Wellington

Some time back I wrote about the places i have lived in, and the list in not short thanks to my defense background. This is the first in a series of posts I intend to write describing what I remember of those places.

I was 3 years old, I am not sure how much a 3 year old is expected to remember of a place she stayed in for a year and a half. But I have faint and very scattered memories of Wellington a town where my father was posted to to pursue his degree from the Staff College.

We stayed in a house located on a hill top. With a small kitchen garden in the backyard, we only had to climb a small hillock from the garden to reach the children's park.Where there was a slide with broken steps, every time some animal (I think it was a bull, but might need to confirm that with my elder sister) came into the park all the kids ran to climb from the sloping end to the top of the slide (as I mentioned the steps were broken) to be safe and I remember never being able to reach the top myself.

There were pony rides we went for every Sunday. And than there was the ride to School on a "shaktiman" truck which collected us from our bus stop, which was a leveled land closed from 3 ends by hills.

On those Sundays when dad would be around he would sit out with his friends and have beer rolling the empty bottles down hill, behind which we went rolling to fetch the bottles.

On days when dad would not be in town and I only remember one such time though, there would be guards out side the house all night and I wondered if we were prisoners.

On the base of the hill we lived on was a graveyard somehow I can still close my eyes and see the place, a little ahead of the graveyard were more multi storied homes. I remember visiting someone there once but can't recollect who. Some times we used to walk a long way, to check on our house maid who had a tent like house in a valley.

Than of course there were times when we went to Ooty lake for boating and this one time that I remember clearly is when Nani ( of course that is what we called her) fell in the lake because she would not let any one help her get off the boat (and she was my age), we only realized that she was missing when we started looking for the car keys, which she had.

I would love to live in a place like that again !

Kalwar Betta

It had been a while since I stretched my self.

So after hosting an elaborate dinner party at home I had half a mind to call Aditi and tell her I can't make it for the trek at Kalwar Betta, this was @ 12:45 pm when suddenly I realized there was a time when I could go on a trip without even half an hour of sleep. So I got up made some food and asked them what time we leave ?---I am glad I made the choice I made.

Kunal, Aditi, Dharma and I set out for Kalwar Betta @ 2:30 am from Bangalore. The excitement started early on the journey when we realized it was a great time to call our friends living on the other end of the globe and had an amazing phone session with Sai and Niti.

After parking our car at a temple on the foot hill we started walking towards the base, not knowing which one of the many peaks in front of us was the main peak to be climbed. We chose the one which seemed the highest.

A lot of people warned us not to venture until day light said that there were groups stuck mid way not knowing what to do.

But we had adventure on our minds so, we set out to climb only to realize mid way that it was not the peak that we actually should be climbing and than we changed our course.

It was a beautiful morning and the gods painted one of the best sunrises I have witnessed.

Though...multiple times during the climb I gave up and every time Aditi and Dharma would not let me and than we finally reached the top and it was so beautiful that I silently thanked them both for not letting me stop mid way !

@ Photographs are taken by Aditi.

BR Hills -- K Guddi

This was one of those rare trips when we hired a SUV for our Journey. (only when I went through the snaps to upload here I realise we did not take any snap of the Scorpio)

We stayed at the jungle lodges. When we reached there, for a moment I felt sad that we could not plan in advance to get one of those tents or log huts.


But... as we went up and I saw a stretch of beds in front t of me it just seemed like the good 'ol college trips when we would all stay in one room and have lots and lots of fun.

The Highlights of the trip were...

1. The morning walk that Anshuman and I went on.

2. The Jungle Safari

3. Camp Fire along with the meals.

4. The Elephants

5. Lazing on the Monkey Net.

The monkeys surprised me by actually figuring out how to open a window if it is not locked. And the scary dark nights were just a little bit too peaceful for Paromita and Sana :D
May be some time it is worth doing this one again with more time at hand !

On our way back we stopped by at Infy Mysore for some urban fun :)