBhadra river to find the hotel. I was rejuvenated the very moment I stepped into the restau. Simply superb ambience and delicious food quenched our hunger.

• Lastly visited Virupaksha Temple

• Inspired by the colourful Hampi Bazaar, did some shopping

• Next day vacated room in Kamalapur and left to Hospet and to Bellary from der

• Attended Karthik’s marriage in Bellary

• First of all cycling throughout the day is no less crazy thing. It needs crazy guts to race through the streets of Hampi and accepting the challenges posed by every big/small slopes of the roads
  

• Srinidhi made us stop at a place where people were making jaggery out of sugarcane juice. It was nice to taste hot jaggery paste [The same paste is left for drying in shade and then cut into cuboid that we buy from shops]

• It feels heavenly to sit with our feet soaked in cold water of a lake on the way to Vittala temple

• As if to test the endurance of my legs, I even gave lift to two local toddlers on the carrier of my bicycle for about 2 kms on the way back from Vitthala temple. By the time I dropped them to their destination, I was breathing like an Asthma patient
  

• To end the day with some more adventure, we guys walked back from Hampi to Kamalapura [dist. 4kms] in the nite. It was scary but fun to walk amidst the pitch black darkness, the only source of light being from Pujar’s 1100 [Now u knw why Pujar takes pride in owning that obiraay Nokia model] and from headlights of vehicles passing by rarely

Plan: To leave for Hampi tonite. Explore Hampi on SAT. Attend Karthik’s marriage on SUN in Bellary. Return to namma BengaLooru on MON

Hum-sufferers: Pujar, Byre, Bhai [joins back the nomad gang after a brief hiatus], Nidhi [new addition, ur welcome pal!] n me

Wat to look for:
Ø Another nice adventurous trip
Ø Ruins of Hampi
Ø The whole gang is enthu abt hiring bicycles to explore Hampi. Lets see wat our bums and calf muscles have to say for this
Ø Ruthless sun of Bellary. Oops mera gore chehra ka kya hoga :)
Ø Tunga bhadra dam
Ø I also have plans of some nocturnal roaming on SAT. Lemme c
Ø Fun n only fun with the gang

Food: My taste buds are screaming the name of Mango Tree hotel in Hampi. Reco’d by many frnds and fellow bloggers, Im dying to visit this place for SAT’s lunch

Stay: Thank u Shilpa for arranging the accommodation

Journey: by BMTC. Rd condition is worst it seems :(

Ill post abt the trip soon... byeee

I rarely experience such an inspiring day on a weekend. Sat started as lazy as any other day on weekends. Was tracking the score on and off between my unavoidable weekend wrk in and out of the home. India had heaped a target of 413 for Aussies to chase in the 3^rd test of the four match series. Though I was not very confident of our victory in this test, but had great hopes over the result of the test match.

Had to go out when Aussies had lost 7 wickets. Then came back to home to see they had lost another wicket in the form of Michael Clarke. Mitchell Johnson and Stuart Clarke were at the crease. I felt the victory is just few steps away.

Again I had to go out to get some things home. It took a bit longer than I expected to return home. Was surprised to see Johnson and Clarke still batting at the crease playing gritty shots. Aussies needed only 80+ runs to win. Though it was not easy for them to achieve this with tail enders, but was surely enough for Indians to press the panic button. Then I sat glued to the seat till RP Singh bowled out Shaun Tait and India snapped the 16 match winning spree of Aussies. The test win was of course special after the turmoil of Sydney test.

I felt good.. I felt elated…

After finishing the lunch, was surfing the tv channels. There was this 3^rd round match happening between Federer and Janko Tipsarevic [49^th seed it seems, I had not seen this guy playing]. Though im an ardent fan of Federer and an avid follower of glandslams, I never manage to remember any program schedule on TV. I was shocked to see the set tally. By then both the players had won 2 sets each and were fighting for the final set. The moment I saw this Tipsarevic guy playing, I could make out why the match was pushed to the 5^th set. He was playing extremely well.

Neither of dem broke the opponent’s serve until the game tally was 8-8 in the tie-breaker. Till den Federer was finishing the game with impeccable aces, and Tipsarevic winning games of his serve with precise mix of baseline and drop shots. I fell flat for most of his well placed drop shots.

A thought crossed my mind that Federer might lose; I could be watching a historic match. Ohh no. I dint want Federer to lose. As always Federer was keeping calm, only once punching his fist in air and showing his temper on face. I don know how some geniuses like him keep cool even at the crunch time. May be that’s wat holds them apart.

At last the Swiss craftsman broke Tipsarevic’s serve in a valiant manner. Fedex was lagging with 0 and 40 in that game. But he fought back with that ‘extra thing’ in him which sets him apart from other champions. Its in these crunch situations, Federer makes tennis lovers feel why is he so great? The game tally now was 9-8, Federer holding the serve. Now the tension in the sir was cleared, every fan of Federer now knew that he has won it. The craftsman finished the match and entered 4^th round of Aus open 08. I also wanna appreciate Tipsarevic for his amazing play that tested the nerve of Swiss genius.

So thus was SAT for me. Watched two great sports events live.

I felt good.. I felt elated…I got inspired…

I have mentioned about my frequent visits to Sankey Lake in one of my previous posts. I prefer going there alone in the evenings. Walk through some distance to find a stone bench and stare at the still water contained by the stone walls of the lake.

Then some retrospection blah blah goes on in mind for some time. When I am tired of talking to myself, I look around for people walking swiftly; jogging with aching heals, drenched in sweat, some walking in weird ways, some clapping their hands [some clap therapy or some thing]. It amuses me to observe people in their candid emotions, in their true selves. The other day in Sankey, I did no different thing; started observing the people around...

Some females had chosen the path along the lake just for the sake of breathing some fresh air on their way back to home.

Two young professionals seemed like they were not content settling the score with their boss in a battle in office. Both looked relieved in giving gaalis to maa and behen of their boss.

Once I heard one of the gal say this to another, “I cut the call, he was talking al nonsense y’day..”. The other gal dint speak nything, but just smiled. Though the first gal said she disconnected the phone, but her face was lit up when she was saying it. May be she was expecting that poor guy’s call with a sweet apology embedded in it.

There was this old couple walking briskly. The old chap leading by two steps and his wife trying hard catching up with his speed. The couple seemed like attacking the enemies called blood pressure and cardiac problems with every step of their brisk walk.

A voluptuous lady walked past elegantly, wearing a pleasant colored chuDi gripping the curves of her body. I could hear the faint sound of her foot tap produced by her newly bought pair of Nikes.

A happy young couple was carefully following their toddler running ahead of them. Both were restraining the kid from running close to the short fence of the lake.

A BF-GF pair were walking, savoring every step of their walk. Girl had gripped around the elbow of the guy softly, with her head slightly bent towards his shoulders.

Two guys in early thirties had occupied a stone bench next to mine, playing music in their phones. The volume of the music was just right enough to be heard only by them. Sensible guys! Sensible for not playing the music loud and harming the ambience of the park.

The water in Sankey looked as calm as always, reflecting the images of the people passing by. The water seemed mysteriously deep hiding all the secrets within but remaining calm on the surface....

This must be my first ever Kannada movie review in my blog, not that I don’t watch Kan movies.. I watch any movie that interests me, language no bar. After many failed attempts to go for dis movie, at last we frnds managed to watch it last weekend.

Lemme make one point clear before you turn away your face wryly, Its not just another Kannada movie glorifying rowdism. Its not just another story where an ordinary boy jumps into rowdism…

The movie is based on a true story that happened in namma BegaLooru during 1980s. The days when people then would get to hear and fear for underworld dons like Kotwal Ramachandra, Jairaj, Oil Kumar et al. Places like Shivaji nagar, KalasipaLya and Sriramapuram were the battle fields for the goons then. The viewers of the movie will be instructed in the beginning itself, to digest the fact that those were the days when there was no advent of mobile phones in people's lives and underworld dons used to ‘deal’ in lakhs and rowdies of those days used to fight with ‘longs’ and ‘machchus’ unlike today’s rowdies who fight at gun point. And no, this does not make the film’s plot obsolete.

The movie unfolds in good pace and maintains the same, keeping the viewer to the edge of the seat. The story is about Chethan Nayak and Mallika and how not only Chethan gets into underworld but also gets involved in the plot to kill Kotwal Ramachandra. I bet this plot did not catch your attention; if you are a Kan film follower. Because this is certainly not new to Kan movie industry, almost every hero here gets into filmdom with a ‘long’ in his hand we might get to watch 100s of such movies. But wait, that’s where Aa dinagaLu, stands out and wins. Lemme also tell you, its not gory as you would expect a movie of such plot would be. Thanks to the crew of Aa dinagaLu for keeping the bloodshed minimal. Except a ‘kurup’ in the beginning and a murder in the end, there is absolutely no violence in the movie.

Speedy screenplay, sensibly violent, 2 melodious songs and tight narration makes the movie a must watch. Though Chethan appears raw in some of his gestures and scenes, but has the ‘looks’ required for the character. Heroine scores better than the hero with better acting skills. Rest of the talented actors are familiar faces seen on small screens and in Bollywood.

Its still running full house in theaters, Watch it guys, don’t miss it…

pic courtesy: nowrunning.com

Name: Mission MelukoTe / Mission YN2C [fundu acronym for 'Yoga Narasimha 2 Crores' he he]

Brains involved: baDDi maga Byre, paakaDa Pujar, loafer Prashi and new-kid-on-block Me!

Master mind: Prashi

Mission started: Analysed the conditions of the spot by inspecting around thoroughly. Then made the plan concrete, speculated the risks, fixed some loose ends

Then on the D Day err.. D nite: All 4 of us visited the temple during nite time and made the jewelery and valuable things gayab frm der. If u ask me how we did it, I can giv u a hint. Watch Dhoom 2

The crunch time has begun: Prashi fled from India, we 3 have gone underground from past few days. No!, ill not tell you where we hid the jewelry

Planning to share the money once investigation fades out n Prashi comes back safely.

Watte news.. Watte comedy..

We guys visited MelukoTe last to last week and there is this news of jewels and other valuables stolen from the temple!!

So dats how 2008 has started for me..

Oh ya 4got to wish you all a very happy and prosperous new year..