A la Wonderla...

I got up at 9:30AM. It was some day in the middle of the week; but I could not readily figure out whether it was Wednesday or Thursday. It is usually difficult to distinguish between Wednesdays and Thursdays; you know that it has been quite some time since the weekend but you don't recall how many days. After all, a routine day at office is as good (or as bad) as another. I was feeling the dizzyness from waking at this untimely hour.Moreover, my right eye was sore due to some reason. The only bright side was that now I had the time to go downstairs and have a cup of tea and then read the newspaper before leaving for office.

Within an hour and a half, I was on my way to office. The April sun was getting oppressive. The mercury seemed to be headed north day after day. I was pleased to find an auto right away. It was the kind of start to a day that makes one feel cheerful. But that was not to last too long. The auto driver tried to act too smart and broke lanes at a traffic signal only to result in utter chaos and a traffic jam both ways. So many vehicles were idling away due to one stupid move from an auto driver and we were not only burning so much of fossil fuel but also pumping out so much of those gases which would push the mercury still further. Moreover, just wonder the number of people-hours lost in the jam. And this was just one road in one of the cities of India. I remembered that quote from the most intelligent person of the last century: Two things are infinite; the universe and human stupidity and I am not sure about the former.

I reached office and it was BAU (Business As Usual). People checking mails and news and other general stuff on the net. Some of them discussing complex things (matters of consequence may be). Soon it was lunch time and I and Kadam met Ramkumar downstairs. The other people around were ZOD, Prady and Pramod. (A more detailed description of the people involved in this blog will appear sometime later in a separate post.) It was then that the idea of making a trip to Wonderla came up and we all jumped on it. Pramod showered heaps of praise on it but then backed off saying he had been there just a week ago (that f*cker!) . But the decision had been made. We were off to Wonderla on the weekend. We got further recruits in Kamesh and Nikesh.

Now was the crucial part. We were supposed to meet at office on Saturday at 9AM. The best I managed to wake up was 9:15AM and found several missed calls on my cell. Thanks to Prady and his Apache, I managed to reach the rendezvous point at 9:45AM. ZOD was seething with anger and the moment we arrived, we were greeted with a live Howler from ZOD. However, the problem is that when ZOD gets angry, you just can't stop laughing. This angers him still further and the chain reaction continues and finally ending with ZOD heaving deep breaths and shifting his weight from one foot to another (You have got to see that to enjoy it!).

Soon we were on our way to Wonderla and cruising at a brisk speed (normally unreachable on city roads) and after one brief pitstop to get fuel, we reached Wonderla around 11AM. The first impression was very good and I knew it would be memorable being here. Rather than waste a few thousand words, here is the first impression.. The refreshing breeze is quite evident isn't it?

After shelling out Rs. 540 per head and also with the natural beauty around, it was a very pleasant start. There were too many rides to enjoy and time was short. So we began with the most thrilling ones!

The first ride was Maverick. A very innocent looking one at the outset but multiple 360 deg turns in quick succession followed by weird turns at 45 deg from the ground had our heads spinning. And the unfortunate part was six of us went together whereas Nikesh went in the next round. The poor fella was so scared that he was just holding his head with eyes shut and the terror kept him from coming to many other rides later.

The next to follow was Insanity and it was pairs of people randomly arranged at different positions and then it starts turning insanely in all directions at high speeds. The background music of Du Hast Mich (Rammstein) added to the atmo and it was thoroughly enjoyable. We had another round of this insane stuff and it was awesome. In fact I would term it LEGENDARY! :P

Next followed the Pirate Ship (Total bachcha stuff but we took the pleasure of screaming nonetheless), a bit of rope climbing, Vertical Fall (thought it would be very exciting but not quite compared to earlier rides; we could have a good top view of the entire place though!) and a few others (I don't recall all the names!). We were all damn hungry and all the turning and spinning had churned our stomachs. We relished some manchurian stuff, fried rice and sandwiches sitting near the water pools. And then it was time to chill out in the water during the afternoon. Some pics to give a feel of the relaxed mood. (Lo! I saved another couple of thousand words!)

The next item on the agenda were the hourly waves in the waterpool that rose upto a few metres and one had to jump up at the exact point of arrival of the crest to stay over the water. Initially, I was not able to get the timing accurate and frequently ended up being submerged in water (I am no swimmer!) The thrill of being in water and enjoying the waves was too much to resist and soon, I had improved my timing and managed to stay afloat (well, most of the times!)

As the waves were about to end after 15 min of total masti, I found that things around me were appearing blur. I thought that it was the effect of the water on my eyes till suddenly it dawned on me! My glasses were not where they should be! We were all on the mission glassesfinder and I even crossed some barriers I was not supposed to cross! Just in search of my glasses! This got the helpers around frantic and they angrily advised me to go back behind the LoC. (I had accidently entered the all-female part of the pool :P) The helper guy promptly brought forward a fishing net and got my glasses out. How nice to have a clear vision again! Albeit with a few scratches.. But I was not the only one whose glasses were damaged. The ZOD had lost his glasses too and he sent nbd waves in the pool after the regular waves. He found them later too but they were broken and no longer usable. This was yet another proof that the universe had conspired against ZOD (when my glasses just had a few scratches, why should it be that his were totally unusable?) Unfair-e-yaar!!

The late afternoon was marked by awesome water slides. The twists and turns on these slides were einfach klase! The sinuous tunnels which wound their way down from the third floor like huge serpents swallowing you down their winding bodies until you saw light after maybe 30 seconds (but which seemed like hours!) The water slides were so numerous that we lost count of the number of times we made our way up and down the stairs enjoying every bit of it. But the climax of them all were the near vertical fall (at an angle of 70 deg to the ground). You could see the setting sun as you made your way from a height of three floors to the pool below. The impact on ur back when u reach the base leaves you stunned to say the least. It was a once in a lifetime experience (at least the life so far!).

It was evening time and we had a few snacks before changing into dry clothes. We had a few more rides to go to.. But the most thrilling of them was the Hurricane.. Moving and twisting at slower speeds is actually more painful than the speed of Insanity. And the sudden gear changes were too much. And even my seat belt came kinda loose in the middle of that! The last ride that we could get after this was the Great Giant wheel whose base itself was some 15 storeys above the ground. The view around was beautiful and it's slothful movement was very soothing.

The return journey took us a bit longer and we ended the day with some delicious Hyderabadi Biryani. All in all, one of the more pleasant and memorable days in Bangalore. And more importantly, I enjoyed some rides which I would have been terrified to experience earlier. I was especially afraid earlier of those tunnel slides and the hurricane ride (from Essel World and Water Kingdom experience). But now there would be no fear... just lingering memories of the times when i conquered my fears.

Look straight at your fear,

And into thin air will it disappear!

The Little Master

Note: Though I had started writing this poem the day when India lost to Sri Lanka; but somehow I have only managed to complete this one exactly one month later on the 34th birthday of the Little Master.

At that tender age of sixteen,
Oh! How young and charming he had been!

The youngest one on the international stage
Who would take him seriously, given his age?

Facing the likes of Wasim and Waqar,
Everyone thought he would never get far.

Hit on his head by a nasty one,
You would expect fear in his eyes but there was none.

Eight men waiting round his bat,
They mistook him for a kid to be mocked at!

Those who saw him play that determined knock,
Knew that he was one of his stock.

He instilled fear in every bowling attack,
None could dare to rest till they saw his back.

Mesmerizing the audience with his majestic strokes,
He was the darling of all cricket-loving folks.

For all these years on the international scene,
He has been the backbone of the Indian Team.

Betting on the opposition would be a risky affair
Specially if the beloved Sachin is out there.

For over a decade and a half he carried a billion hopes,
The ball seemed in a hurry to fly past the ropes!

In recent times we saw his glory wane,
And more too often India has lost the game.

They say that Sachin is a past legend,
But I believe that the journey is still too early to end.

Soon again Sachin will be back to form,
And then no one would dare say that he does not perform.

Soon yet again when he will set the stands ablaze,
The nation will be gripped by a renewed cricketing craze.

India may have crashed out of World Cup two thousand and seven,
But with Sachin around we still nurture the dream of 2-O-eleven!!

Some quotations on our beloved Sachin:

“You might pitch a ball on the off stump and think you have bowled a good ball and he walks across and hits it for two behind midwicket. His bat looks so heavy but he just waves it around like it's a toothpick.”
– Brett Lee, on Sachin Tendulkar’s batting.

“Beneath the helmet, under that unruly curly hair, inside the cranium, there is something we don't know, something beyond scientific measure. Something that allows him to soar, to roam a territory of sport that, forget us, even those who are gifted enough to play alongside him cannot even fathom. When he goes out to bat, people switch on their television sets and switch off their lives”. (Waiting for that moment again!)

The Little Prince

Well.. the book blog series continues! And this time I am writing about a book that, at least superficially, is a book meant for children. But it makes some deeply inspiring philosophical points about life which make it a very enjoyable read.

To add a historical perspective (Courtesy: Wikipedia), The Little Prince was written by Antoine De Saint-Exupery as the French Version, Le Petit Prince, in 1943. The author was a French aviator and mysteriously disappeared during the Second world war. [It is supposed that his plane had crashed into the Mediterranean during the war but there have been speculations that this could have been motivated by a suicidal intent.]

Coming back to the book, it distinguishes the interpretation of life from the point of view of children and grown-ups. Apart from the difference of age that is apparent in these two points of view, the children's point of view is the one which is centred on emotional perceptions (driven by feelings) rather than on the material perceptions (driven by what one can observe and measure) of the grown-ups. The latter point of view is the more objective and logical point of view as accepted by many adults but which unfortunately is heavily centred on prejudices. The children's viewpoint is expressed through the experiences of the author as a child and through those of the little prince as he travels across the different planets.

Being a very small book that can be easily read within one hour, I would rather not go into describing the incidents or characters in the book but rather mention a few striking sentences verbatim from the book. [Read the book yourself when you have an hour to spare.]

1. Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them. Children should always show great forbearance towards grown up people.
Here grown-ups need not necessarily be adults and children need not necessarily be less than thirteen years of age. Rather, a grown-up is someone who has collected a set of experiences in his life and tends to look at the world only through the lens of this experience. Thus he is a captive of his own prejudices and utterly incapable of comprehending a point of view other than his own. In contrast, a child is free from such prejudices. Grownups cannot appreciate abstract ideas such as love, beauty and friendship and would consider someone talking about golf, politics and neckties as a sensible person!

2. Where I live, everything is very small. Straight ahead of him nobody can go very far.
These words were said by the little prince after the author gifted him the drawing of a sheep in an opaque box and the prince was concerned whether the sheep would need a lot of grass to live on! The second sentence just says that one cannot progress too far by just trying to move straight ahead. To experience the richness of life, it is necessary to look around oneself rather than indulging in plans to move straight ahead.

3. I have serious reason to believe that the planet from which the little prince came is the asteroid known as B-612.
A sarcastic comment that tries to throw light on how we spend time paying attention to unnecessary details in life and how an argument based in numbers (reliable or not) tends to command serious attention. Also many a times, our acceptance of an idea stems from how we feel about the person presenting that idea rather than on the merits of the idea itself (The Turkish astronomer example in the book).

4.If you were to say to the grown-ups, "I saw a beautiful house made of rosy bricks, with geraniums in the windows and doves on the roof", they would not be able to get any idea of the house at all. You would have to say to them, "I saw a house that cost $20,000." And they would exclaim, "Oh! What a pretty house that is!"
Something that exposes the ridiculous obsession of people towards figures and statistics. Just as an aside, when I say to people that Tendulkar is a very good cricketer, they refute by saying, "No. He is unnecessarily overrated. Just tell me how many wins he has secured for India?" But I am not free from this obsession either. More often than not I end up saying, "But he has scored the maximum runs in international cricket and also the most number of centuries." Probably the rational thought is too heavily dependent on numbers.

5. Children, watch out for the baobabs!
The baobabs here represent nothing but the bad thoughts that take root in our mind gradually and if un-attended, may grow into rigid thoughts and prejudices which would deprive us of the ability to look at life as it is. The baobabs are very similar to the roses (good thoughts) when they are young and so it takes a discerning and alert mind to spot the differnce.

6. It is such a secret place, the land of tears.
The above line comes when the author finds himself helpless to console the Little Prince who is driven to tears by the author's indifference towards the safety of his flower.

7. "The fact is that I did not know how to understand anything. I ought to have judged by deeds and not by words.She cast her fragrance and radiance over me. I ought never to have run away from her. I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent. But I was too young to know how to love her."
Coming in the form of the little prince's mulling over his experience with his flower, it is a subtle reminder of how we should not try to interpret too much from the external behaviour of the flowers, especially in a relationship.

8. "What a queer planet! It is altogether dry and altogether pointed and altogether harsh and altogether forbidding. And people here have no imagination. They repeat whatever one says to them. On my planet, I had a flower. She was always the first one to speak."
These innocent thoughts of the prince after hearing the echoes from the mountains on earth very subtly ridicule the social structure that exists here, where people are forever engaged in behaving in a manner that pleases others around them and expect the same from others.

9. One only understands the things that one tames. It is an act too often neglected. It means to establish ties.
The fox says these words and goes on to explain what it means to tame someone. It is this act of taming that makes someone special and different from rest of the world. More details about this in the book. :-)

10. And finally my favorite quote, "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly. What is essential is invisible to the eye."
This is the secret that the fox shares with the little prince at the time of the latter's departure. It's beauty will be evident after thinking it over again and again.

Apart from these top 10, there are numerous other simple thoughts scattered throughout the book. Specially the experience of the prince on each of the six planets (or asteroids) before he comes to earth. But I will leave you to explore these by reading the book yourself.:-)

And now, I think it is time to put a full stop to this blog post which has already out-grown its size. But when I sit down to write blogs on topics like this one or the Fountainhead, I simply cannot stop the flow. Finally, a word of appreciation for those readers who had the patience to read through these mostly unorganized thoughts that never allow my mind to remain unoccupied. And there will be a lot more writings here in the days to come.