Travel me wild

It's not the journey, but the destination.

Who says you can't enjoy both. Just returned from a short trip as a part of the Skoda Yeti Right of Way Expedition. I along with another duo were selected to join the leg at Dessert National Park, right off of Jaisalmer. The organizing teams had done an awesome job in every aspect to ensure that everything was in place... Other than an early morning ride along the Samjhauta express route there were no hiccups sighted. Anything to improve neighborly relations I say. That out of the way we were brought back to our senses and the national park with some awesome eagle sightings around us. Having renowned wildlife photographer Nayan Khanolkar along with us definitely helped us learn more about all the wings we saw. Our various visits were coupled with some off-roading with the Yeti and the little package showed off its beast of an engine each time. Sly little package.

However, the presence of the two superstars I was teamed up with was what everything was about. What a difference some good company with receptive minds can make! Two cheerful "adults" who seemed to have just got the "get out of jail free - for 3 days only" card. And boy did the convicts play havoc. The conversations started mildly with a flurry of jokes, vegetarian only of course :), and covered topics like spirituality, sexuality, frozen exit points in the body from the early morning chills and a variety of camel talk. A well rounded conversation if I've ever had one? (I just hope none of it got documented in any format)

Not many pics of the trip with me. Will upload the few I have soon anyways. The NatGeo team took some snippets of me with yellow aviator shades on and a few with a camel. My best guess is that the videographer wanted to fill up some slots in "Laughter Video Challenge" or "India's Funniest Home Videos" sometime soon. You could extort money out of me to get those back man! lol!

So now after Jet airways took my boarding pass and handed me my "go straight to jail" card am back in civilization. When I sit here trying to put this down to words I remember another quote that brilliantly sums up this trip

A journey is best measured in friends rather than in miles

This one cranked up the odometer to all 9's!

CommonWealth Games Delhi 2010... are over

Ok so its over.... and hell yeah we snuck into the second place on the medal tally.. yipee..

So what sucked... Listed very much in order of suckiness
1) Suresh Kalmadi and his entourage were by far a the suckiest part of the games mess.
FOB* collapsing without this SOB under it proves that evil still rules this world.
Whats worse he didn't send me a VIP pass either.. dude.. come on we bro's ain't we?

And a very very very distant set of second, third, fourth and fifth
2) A.R. Rahman. KARO MARO PEEO JEYO. Did I hear him say this was gonna be bigger than waka waka? Dude.. just because you got a sympathy FOB** vote at the Grammy doesn't mean you have proven yourself... And dude this was your chance and did you screw it up.. I cant even remember the tune of the thing you charged 5cr for man... let alone the words. And yeah.. plzzz plzzz don't pick up the mic ever again. Spoilt brat.
3) Central Bank of India. These dipshits don't realize that today if a ticket is issued online you get to board a freakin aircraft. Why the fuck then did we need to come to the fucking branch? Was there a swayamvar planned that needed my presence there?
4) The dedicated CWG lanes... Come on I thought that the idea of hosting the games was to have the visitors enjoy our culture as well. And being stuck in never ending traffic snarls is very much a part of that. You cant just enjoy our chicken tikka, butter chicken and not sweat your ass off sitting in an auto rickshaw having to pay 10$ to get exactly 100mts from where you are [ without being informed about it by the friendly auto rickshaw walla of course]. Come on... catch the metro if you don't like the traffic.. no special treatment.
5) Sheila Dikshit... why were you sleeping all these years woman. You should've kicked ass way earlier.
6) Hate to say it but the indian men's hockey team. Come on how can you loose 8-0 in the finals. Didn't the coach insult my surds brothers enough prior to the game to rev them up?

So what rocked?
1) The entire "better than Beijing" stadium booing Suresh Kalmadi at the opening ceremony
2) Sheila Dikshit for an entirety of 3 days prior to the opening
3) Jat boyz... and no plz don't email me.. am not like that.. not yet anyways
4) Saina Nehwal... rock on girl!
5) Indian track athletes... kick ass attitude
6) India-Pak hockey match.. esp considering we won!!
7) And what rocked the most... ??? The Indian national anthem playing for all of 38 times... it ain't the Olympics but hell it sounded just as great.

* first FOB is for the foot over bridge
** second FOB is for the Fresh Off Board tag

Night Skies at Pangong Tso

Of all the things being planned the trip to Ladakh has been on the list for a very very long time. Ironically though, the decision to go was taken just 3 days prior to departure and nearly everything done last minute. But then isn't being spontaneous (read. lazy) half the fun?

People have written and talked about Leh and the amazing landscapes that it has to offer and they were all spot on. The gorgeous views on the Leh-Manali route, the shocking sand dunes in the Numbra valley, the abrupt and non seasonal snowfall at Kardungla, the precariously perched gompas at every visible horizon... everything was spot on.

But then they missed one very special thing. The heavenly views of the night skies from Pangong Lake. That I guess was the one hidden secret that was discovered during the trip there and what a well kept secret it is. For most people head out to Pangong Tso as a day trip with very few willing to bear the sub-zero (debatable :)) temperatures of the high altitude lake post sunset, which amazingly is around 7-8pm. Or maybe its simply because most people can't stomach a night in minimal accomodations available here. Sissies.

Luckily the low temperatures are never a deterrent for this thick skinned Mangy. Standing out near the lake, when you raise your head to the sky, you are greeted with the most amazing array of stars that you could ever imagine. Think of the Nehru planetarium on steroids. A 180*360 degree hemispherical view of the skies with nothing blocking your sight in any direction. The stars so bright that we could neither call out the north star nor Orion's belt, which is ever so prominent from the subcontinent. The number of stars and their intensity was something that could not be believed. While the fact that most of them twinkled like gorgeous diamonds was a spectacle in itself, you could also find trails of white clouds beyond those stars which could be star clouds or nebulae. Who knows what they were, who cares.. it was stunning!
And if that didnt satisfy your appetite for wonder - the patient few caught more than one strikingly clear shooting stars. Oh yeah, wishes were definitely made#!

Call it godly, heavenly, spiritual or just plain romantic... this is one sight that will be etched in the sanctum sanatorum of my soul and retinae for a long long time.

In fact I was told that I must apologize to everyone for not having a suitable camera on me to capture the sight. I am deeply sorry for that. And extremely ecstatic that I saw it and you didn't :P For regardless of how well one may be able to express themselves through words there are some things that just need to be experienced!

What a night!


For rest of the experience in pictures.. see these

Just got Leh'ed

Sports are finally back on Indian Televisions

Da beautiful game is back with the fifa World Cup 2010... Finally some sports on the desi telly.

Gear up guys. Rainfall 2010 is gonna be anything but normal

Assurance from our brothers at the IMD