31st Celebrations at Matheran

Matheran is a heaven near Mumbai. I love the place. I had blogged about Matheran on my previous blog. So wont repeat the same things again, and this post is not about Matheran it is about our 31st celebrations at Matheran.

It is my experience that things that I plan well in advance, do not ever happen. I had been planning for the 31st Dec 2009 celebrations since Diwali. Initially my plan was to have a barbeque party at my farmhouse at karjat. But the house is still not ready to have any party. So I had to drop that idea later. My 2nd preference was to fort Raigarh. But eventually I realized that nobody would agree to come to Raigarh. I was determined to go out of Mumbai and celebrate the last day of 2009. At last just two days prior to 31st I came up with the plan of celebrating 31st at Matheran. Of course there wasn’t much response. But ultimately 3 of us made it successful.

3 girls having a New Year party in an old, small and secluded house, located in a Jungle like Matheran sounds totally insane. But well, we are really crazy and often plan such events and make them memorable with the stupidity we do out of over excitement and enthusiasm.

We started really early and could reach Matheran before noon. Our bags were already full with the stock of food items and drinks we were carrying from home. As if that was not sufficient, we bought more stuff from the local market. Our sacks were damn heavy, and the walk till my house, which is at the far end of Matheran, was a bit exhaustive. But it was all worth.

The main program was to have snacks with cake and red wine and play cards in the verandah decorated with balloons and crapes. The whole evening was gone in cooking corn chat and blowing up the balloons. At last by 10 all preparations were over, and it was time to shuffle cards and open the wine bottle. We amateur drunkards were handling a wine bottle for the first time. After caressing and cuddling the bottle for a while we proceeded to open it. It didn’t take us much time to realize that the bottle had a cork and we had forgotten the cork opener (actually, forgotten is a wrong word, because I never considered cork opener could be an essential thing to carry). Now from where the hell was I going to get a cork opener in the jungle? The market was 3 km from my house, and there was hardly anybody living in the vicinity that can have a cork opener. The only tools available in the house were scissors and knife. So ultimately I opened the cork by continuously prickling it with the scissors. No wonder I had to filter the wine before drinking. The efforts I took made the wine taste better as I was the one who drank most of it.

The rest of the evening and the following day was fun and was quite (un)eventful.

This incidence has led me to make New Year’s resolutions of learning “drinking etiquette”. I am serious about it.

Mission Karnala

For a long time we had been planning to go out on a weekend. But no plan could work out. At last yesterday we made it. We trekked to the fort karnala!!!

We gathered at the entrance at 8.30. Bought entry tickets and our trek began. The weather was good. We were so excited about our 1st trek together, and very busy clicking pictures that we did not care to look at the site map that was put up near the entrance (we took a picture of it though!)

Having not seen the map we did not know which path to take. But we were in no mood to think about whether we had taken the correct road or not (were too busy admiring the beauty of the nature). After going some distance the way ahead was blocked by logs and mud. And then we started realizing that we had taken the wrong path. But we were too determined not to go back. Dharti in her full spirits took the lead, she crossed all the obstructions. We followed her. There was a trail ahead. We followed the trail.

As we moved ahead, the trail narrowed, became more slippery and steeper. And at one point it vanished. We were stuck. Going back was impossible going ahead was difficult. But we had to keep climbing. The ground was inclined at 85 degrees (or perhaps more). We were rock climbing, actually moss climbing (as there were hardly any rocks). Taking support of the roots, and stems, and creepers we were moving ahead. The only positive thing was that it was not raining.
After some time, to our relief, it was over. The ‘no trail’ path which we took ultimately brought us on the regular track, the one that is usually taken by people. The trek ahead was pretty simple.
At around 12.30 we were on the top. We had our tiffin, then had a photo session, made plans about our next trek, and started our return journey.
Obviously while climbing down we took the regular track. It was very easy. Without any difficulty we climbed down within an hour.

Karnala fort is supposed to be one of the easiest places to trek to. It stands 475 meter high. The 3 km trek generally takes not more than 2 hrs. But we made it difficult, we took around 4 hrs to reach the top, and reduced the distance to only 2 km (as we were climbing at a higher inclination). To put it in other words, we made the simple trek, adventurous, thrilling and a memorable experience!!

Solar Eclipse 2009 (an irony)

They said in the news papers and TV channels again and again that ‘The next time this sort of a total solar eclipse passing the main land of India will happen in 2114 AD -- that is 105 years later’. Of course I did not want to miss such a once in a life time event, and I decided to go to Patna. Patna because, Patna was said to be the best place to witness solar eclipse. The total solar eclipse would last for only 4 min between 6.26-6.30 on 22nd July 2009.

The biggest concern was that monsoon clouds may get in the way. Just a day before the eclipse we came to know about the depression in Orissa which increased the possibility of a cloudy sky the next morning.
And that’s what happened. The next morning we went to the terrace to see the sky covered with thick clouds. More over it was raining. We missed the show!! Later around 7 o’clock the sky cleared out and we could catch a glimpse of the partial phase.

I was very much disappointed. Whenever I am sad and the question ‘why this happened’ annoys me I think of the probability theory (that’s weird I know). It helps me to think practically and rationally. To travel miles away from your house spending a lot of money and time to see an uncertain event like this was a gamble. We tried to play it smartly and reduced the probability of failure by choosing the location Patna. But failure remained a possible event. Every possible event is associated to a positive probability. That explains it all.
In case of Mumbai failure was a certain event with probability 1. Hence there was no point in staying in Mumbai. I had to be in Patna if I wanted to see the eclipse. And I was there. Hence I shall not feel bad about it.

Varanasi was the only place in India from where the total eclipse was witnessed. I envy all those people who went to Varanasi! They were really lucky!

About me and my blog

Here you’ll meet the little girl, who never speaks aloud,

But on this blog, with different plots she’ll pour out.

Though she plays with guns and arms and hits the bull’s eye

But believe me, in her blood and flesh she won’t even kill a fly

Travel the globe and explore the world is her deep passion,

Learning how the money matters is her current profession

With this brief account of me I start writing my blog,

I hope I keep feeding it so that it would never clog.