Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere

Being footloose has always fascinated me. The most Primeval instinct of mankind is to migrate from one place to another. I should be quite modest in confessing that my lust towards travelling is neither Atavistic nor some divine fate playing its cards on me. I simply pack my backpack, book the tickets, make arrangements for accommodation and just hit the road. This principle has worked wonders right from Barcelona to Varanasi, from jumbled streets of Old Delhi to Cobble-stoned pavements of Vieux Lyon.

While on travel, I tend to put those worldly emotions behind and crave for moments. The moments which gets into your memory as an indelible tattoo. The women selling Baguette in a marketplace in Straussbourg, The Brandenburger Tor in Berlin, The carnival in Cologne, The Taj mahal in moonlight, The Amber fort in Jaipur during sunset, the bicycle ride through nature-parks. Time defies its physical property and comes to standstill in those moments. It is worth trying twice. To paraphrase Christopher McCandless - "Life is all about meeting new people and having new experiences."

I feel at home when I am on the move. The constantly changing horizon, The used flight-tickets in my wallet, Restaurant bills, Visiting card of somebody whom you can't recollect.. these are my souvenirs of travel. The Window seat in the train and the sight of a display boards in new different languages..

these are my feel-good factors. Travel is a default expression of freedom. I reflect on myself better when I am on the go.

I tend to read about the culture and history of the place before I travel, so that once I set my foot on the destination I figure myself as someone getting there after a long break. I use 'Ick' instead of 'Ich' (German for 'I') when I go to Berlin. I greet an elderly man near Turkman gate in Shahjahanbad-Old Delhi with 'Assalamu Alaykum'. I feel the Catalonian pride in Barcelona and support VfB-Stuttgart in football.

I prefer local food rather than McDonalds, and I prefer 'talking to a stranger' over 'i-pod'.

It is just fascinating to see how civilizations in differ in certain things, and is exactly similar in certain other things.

The Fire that burns into Smoke

They were burning something in my street corner. Dried leaves, Trash, Plastic covers, Newspapers,... The man behind the fire is a muffler-clad middle aged man. With a cigarette in his hand, he was looking at the fire with the pride of creator. Fire is a piece of modern art. It doesn't know rules.

The fire burns tall and upwards (Fire has never obeyed Newtons equations) spitting out flares. Its glow is not camouflaged by Sodium-vapor lamp. Fire, the mother of all constructive as well as destructive inventions by mankind, is standing in my street corner. It is one friend of mine with whom I can never dare to have a hug. It is fierce and has mercy on those who trespass its boundaries.

I have seen 'the fire', turning human-corpses to powder-ash in the banks of river Ganga at Varanasi. He is a destroyer, and in-front of him nothing else matters. I have seen 'the fire' in the metallurgical furnaces making out Industrial iron. I have seen him in happy moments in camp-fire. I have seen him in some accidents.

The Fire is my favorite of the five basic elements of nature. Invention of 'how to make fire' is one of the landmarks of human advancement. That holy moment made him superior over other Faunas. Even the most carnivorous'tic of animals still fear seeing the fire. Invention of fire allayed us from the fear of getting extincted in the survival-cycle.

Perhaps, Fire bypassed the evolution theory in making humans 'the strongest' albeit not the fittest.

'Fire service' is that name that we have given to put out fire. Even the most advanced of human construction techniques can't be complete without 'Fire exits'. You need to co-exist with this rude friend who lives on oxygen just like us.

Let there be light with some fire. It is a cold evening in Bangalore.

The Clockwork of Life

Deathbed. The White linen sheets, the smell of the disinfectant in hospital, the feel of my index finger touching the thumb, the continuous beep of some machine near my pillow. Moments in deathbed. Living this aesthetic moment in this epoch of time is indeed bliss. These, i know, are last moments of my human-hood before the 'I' inside me plunges into valley of unknown.

I try to recollect all my good memories in my life, in vain. All I end up, is recollecting images. That flower-vase in the windowsill, that bright wallpaper, that Che Guevara sticker in my motorbike, the solo boat-rides in lake near my house. Then, I try to remember people. The process of imagination then becomes like a giant collage of group photographs. It seemed like everyone else in the collage, except me, had got themselves caught in a big time bubble and hence frozen.

One, they never grew old. Two, their character never changed in my book of life. Strange. Indeed.

I had learnt quite a bit of science in my 65 years on my stay on earth, that I never indulged in any religious practices in the last 40 years of my life. There were religious men and Women, driven by their vedic intolerance towards Atheism, persuading me to follow a cult.

In this moment in deathbed, where the realms of Physics gives way to the Occult labyrinths of Metaphysics, I don't denounce my atheism. I am just a bunch of Cells. And they are going to stop replenishing in few hours. I believe ignorance of Science among masses is a sign of degradation of Civilization to Barbarianism.

I slumber, I hear people speaking, I slumber again. I try to communicate in vain. It is an irony that we still believe in languages for communication.

Every time my eyelid opens after a wink, I feel similar to my first kiss. Every time I move my head, I feel like an axe splitting my spine. It is the dusk as the Life sinks into horizon. The Sailor is going to dock his ship in the harbor.

I am not sure how I look like now. It has been months since I looked at my reflection in the mirror. I am not sure how I smell now. Damp squib of an old man, may be. The Nature still asks me questions, which my system is too tired to answer. The music is all gone in my ears. It is just like feathers of a caged bird. This state of mine is neither a curse nor a Punishment for my sins, It is just nature.

Wars, Famine, Child labor, Racism.. I forgive mankind in my deathbed and give'em one more chance to reform. Let there be light.

"A Post to Remember"

Prasanna was 95 when he died. I had a nice friendship with him. I am 90 years old physically but 25years old mentally. Senility has given me more things than it has taken. I always have this hope towards future though i know that end is near. My first publication was in Ananda vikatan magazine in 1944. I was a young satyagrahi then. I was taken aback by Gandhi. Many young women like me were drawn towards the national movement then, just because of Gandhi. With his principles and methods, he represented a father-like figure for us.

Things apart, I used to have a really nice talk with Prasanna till his death last month. We were walking partners for 10years. Chronic diabetes had made my doctor to prescribe for walks everyday for me. It was then I saw the real senile world.

The world of many old people I met during those walks, were loomed by fear of death. They portray themselves as enacting the last sequence in the drama of life. Soberness, sorrow and desperation always dominated their thoughts and speeches. Well, I am not of that kind. I worked in archeological survey of India for 30 long years. I had traveled places and had excavated lot of sites. I had lived a meaningful life and I am ready to accept death at any moment. So that makes everyday a fun ride.

Among all the walking partners, Prasanna is a different person. He talks about medicines and how herbs are better alternatives to british introduced english medicine. He used to say, before English medicines came to India people used to be treated for thousands of years with natural medicine and it was highly effectual.

It may seem like a mundane talk for all those M-Tv generation people reading my post, but at the age of 80 you hardly can find people talking like this.

Age hood in India brings tremendous amount of respect, but least recognition. The two main things that needs attention in India are Voltage (electricity) and Old age. I had applied to work as a freelance writer in local journal, just to be turned down with a note saying that I am old and I wanted rest. I am not cutting logs or laying roads everyday that I need rest. I am still active in my mind. So is Prasanna and he also had this same complaint towards the worlds view of the aged people.

Well to recount my past.. The 1970s were the toughest years. I worked in ASI office in Delhi. It was in those years that Indira Gandhi had declared emergency and everything was in a state of chaos. But for the elite in Delhi, we always had enough food and enough wine in our casket. But still some mysterious calm was engulfing the air those days.

Then came the dream 80s. and then promising 90s. I am not going to narrate all the incidents in detail and make this post as a look-back on history.

All I want to say is, whatever recaps of the past that you see in news channels, I have lived through it in flesh and blood.

Oh no!! I wept like anything hearing Rajiv's death, I cried like a baby when I got my first Maruti 800 car. I am a citizen of this billion large Republic of India right from its inception.

I am really happy that our young generation of IT engineers are making waves around the world with their intelligence. They say that the Indian economy is one of the strongest in the world and that we are slated to be a super-power soon. I have heard this slogans many times, but this time it seems to be real. I can visually see the changes in the society. It is a good sign. Of all things I had dreamt of, my greatest ambition is to die in a developed India.

But for your information, My grand-daughter is in Houston and my grand-son is in Australia. It is one thing which Prasanna always didn't like and the one topic which we debated about most with hot mug of English tea.

Charlotte Square (Charlottenplatz)

He took the filter and held it in his mouth. Then he unwrapped the pack of tobacco, took a buch of dried tobacco and started rolling it a paper. A small stuck of tobacco fell on the floor.

'Scheiße' he screamed and started rolling furthur. Beside him was the half drunk bottle of the regional beer and some plastic covers. He had a badge on his half torn coat which asked government to give jobs to the Youth.

'Was machst du hier (What are you doing here) ?' he asked me.

'Ich möchte nach schlossplatz gehen. Ich warte für die U-Bahn (I like to go to palace square. I am waiting for metro)' I replied.

With a puff of smoke with which had the mixed smell of beer and rotten food, he said - 'scheiße..Ich frage, was machst du hier im Deutschland? (I asked what you do in Germany) '

'Ich arbeite hier (I work here)' I replied.

The U-Bahn had come and I have to bid adieu. From the window of train, I can still see the gentleman puffing out circles of cigarette smoke in the air.

I was there in the same station on the evening of new years day . It was a cold January evening. Charlottenplatz (Charlotte square) has a honeycomb like train station. Sometimes, you get confused between escalators and elevators on which platform you should go.

I met the same guy in the same place. I quite understood that in the charlottenplatz U-Bahn station he is quite popular. This time he was having a regional zeitung (newspaper) and reading aloud the new year message from the German Chancellor.

This time also he had the same regional beer beside him and same set of plastic covers.

In between his address to the public, he noticed me and came near me.

'Habst du eine Cigaratte? (Do you have a cigarette)' He asked me.

'Entschuldigung! Ich rauche nichts (Excuse me, I dont smoke)' I replied.

He left with a murmur that I cannot withstand German winter without smoking. He went to a person nearby and asked for a cigarette.

Yesterday , when I took a train in Charlottenplatz, he was inside the train. He was overdrunk.

Today evening I had to go to the library again, So went to Charlottenplatz. Took a hot cup of coffee and walked back to Charlottenplatz train station.

He was not there.

As I stood waiting for my U-Bahn, A teenager came and asked me 'Habst du eine Cigaratte?'

I said 'Entschuldigung! Ich rauche nichts'

"Almighty" to "A mighty"

There was giant streak of lightning. After that the sky opened and there was a huge gush of water flowing from the sky. It was not like raindrops but rather like a waterfall. It was pouring as though it wanted to wash away the entire planet. But it didn't reach the ground. It vaporized on the way down. It formed a hazy layer.

Then came the Sun from behind. It was not like the one I have seen. It was so huge and had a very peculiar flaring effect on me. Someone standing near me cried loud to switch off the sun.

Somebody shouted that it has been such a bad idea by government that it decided to open the Sun cover. There were people crying to switch off the Sun.

But the officials there didn't seem to budge. "No way, we want our people to have vitamin-D. It is quintessential" is what they argued.

Last week, I caught a fellow city dweller over coffee. He said his son almost died of UV rays because government decided to switch on the sun.

"Nobody likes Sun here" he said as he left the pantry.

There was again giant waterfall from the skies, this time more damp than the earlier. I longed for breath. I then Inhaled the oxygen capsule which my wife had given last Christmas. With the orgasmic effect due to gush of oxygen, I began to think.

Sun has changed. It is after all a dying star now. Nobody thought it would bulge and become a red giant.

It had engulfed earth some centuries back. Mankind was rescued to this space-planet.

We created artificial rain, artificial everything. We made a lid over this artificial planet to close our view to Sun. We made giant light which burnt from nuclear capsules.

We wholly detest Sun and it is a demon now.

Anyways, I met my Doctor on the way back home today and told him Happy new year 80667 which is going to happen in a few atomic seconds.

After all, we are not going around any stars but we still needed new year for the party and the babes.

Mysuru Odyssey

Can I have a plate of pizza, oh I forgot... Give me drumstick sambar as topping. Well, this is Mysore (lately mysuru) for you. A mix of cultures. People saying distances in 'furlong' units, People wearing jeans and whizzing away in their unicorns. Well, I decided to taste this unique mixture on a holiday, and by coincidence it happened to be a 'holi' day as well.(28-feb-2010)

I always believe that Trains are the best mode of transport invented by mankind. Somehow nature has agreed to include this man-made thing into its coterie. I took the early morning train which leaves Bangalore at 4.50am. To underplay, it needs hundred eyes to capture the splendor that you can cherish with a window seat in a morning train. Green fields leave way to bunch of trees only to come again a few yards later. Its like seeing a soliloquy. I reached mysuru at dot 8.

Odyssey #1: The Mysore palace - Where perfection meets the grandeur

The colonial city was basking in the morning rays when I reached there. The gothic inspired arches of railway station has imperial style written on its mortar.

Just leave the railway station, you catch the Sayyaji Rao road which forms the main artery of Mysore. Dotted with colonial buildings and a typical freshness in air which is so common in Karnataka, It took a walk to city bus stand. On the side, of the road we can catch the glimpse of St.Philomenas church whose outlay makes you think that you are in Scotland.

Then we cross some squares, and then we see the Persian inspired bulbous domes of Mysore palace emerging out of thin air. The palace in itself has a rebirth.

The earlier palace used to be a column and beam structure made of wood (available in plenty in this part of Karnataka) which got razed because of kitchen fire during the marriage ceremony of one of a Wodeyar princess in 1897. (A side story here is, in the same year 1897 an outbreak of bubonic plague killed half the city`s population). The royal Mysore king took no time in deciding to reconstruct the new palace, this time more lavish and more fire-proof!

So fire-proof was the design that the Maharajah ordered to make the main pillars of the 'marriage pavilion' in cast iron!

The electricity came to Mysore in 1906, much before the palace construction was completed. So one can see those vintage fans and lifts traversing the rooms whose style is a mix of saracenic, native-indian and european. It makes no compromise with the use of ivory, teak wood and glass-works. And in every direction we see, our eyes always end up in the royal insignia (double headed hawk). Every corner is blended to perfection and it was not so difficult that I started drawing parallels with the city palace in Jaipur (another masterpiece).

The public hall for audience is huge and overlooks the grand garden. Its arches are islamic and its ceiling paintings are Victorian which carries paintings of Hindu deities. This mixture of diametrically opposite culture is quintessentially Mysore.

Here, I would take a stop to mention about the hall of private audience. Its more exquisite than anything and I am running short of adjectives to describe it.

One needs to see the palace in night on Sunday nights.. Thousands of light smile away the splendor of the palace to the night sky. Its a photographers delight. It cannot get more royal than this.

Odyssey #2: SriRanganatha swamy temple, Srirangapatna - Back to those stone henges

We read a lot of history. Many say that first millennium (1AD - 1000AD) is the most golden of the ages that India has seen. Different parts of India had this so called 'Ram Rajya' at different timelines in first millennia. But we have awfully little sculptures of these glorious days.

Some sculptures though have stood against time and conquests to tell the magnificence of those days. The origins of the Sriranganathaswamy temple in Srirangapatnam can be traced to 9th century AD and I decided to make the tryst with destiny on the dusky february evening.

The river kaveri forms an island in three different places on its course to bay of bengal.

One of them is Srirangapatna. Located 15kms from Mysore, this is one place where history puts a comma in it long narration.

So often this place has gone into the history that the present-day municipality has decided to give it a break by negligence.

As we walk inside the temple, you cannot control to connect yourself to the past. The same steps that you have taken would have been treaded by the Hoysalas and the Rashtrakutas and Vijayanagar kings. The sculptures in the pillars (of pillar & beam structure typical of pre-islamic buildings) are lord Vishnu in various poses and gives a eerie feeling which takes you to distant past.

This along with Shivasamudram and Srirangam forms a holy trinity of Ranganatha swamy where Lord Vishnu poses in a reclining posture on top giant snake after taking elixir from the sea of milk. This tri-rangam forms the core of Vaishnavite belief.

Odyssey #3: Dariya Daulat Bagh, Srirangapatna - The garden of sea of wealth

War is the catalyst for change in history of a nation. The history takes a U-turn in such episodes and brings forth tremendous human characters and their bravery. A fitting example for this is Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan. Their arsenal and men matched the finesse and discipline of British. Even the great French Napoleon (after conquering egypt) dreamt of having an alliance with Tipoo sahib to uproot British from Indian Soil.

"Having occupied and fortified Egypt, we shall send a force of 15,000 men from Suez to India, to join the forces of Tipu-Sahib and drive away the English" Writes a French diplomat from Napoleon times.

The mighty soldiers of Tipu won three main battles against East India company. In the fourth mysore war, the Tipu`s soldiers were outnumbered by Company troops which now included forces from Nizam of hyderabad and Marathas.

Yet, Tipu provided a stiff resistance before falling. The defeat of Tipu in fourth mysore war (called as battle of seringapatnam by British) is one of the major events, along with victory of company-men in Battles of plassey and Buxar, which marks the beginning of company rule in India.

The Tipu sultans summer palace (Dariya Daulat Bagh, now a museum) has a lot of this scenes captured in pictures drawn by the company artist Hickey. The murals in the walls of palace depicts the victory of Tipu over red-uniformed company men.

One thing to notice here is that, Tipu is always depicted in paintings smelling a rose flower which is typically mughal style.

A few kos from the palace is this place called 'Gumbuz' which is mausoleum built by Tipu for his father Hyder Ali. The company soldiers later cremated Tipu too in the same place.

As I told in the beginning of this odyssey, so many times war acts as a catalyst. It creates heroes.

It defies future. The battle of Seringapatnam will surely be remembered for the bravery of Tipu and his men.

On the Gumbuz (on the eastern corner of srirangapatna) now connected by a single town bus which always runs 1/2 hr late, lies the tomb of the person who as a scientist pioneered rocket science and as a scholar wrote poem and basically as a soldier thrusted his sword and made company`s uniform more red. This is Sultan Fateh Ali Tippu (Tipu Sultan) for you.

For more information on how to travel to this places, Please do leave a comment.