Tata Nano

10th December 1130 IST.
Something happened at this moment. Well truly speaking each and every moment is unique and has its own significance. But on this very moment, something really out of world happened. Tata Motors presented its most ambitious project to the world. TATA NANO -The first car in the world to be brought into market for Rs.100000/- or 2500$. No one had ever thought that this wonderful 4 wheeler invention will be available at such an affordable cost.
Man! That's really something to think about. A person who never thought that he can afford a car is made to think twice, thrice.... I dont know how many times. Suddenly, the real driver of the India's ever up surging economy --the Middle Class thinks that it can afford a car. And that too without compromising on its lifestyle at all. The car is now available for a college student, a housewife, an elderly person, a family whose annual income is just 2 Lac per annum with the help of car loans. And that too at so low cost. Is this car bent on to change the view of how the whole world will look at the cars from now on?

As this will be the cheapest production car in world, it has created a buzz in the Automobile Industry (at a very large scale in India and worth mentioning scale all over world). All Aotu-Cos especially in India are analyzing the gravity of impact they will be suffering (They will be for sure). Will they enter into this micro-mini car segment or drop the prices of their existing lower end models. May be they have some time as Tata wont be rolling out the first car till Diwali. So we still have 9-10 months to see what are the tactics of other companies. It will be a really interesting episode in history of Indian Automobiles.
Will it follow the footsteps of the Telecommunication Industry where,
-Once a Nokia 3310 with minimal features was priced at 5000 Rs. and now a mobile with even more features comes at less than 1000 bucks(of course no mobile can beat 3310 when it comes to sturdiness).
-Once incoming was charges 1 Rs/ Min and outgoing as 3 Rs/Min for a local call and today forget about incoming, the telecom service providers provide the outgoing at mere 10p/min.

Only time will tell!!!!!

But one thing is for sure, consumers are gonna be the ones having the broadest smile on their faces.

Ride to Mysore

Well this one was my first ride. Till now I had never travelled more than 150 km on my Caliber Croma at a stretch. It has almost been 5.5 years now. So before persuading my passion I just wanted to test the endurance of my bike as well as myself. I chose the day as Saturday(obviously) 21st Dec 07 for the first long ride in my life. Mysore is just approx. 150 km from Bangalore.
Saturday morning I made a quick dash to office as had to complete some urgent work. I was done by 1000. I had a nice heavy breakfast of bread-omelet and juice. I started at 1030 from my office at Electronics City. Filled up the petrol worth 400 bucks which was enough for my bike. As soon as I reached Silk Board, the traffic was as usual horrific at its best. Some cynical feeling creeped into my mind. But I was going to do this time around. It took me almost 1 hour to hit the Mysore Road. If you are starting a long journey, start before dawn so that city traffic wont spoil the beginning for your journey. Anyways as soon as I hit the highway, I could feel the difference. No more toggling of the gears. I just put in on 4th(unfortunately that is the top gear on my bike) and zoomed ahead. I knew that my bike wont be able to withstand high speeds for a long time. So I decided to play it between 60-70 /hr. I just looked at my watch it was about 1145. Milo read Mysore as 125km. When I was travelling I encountered quite a beautiful views on the way. A series of small mountains was accompanying me for quite some time. I just stopped for a break and then I realized that I have missed out my Camera. SHAME ON ME! I forgot such a vital thing. As I already had quite a heavy breakfast before leaving, I didnt stop on the roadside dhaba. But just I was midway between Bangalore-Mysore, I saw a coconut-water guy. Immediately I stopped. Had good two coconuts full of water. That's the beauty of SOuth India, you can get rehydrate anytime, anywhere with this wonderful source. That was enough for me to get going till Mysore.
On the way I saw a group of bikers on their ZMAs, Pulsars and all. They just zoomed past me. I was helpless. Anyways soon I would be having one of those. I gave myself some consolation and moved on. The road was just awesome and I reached Mandya in no time. I saw the clock and it was 1300. Mysore was still 60km away. Well almost 65 km in 75 mins. It was OK. I had a small break there as I am not used to such long rides and I already started having some butt-ache. I headed towards Mysore. Just as Mysore was aout 25 km, there was one big procession and one side of State highway was blocked. Suddenly my speedo dropped from 70s to 20s.. It was blocked for almost 1 km and took about 5mins. Whoa!!! Again I hit on accelerator and reached mysore within half an hour. The time was about 1415. Now the big question? Should I head back or go somewhere in Mysore???? I decided to visit my office campus in Mysore. Well 2 years ago, I had my training there and just wanted to reminisce those old days. Got the directions for the campus in no time. It was about 8 km from where I was. Reached there within 10 mins. The time was 1430. I decided to have a glass of juice at my favorite swimming pool-side juice center. Had a nice Pineapple juice. Took a small walk around campus and decided to head back as I was running out of time.(?????) (Just wanted to get back before evening as had a party with some friends at 1930)
Started at 1515. This time I wanted to travel non-stop for 1 hour. As soon as I left Mysore, again encountered the procession. This time I had to take the wrong way as my lane was closed. I dropped the idea for non-stop 1 hour in this part of ride. Kept on continuing till I encountered the Hotel Amravathi just before Mandya. When I was in Mysore, every time I used to travel to Bangalore, the KSRTC bus would stop at this restaurant and I loved the Curd Rice there. Immediately I stopped and had one Curd Rice and a Idli-Wada (Actually I wanted a Dosa, but it was not available in afternoon and I had really heavy breakfast for a full-fledged South Indian meal)
After that I decided to have the non -stop ride till Bangalore almost 90 km away. At 1615 I started from Hotel Amravathi. Again ZMAs, Pulsars, TBs were zooming past me. And not to forget the super fast Lancers and Mercs. Volvo buses were giving them a tight fight. I kept on continuing at my pace but I gradually saw it increasing to 80s. I didn't worry as Bangalore was approaching near. Almost at 1700 I was not able to take it anymore and I had to stop. My bike's sitting position is a bit awkward which led to the strain on my shoulders. Took rest for about 5-10 mins and headed back towards the Silicon city of India and reached by 1745.As soon as I entered Bangalore, I was greeted by enormous traffic jam. Finally managed to reach home by 1900 as the Saturday evening traffic was really very bad.
Well the trip was quite event less but I really enjoyed the ride. Surely will be having many more in the times to come. In all a very satisfying day for me..
Statistics:-
Distance :- 350 kms
Route :- Bangalore - Mandya - Mysore - Mandya - Bangalore

Blackbird

So finally after long wait of two and half months, I got to lay hands on the new Alter Bridge album Blackbird. The album was released in US in October. As this band is not much famous in India, it took two months for the album to come in India. Well truly saying, the wait was really worth something. It is a modern album having a feel of traditional rock. Even the lyrics are so motivating. The whole album screams out the message "Move on. This is your life. Live it."

I read its reviews on net and likewise wasnt let down by the album. I really dont know why people dont appreciate good music. The guitar riffs, solos, bass riffs and also drums are amazing in this album. Even the lyrics do stand out. Specially the title song Blackbird which was written as a dedication to the Myles'(vocalist) friend who passed away during the course of the album. It is really an awesome dedication to someone who passed away.
But I was really dissppointed that the way the album fared in market. Anyways as Mark Tremonti(lead guitarist) has said, they make the music only for thier fans. So here it is, an album made perfectly for the fans who love the band from the bottom of thier hearts. And I am surely one of them.

I know the band Alter Bridge. since 2005 when I happened to hear their first single "Open Your Eyes". But then I had a premonition that its just Creed with a new vocalist as it contained three former Creed musicians and a new vocalist. Then over the course, when I used to hear Creed songs, I liked the way Mark played guitar. But I always felt that he could play much more heavier than he used to play in Creed. I always felt something was stopping him. That's when I decided to re-hear the Alter Bridge closely. And to my joy, that was the music which I wanted to hear all along. Only two more bands were able to do this for me till now - Oasis and Iron Maiden(Gods of Heavy Metal). And from then there was no looking back. i immediately ordered for the first Alter Bridge album One Dy Remains. People ask me why do you waste 400/- on some stupid Audio CD. They really dont understand the real love for Music I can say. Anyways, that album was the one which rekindled my interest in modern rock(after Linkin Park). And I was waiting for the next album to be released very soon.

For me Alter Bridge a truly genuine band with a wealth of talent hidden within those 4 amazing musicians. Even if the band doesnt receive any awards or certifications, it will remain one of my most favourite bands of all time.

Kudremukh trek

24th November 2007
It was Pushkar and me again. Yeah the two Pushkar Patils were again on the way for a new adventure. (Let me clear, my room mate’s name is also Pushkar Patil. Strange na….) After Gokarna and Pondicherry, Chickmagaluru was our next destination. We boarded the bus from Bangalore at 2300. Reached Chickmagaluru early in morning at 0430. Wondering what could we do? We had come there as usual without any plans or preparations. We loved it much more. Just to go out without plans and then everything falls into place as the time moves on. We had heard that some Kudremukh peak is really a thing you should see if you visit Chickamagaluru.We headed for Kudremukh. Got the first bus for the place from where we could get a bus to Kudremukh. Sadly as both of us were Marathi and conductor was a Kannada, so a big misunderstanding was creates between us. We told him the station where we wanted to go and he heard something different because of some mis-pronunciation from my side and also it was one hell of a bus. Each and every seat of that bus was sounding in unison and the windows were just adding to the chaos. He gave us the ticket to some other station and when that other station came, he asked us to get down. Once we got down and we enquired about Kudremukh. Thankfully the babu there was well conversant in Hindi. He told us that we had got down at wrong station. But he guided us the right path and we took the next bus to Mathikere from where we were supposed to catch the bus to Kudremukh. After getting down there we had nice hot idli and some tea. At 0700, the bus started for Kudremukh. It was damn chilly as winter was already on. The drive was uphill for almost 2.5 hrs. We enjoyed the scenic beauty. On the way, we encountered many tiny villages where some students were boarding a bus. We were spell bounded by the beauty on the way but for all the school children it was a daily routine (Just like Hosur Road for all the Electronics City guys in Bangalore or NH4 bypass for the Hinjewadi people in Pune ). I supposed that there was only one school for so many villages. After sometime, we arrived at the school town(I don’t remember the name of the town). All the school children go down and the bus was again empty. Finally we reached Kudremukh at 0930.
Now we knew that we had to get some forest officer permission before we ventured into the jungles/mountains of Kudremukh. We got the forest office in no time and were glad to find a group of 7 guys just like us(You got it right, they were all software engineers from Bangalore). 2 among them were Kannada, so our interfacing problem from there on was resolved. The forest officer gave a common guide to all 9 of us and thus we set out for the trekking base. We had to book some a jeep to climb uphill for some part of hill. The rest was to be covered by foot. The jeep was old styled Mahindra. I was surprised to find that the jeep had only 3 gears and no wind shield. It was quite a unusual difference. I understood the difference as soon as we started. The climb was so steep and the road so bad that forget about 4th, the vehicle never reached the 3rd gear. I think they must have found it pretty weird to design a 2 gear gear-box, so they just kept a third one just for the sake of keeping it. Anyways, at last we reached the base of summit from where the jeep could take us no further.It was 1130 when we started the trek. By now we both had acquainted ourselves with all the other 7 guys. They seemed to be kind of regular trekkers and one among them seemed to be an avid photographer. He had some mind blowing camera lenses which could zoom upto I don’t know how much x. He also had those camera tripod and all stuff. He really seemed to be passionate for photography. I had a simple(????) digital camera with me. And I was satisfied with it. I am not a good photographer either. We set off for our memorable trek. The guide was a young man. Must be in his middle 20s. He immediately glued with us all.


On the way..............
He said that the normally trekking should start by 0600 in morning, reach the top by 1200 and after spending 1 hour at top, one should come down. He told us that it was about 12-13 km uphill. Hearing that we were stunned for a while. We were already late. We looked at our destination. Faraway, the peak was resting in peace waiting for us to ascend it. The guide told us that we have to hurry up and climb the peak before 1500 so that we can be back before dusk. We started the trek with great enthusiasm. Some time after start. You can see the peak farthest at left.

We were really not worried about the distance, we were just too much pumped up to see what lay ahead for us. For almost 1.5 hours, the trek was fine with no steep uphills and we were enjoying ourselves to heart’s content taking snaps wherever we could find. It felt so good to watch the greenery all around you. No sign of human life was visible. As far as we could lay our sights, only there were beautiful mountains perched between each other. I looked at our destination, it lay ahead beyond some 2 hills. The guide asked us to have the lunch at 0100, as the path ahead was going to be somewhat difficult.

After one hour of walking, still the peak didnt seem to be close.

I didn’t knew how difficult, but I thought that the rate at which we are going, we would definitely make to the top by 1500. But I was wrong.After lunch, we continued our march towards the peak. And that was when we saw the first steep climb. Just after looking at that, we came to know what lay ahead for us. Suddenly the cliff seems farther. We managed to cross this climb and then we were at the top of some small hill. But the top peak seemed to be at same distance as it were sometime back. Panting, I asked the guide, how many such climbs. He smiled and said 3 more to go. And then started the real trekking. A decapitated house on the way. Sole thing in whole path showing some kind of human life. Although it was empty.

At about 1430, we were still faraway. The unexpected physical exertion was taking a toll on some of the guys and we could see a difference of almost 1 km between the first and last. The breaks became frequent and duration started to increase. Often we used to gasp for air. But one of the best thing to happen was that we had a stream of fresh water running all along the way. So we were never short of water. The water was really sweet and chilly. It just used to refresh us. At one such break at the stream side, one of the guys removed his shoes and to his horror, he found it all smeared with blood. Leech Attack!!!!. All of us checked our shoes, to check who all had done the social service of feeding the leeches. Thankfully I wasn’t the one. I had one leach being stuck in my shoe lace knot. After bit of cleaning up, we continued forward. At last we ascended the last steep climb.

Destination just in sight....

We were now almost just a km away from peak and it was almost a plateau with again a small steep climb near the top. Well nothing comes for easy man, I thought to myself, whether getting a job or a girlfriend or climbing this peak. I don’t know why I could find a similarity between all this stuff. Maybe climbing the mountains also raises your philosophical / spiritual levels. Maybe that’s why all the great sages and saints, the ones which we used to hear about in Ramayana or Mahabharata, always used to go to some mountain for their penance. And that was why we need to climb treacherous climbs like Badrinath, Kedarnath, etc.. for all that Bhagwan ke Darshan. Well this one is just off topic, so I will leave it here.

Anyways, I wasn’t going for any penance there. I just wanted to climb this peak. As soon as the peak same closer, our speed increased. Finally it was only me and Pushkar ahead. Even the guide had started taking frequent stops. We had lost our physical endurance long back. It was only the longing/will to climb that peak, which had dragged us on. I don’t even walk 2 kms daily and here I was climbing 12 km hastily when I knew that I have to go back the same distance downhill. So finally at 1545, we made it to the peak. At the Zenith. the cloud level can be seen.

The view from the top was just awesome. We were already above clouds. As far as we could lay our sights on was just green all around us. The others followed. Some sooner others later. I think the last one came almost 20 mins after we reached. The peak was about 1880m above see level. I just laughed at myself saying that just multiply it by 4.5 and it becomes Mount Everest. We kept on snapping the marvelous piece of nature and munching some stuff which was remaining after our lunch. We just wanted to lay down flat on the ground and not move. All of us were dead tired and everyone knew that. But anyways, we had to get down at least half way before dusk or it would be a problem as there were a couple of small jungles which we had to cross on the way back.

At the top...

We started downhill at 1630. It was getting chilly very fast. The sun had started to set down as it was winter and we were at height as well. The descend was tiresome and difficult as descending any peak is. It always takes the better of your knees. We slipped a lot.... first because of the steep slope and afterwards because the dew seeting in made the ground and grass slippery. We managed to reach half way down before 1800. The light had became indeed low. We had crossed two forests and only one was remaining. Just then we saw a Bison. Took some snaps although everyone was tired. Well we cam into a forest and never saw a wild animal…(kind off funny). But we never went there to see wild animals. At 1830, the last ray of sun had gone and ray of lone torch that we had among 9 of us came out. But the guide was an experienced one. He knew that road like the back of his hand. But just then we haw the moon rising up the horizon and to our astonishment, it was a full moon. We thanked our stars and were happy. The guide just mocked at us saying that all the wild animals always come out when it is full moon. We just laughed off his comments. But what if……??

We had the last patch of jungle behind us by 1930. We were so much tired and weary that we had become numb of walking. We jut were searching for the sight of the blue jeep which was waiting for us at the foot hills to take us to our bus. At 2000 finally we reached the base. So finally after an arduous up-down walk of almost 25 km, we finally were relived to see the jeep. We climbed into it with the same desperateness as a thirsty man stranded in the middle of desert will show when he sights an oasis. The whole day was a memorable one indeed. Well now the spiritual/philosophical feeling was lost and nowhere in sight and we longed for some good food and good sleep of course. We just checked into some XYZ hotel in next town and had some good food over there. Then as soon as we returned to our room, we slept of almost instantaneously. So it was a fitting end for a memorable day.