Source of Inspiration...

Tea has become my poison now. Having tea twice in the morning has become a must for me.

The tea I get out here at “tapri” is just amazing. The tapri happens to be very near to my place. However, the area is crowded by a whole lot of shops and vendors. It has become my habit to observe the things en-route to tapri.

There is a lady vegetable seller nearby whom I have been observing for quite some time now.

Every day morning, when I go for my second cuppa I see her reading the newspaper. She does that so religiously that I am simply awe-inspired by her desire to be up-to-date.

Here is this lady, who I am sure doesn’t really have great educational background. She is still trying to make the most of the time and whatever little opportunities she gets. Here am I, who is lucky to have got resources to have education and yet not a wee bit motivated to get the best out of it, compared to her.

Inspiration should never be taken from the historical personalities and legends. Inspiration, in my opinion should be taken from the people in your day-to-day life.

There is one thing I am thankful for, to this lady. For months now, I have nurtured a dream - A dream of doing something for this society at some point of time in life. To be very honest, I am not sure when I would be starting that. However, I would love to teach such people - Maybe, by being a part of an NGO.

This lady has fortified that dream. And I am sure, unlike many of my dreams, this dream won’t remain just a dream.

A perfect date

I just happened to watch the movie “Notebook” some time back. It is supposedly one of the best love stories made in Hollywood.

I liked the movie. However more than anything else in that movie, I liked the cinematography in the beginning. And there is a reason I can relate to it. It resembles with my idea of a perfect date [:)]

So here it goes – My idea of a perfect date

It has to be a complete evening. I should be rowing with her in a beautiful lake. There would not be anyone around. I love evening hues beyond doubt. However it is her twilight-lit face that would be captivating me. Her hair should be shining in the twilight. Her smile would make me forget everything else in this world and just be with her. Then we would start playing with water. There should not be too much of talking, though naughtiness would be highly appreciated [:)]. I should feel like the evening should never end.

The twilight would soon start fading. It would soon be dark. Then we should come out and go for a long walk. When the moon comes up fully, I would be reciting her quotes of one of the most beautiful songs ever

“I wish I could fall, on a night like this
Into your loving arms, for a moonlight kiss”

The experience would be evanescent, but the memories would be etched on my heart, forever...

Off for a much needed break..

For long time I was stuck up in the city of dreams for one reason or the other. No doubt I love being there and living the life on the edge but the urge within me to take a break from everything and go off to my place was growing day by day..

Exams got over and since then I am in total festive mood. I did not feel like doing anything else and to be very honest the thought of “home calling” was the only motivation for living these 3-4 days..

Yesterday, we celebrated my good ol’ friend Sattysimple’s B’day and then had a storming discussion on “Career and love” (god knows wot that was [:)]).

Today morning, I came back to mulund and decided to take off for my place in the afternoon itself. Initially I had planned to go tomorrow, but my urge which I mentioned earlier made me cancel tomorrow’s tickets.

2 hours in the train and I realised that I had reached near my place. The difference in the atmosphere was too stark to ignore.

From lonavala onwards there was silent breeze flowing through the compartment. When I looked around I saw the green pastures waving to the tunes of the same breeze. Further, there was something magical about the moment. I guess it was the freshness of the breeze. For a long time now I haven’t experienced something known as “Fresh air” (apologies to Mumbaikars).

Three years ago when I was working in Mumbai, I used to come back home every Friday night. And there was one thing I never missed during any of my trips. I used to stand at the door of the local after lonavala.

Was there any particular reason for that? Hell, yes. It was the same maddening breeze. It used to re-energize me. It used to prepare me for next 5 days of hustle-bustle in my life.

I did experience the same soothing breeze and felt like I’ve got room for ....breathing

Musings

Another 12 hours of sleep and I started thinking about life while i was taking a morning walk in the beautiful park nearby..

The first thought that came to my mind was why is it that almost for 3-4 years now I have always been running behind something or the other? Like in my BE I was running behind the good end of my engineering. Then after joining Accenture I was running behind these entrance exams like cat, xat etc. After failing in almost all of them :) and after good score in CET I was running for admission. After getting into mba i was again running behind some certification and some projects and after that now it’s for placements..

So it has so happened that I cannot enjoy the time when I have nothing to do. It’s not that I did not enjoy my life in all these years. Like I have written in my previous blogs, the moments I enjoy with my friends is what keep me going. But then there are times when you are not with your friends or you are not having gala time in spite of being in company of your friends. It is these moments I am talking about..

One thing I candidly confess that all I have done till now is to fulfil my professional ambitions. I also agree to that fact that I have decided long back that "on a professional front I will make my life happen and on a personal front I will let it happen"....

But today I was sorta dumbfounded by this premise. And asked myself why I decided that. I think there have been times when I consider myself to be made of two contradicting personalities. One is professional Saurabh who is almost always happy, who always loves to be on the move, who is wary of emotions other than that of happiness, who believes and takes effort to keep the atmosphere around him light and happy and who is at times a very good person to discuss the personal issues with. The other one is emotional Saurabh, who is always has a fleeting presence in my life, but whenever he is there, life becomes hell lotta confusing.

So, by choice I have more often than not been a professional Saurabh. At least that is what I believed till yesterday.

I think because I was splitting myself into these two personalities, and because my so called professional me was always dominant, I was feeling a bit nervous for last 2-3 days..

But today I realised that I am just being myself by being the first personality. There is nothing like emotional Saurabh. Emotional bouts are normal to every human being and as long as it is not having any ill-effect on the health of somebody it is okay....

So, I have once again decided that it is my decision to be happy always. If I need a reason to be happy, then absence of such reasons will make me sad. And even my decision to “make my life happen on a professional front and letting it happen on a personal front” is perfectly justified.

In fact the uncertainties of letting life happen on its own is what makes this life beautiful, like my very good friend Satish puts it.

“Life is full of glorious uncertainties”..

I realised I was surrounded by many people out there were enjoying the chit-chatting on a bright sunny Sunday morning and suddenly reminded me of my favourite Celine Dion song..

“Let it shatter the walls for a new sun
A new day has come ”....

A year of madness

August 12 is indeed a very special day in my life. Exactly a year ago I met Sankalp and Venky and we started our life @ we school...

It’s been a year at Welingkar. And its hard to believe it. I feel like it started just yesterday. Truly, this has been a year of sheer madness :) , and fun and frolic with my buddies who are added to my best buddies gang now.

If I am to remember the best of the moments of this year, the first that would come to my mind is surely the night out @ marine drive. This was our very first night out in the Mumbai. And in my personal life it has been another landmark.

Life, they say is never like a smooth sea. So of course the 1 year I had here is also full of ups and downs. I am lucky to be surrounded by great friends like Venky, Sandya, Shingu, Preetom, Akshay, Chamku, Sankalp and many more. So life indeed has become much more enjoyable.

The moments which I will never forget surely are the nights at the Marine drive, the nights and ruckus we created @ sion hostel, playing cards whole night @ sion hostel, the hangout @ carter road and never to forget, the evenings @ katta.

Its the madness of me and my friends that has kept me going. It has also made me believe that whatever happens, happens for the best.

There is one more year to go. And I am sure this year will be much more eventful on many fronts. I hope I make something out of this year.

I dedicate this to you my friends. Kudos to our friendship. Let’s make this a year to remember.

Memoirs of the most cherished travel

You plan to go somewhere with your best buddies on a day... but something happens and the plan gets cancelled..

How many of us have had this kind of experience? Well, I guess all of us..

You have a holiday.. you just go meet your friends and decide to go somewhere.. very instantaneously..and then you go over there.. have a great time...

Things which are done unplanned have their own significance..

What would happen if such an unplanned picnic sows the seeds of a perfectly planned trip in future?

What would happen if this trip gets executed as per plan and it also has the imprompu flavor?

Our kokan trip on bike is one of such experiences in my life..

It all began an outing to mulashi dam one fine evening..

that was 30th December 07..

vabs, panky and I had a great time that evening enjoying the scenic beauty along the way and at mulashi..

Panky and Vabs always have some cool ideas in their minds... And that evening was a decider for such an idea - kokan trip on bike....

The idea itself was so good that it was almost fixed to go for trip on 19-20th of jan..

Thanks to research by pankaj and planning by vabs.. we were all geared up for the sojourn a 2 -3 days before day 1..

There were 4 of us - Vabs, Panky, Deeps and myself...

4 Guys 2 bikes 1 travel - travel for a unique experience

Evening day 0

We all met once at panky's place.. decided to meet at paud road at 6 am and dispersed..

Day 1

Out there we were all set at 6 am to unwind.. Bikes were at full throttle..

We crossed the chandani chowk and headed for pirangut..

It was all dark out there..

Panky, the most observant guy amongst us sensed something is wrong with the road... "I dont think we are on right road", said he..

But Vabs and myself, confident as we were, affirmed panky that we were on right track..

when we saw the beautiful orange tinges on the horizon before sunrise, we became aware that we were in ghat..

It was an extremely beautiful ghat...We took some snaps out there and headed ahead.. We came across a village called "Mutha"..

Startled, we tried to remember if we had come across such a village en-route to Mulashi..

Panky was right.. we had taken a wrong turn at Pirangut.. And we had come 14 km ahead..

But the takeaway was the beutiful sunrise in the ghat..

after 1 hour of extra journey, we were back on track.

Pune is considered to be pretty cold a place during winters... but very few know that there exists an extremely frigid road just 10 km from chandani chowk..

So we were back on track where chilling wind was flowing at a rate greater than that of tsunami..

Man, i still remember the resonance of cluttering sound of our teeth... Deeps and i were still better off for Vabs and Panky, the drivers were mollifying the intensity of wind by facing it..

Desperate for having something as hot as boiling tea, we started seeking for dhabas around.. finally we found one. This place was more of a park than dhaba..there were ducks and some other birds over there..All of us wanted 1 thing and cups and cups of it – tea. We all had 2 cups of tea each. You experience the real taste of tea only when you are chilled to death.

Back on the track.. now with changed positions. Deeps and I were the drivers and Vabs and Panky – the pillions. We were hardly 20 km away from the main attraction of the journey and that was Tamhini Ghat. Meanwhile we took a short break for photo session near mulashi dam. And we reached Tamhini. An avid trekker that he is, vabs showed us some Gads (forts) from the ghat. The Pune end of ghat is full of beautiful Jungle and trust me guys worth visiting during monsoons. Then we throttled again.. and continued till we reached Poladpur. Vabs remembered having sumptuous misal in a hotel over there. We all headed over there. And had lots of misal. This was break no 2. And now we were set to go to Dive

Aagar non stop.

We were cruising at decent speed of 60 kmph only till a cop stopped us. Actually we had license and stuff but he was hell bent on showing insurance papers. Obviously we dint have them. Never mind. We could still have got away and Panky was doing needful. But Vabs struck again. This cop was hardly 28-29. And vabs called him “uncle”. His anger was understandable J and we had to pay him the kickbacks.

We gave kinda speech to vabs about it and carried on.

At 1 pm sharp we reached at Dive Aagar. It’s a beautiful village having typical kokan aura. Thanks to Panky, we had a room booked over there.

Then we had the famous kokani food (which included solkadhi). Vabs has taken nice pic of the dish.

After a rest of 1 hour, we headed to Harihareshwar. This place is famous for its Shiva Mandir. And the rocky beach. We had the Darshan and we enjoyed the beauty of the beach.

A few kilometres from there lies the Shrivardhan beach. Seeing the sunset on a beach is a splendid experience. And playing in the sea at that time, even better. We tried to do something crazy over there. We rode our bikes on the beach and trust me its hellua of fun.

What followed was one of the most memorable evenings in my life. The road from Shrivardhan to Dive Aagar goes along the beautiful coastline. There are hills and beaches along the way. There is a point on the hilltop from where you can see picturesque sea. Add to this the maddening sound of the waves and a wonderful sea breeze and you have the evening of your life.

We all were bedazed by this evening. And together we decided, “we gonna to come back by this road only”. This was the place which made our evening and we did not want to miss the beauty of sunrise at this place.

All exhausted, we had our dinner at a place in Dive Aagar and retired for the day but not before playing a few games of cards :)

Day 2

We all got ready and went to see the temple in Dive Aagar. It is a very nice temple and the speciality about it is that the Ganesh Idol which is made up of Gold was found in the backyards of a home while digging.

Here we were, once again, on our bikes, this time on the way to Murud Janjira. Cross a beautiful ghat in the Sahyadris and the village welcomes you. We did our pet puja before booking a ticket of the launch to the fort.

The beauty of the fort lies in the fact that – you cannot see the entrance of the fort till you reach it. It is one of the major reasons why the fort remained unconquered for 800 years. Inside the fort all you see is the glory of the bygone age.

How many of you think that a cannon can be as cold as an icecube? Dont believe me? Visit murud Janjira and see Kalal Bangdi... The coolest of the cannons claiming hundreds of lives in her heydays...

And you will also find a lake which is full of quicksand now..

Then we took about turn to our place of the day i.e. Dive Aagar. Now the only thing remaining was the Dive Aagar beach. We had lunch and rested for a while.

Thanks to the room owner, he had bat and ball. So we played li’l bit of cricket before going to the beach.

And here we were, on a beach which has crystal clear sea water, which is surrounded by endless patch of coconut trees and which full of golden sand. We played over there for 2-3 hours. We played beach cricket. Then we made a fort out of sand.

I have seen a beach in morning, evening and night. Most of you might argue that evening is the best place to be on a beach. But trust me, beach in moonlight is much more resplendent than that in the evening and for that you got to visit Dive Aagar.

All night went in anticipating the morning, coz as i said earlier, we had decided to go by the “Dive Aagr – Shrivardhan” road.

Day 3

The return journey had started. And we were again on the road... biking along the coast while the horizon was poised for a beautiful sunrise. We took a break. We watched the sunrise. And I must mention 1 thing. An idea of “two legs on two islands” kinda pic by Pankaj :) Panky as I always believed is full of fabulous ideas. Vabs executed this pic to perfection and i am sure even you people would admire it.

Then were back on the track. We took 1 last break to see the sea for the last time. And we wrote our names on the sand “Vaibhav, Saurabh, Pankaj, Deepak”. As someone famously said (and that someone is me J)“Sea waves can erase this but memories are unforgettable.”

I called up at office and told my supervisor that I am sick and would not be able to come to the office

Poladpur, Tamhini came and went. And now we were all eager to reach the place where we started. The final destination and that was Pune. So when we reached the Chandani Chawk, the entrance of the city, we yelled, we shouted and we were nervous coz the journey was over.

There is a ritual you got to follow when you are in Kothrud. No prizes for the guesses if you are a Puneite. Cold coffee @ Durga. The best of the cold coffees you could ever get on this planet.

All good things come to an end. Don’t they? But that’s the way they are supposed to culminate. And it is necessary anyways because it paves way for the next good things to come. As I end this article I am getting the same feeling. Don’t feel like ending it. But can’t help it.

A few days from now is the first anniversary of this trip. And thank you panky, vabs and deeps. You are the witnesses of my most memorable journey.