Reckonings & Reminiscences

Just another weekday. Rohith started for office, like always, at 9:20AM. It takes approximately 25 mins for him to reach Sagar Society, Banjara Hills from Hafeezpet (near Miyapur) and today is no different.

9:37AM

He reaches Jubilee Hills check post and is wondering how come those two mini trucks, which are 10 to 12 cars ahead of him, are allowed in to the city in office hours.

9:39AM

Green signal and everyone started.

9:40AM

The ride on Banjara Hills road no.2 is always a smooth one. Every vehicle maintains a steady speed of about 40-50kmph (except when BMWs and Audis enter the picture). He is in front of the Maruti Showroom when he felt the sudden change of wind which is now blowing against his direction of motion. And within seconds, one of the plastic rooftops that are placed on top of one of the aforementioned mini trucks (which is about 4 car lengths ahead but with no cars in between) flies into the air.

It lands on its shorter edge and stands like a big wall in front of him while his brakes are working hard to slow down his bike in order to give him some time to think. In these situations, simply staying where you are is also not a good option.

Rohith and some fellow bikers change lanes swiftly, missing the sheet by a couple of feet,  just to realize that they have successfully escaped the first one. Still, the truck driver is unaware that he is launching plastic missiles on to those poor souls behind him. The second sheet is more furious than the first one but lands at a safer distance from Rohith.

9:41AM

The truck stopped, not because of the realization of the driver about the littering he has done till now, but because of the traffic signal near the entrance of KBR Park.

9:45AM

He reached his office. Safe and Sound

PS: My first post from Office

After writing a post on BatchTrip 2007, I realised it was much too technical and boring (which wasn’t posted). So, I decided I should not involve in the ground works of the next in order to have some memorable moments.

This trip is, indeed, entertaining right from the word go. As I said, I didn’t want to take the initiative for this one and was waiting for Sundeep to take it. He, as always, eventually took and started discussions on where to go. There were so many (casual) arguments in our batch. And for the first time after 3rd sem(Monsoon 2005), we had elections: to decide where to go .

‘Shimla, Kulu and Manali’ was the choice. From this point onwards, I had no idea what was happening except monetary matters . Because of tiny staff force of the institute, any additional work like railway concession forms for the batchtrips etc will be seen as burden. So Sundeep and I took turns in filling the concession forms and getting them signed by the concerned authorities . The bigger problem of all: finding ‘two’ staff/faculty members to escort us. With great difficulty I could manage to find them.

Day -1: April 3^rd 2008

Less than 24hrs for departure. Last minute brain storming on what we might have forgotten, final checks with tourism department, final warnings to those who are coming and reminders to the escorts. With one escort out of the equation because of work load the day before, the shocking message from the another that “he can’t come” left me trembling. I immediately called Dr. Mitra (SLC chair), to find out what to do. First words from the other side were expected, “How can we allow this?”. I didn’t speak a word after that because I know that he understood the situation and waited for the silence, over the phone, to break. “Let me talk to those escorts and will let you know.” After a few minutes he called and gave permission to go.

For most of us, this will be the last day on campus which resulted in a sleepless night

Day 0: April 4^th 2008

As most of us didn’t sleep, it became easy for us to catch the early morning AP Express. Seats/Berths allocation was done quickly to my surprise and the long journey north began. Train journeys are always awesome if you are with friends and this one wass no different.

Day 1: April 5^th 2008

Arrived at New Delhi Railway Station at around 9AM. The plan was to freshen up and visit local places and an overnight journey to Shimla. Everyone were ready by 1PM. There we saw one of the most ridiculous traffic jams: because of parked vehicles kabjaaing more than half the road and acting as if it was their right to park there. So we have to get into buses quickly in order to relieve the congestion near that junction. Our gang quickly boarded the third bus to get good seats .

Later that evening, we went to Aksharadam temple. The architecture is magnificent. Finally!! I went to a temple where there was some silence. There was still a problem for us to solve: rearranging people into buses so that none of the groups are separated. As the discussions failed, we started again with more or less the same seating arrangements .

My picture of what a daabha was was based on the daabhas shown in ‘telugu’ movies with characters of sikh drivers who speak ‘naaki neeki’ telugu. And they(daabhas) sucked big time. Contrary to that picture, the daabhas we dined that night were really good. They were hygienic, parathas were delicious and curries great. No wonder those drivers have such huge bellies .

Day 2: April 6^th 2008

At 3AM. We stopped at around a km from kalka station. Its damn cold outside and it started to rain. That experience was awesome. The drivers took a break till 7AM because of poor visibility due to rain. It was amazing how they built a town on the slopes of a valley. By noon, we checked into our hotel rooms in Shimla and relaxed. Our room(being in the top floor) overlooked the entire valley . Early that evening, some of us started our toy train ride to the “famous” Taradevi temple station.

After burger lunch, we(our gang) started our unplanned trek to the Taradevi temple which was supposed to be ‘just’ a 20 min walk from the station according to yaso (who found this information from a local guy in hindi). This trek showed how frustrating can kirthi, samba and especially ling get. The unplanned trek took us 90 mins through jungles of that mountain. Pondy wept, literally. But the view from the top was excellent (though the above mentioned names deny this ) Most of the peaks were below our line of sight parallel to the ground

Later that night, visited mall road but didn’t pay much attention.

Day 3: April 7^th 2008

Need to vacate the rooms by noon and go to kufri. So had a quick visit to mall road again. Had some good time pass and reached hotel to check out. By the time I came to the bus, sundeep told me “Daka, as the girls in your bus came early and your bus was not ready. I asked them to get in the other bus so make sure that everyone in your bus get into this other bus.” Immediately, I screamed (in mind) “Shit!!” and looked at the ‘other’ bus. As expected, the girls have occupied the good seats. x(  I gave a warning to them (not that they care but still we tend to give such warning right?) and went to put my luggage in the boot of the bus. The cleaner told me “sir! you have to get down from the bus because it is very risky to reverse the bus with people inside as it was on very steep inclined road.” (I don’t know why it was risky so don’t ask me) As everyone have to get down anyway, I decided to have a little verbal fight with them to while away my time in the hope that more will join me in eliminating this kabjaism. But none joined Everyone left the dirty work to me. But by the time every bus was ready, fight became serious and everyone kept quiet in order not to prolong that stupid discussion.

To reach kufri, we need to go on mules as the route was treacherous. First experience of riding was good. Unlike some people, I didn’t fall and ruin myself . As it was early summer, there was no snow up there. Later that night, started our journey to Manali.

Day 4: April 8^th 2008

Early in the morning, we found ourselves on the banks of River Beas. The buses were halted so that the drivers could get some rest. Playing there next to the river in those chilly early hours was really awesome. As the road was in the valley, we found ourselves a hill onto which some of us including our physically handicapped rasagna went for a trek. By noon, we settled in manali hotels and the entire group were give two choices: adventure sports or manali shopping. But fourteen members of us chose something different: Rafting. The experience was indescribable.

Day 5: April 9^th 2008

As rohtang pass was closed due to extreme conditions, we went to a snow point near manali (the name of which most of us seem to forgot and yaso is not available ). Everyone did their own adventure. We had a special adventure about which a separate post is required . Later that night, most of the manali market was filled with our batch

Day 6: April 10^th 2008

Because of lack of time, we decided to just visit kulu market which was supposed to be famous. Some of us went to a gurudwara nearby and joined us in kulu by noon. And for the first time Rahul, Yaso and Ravi feared me because of a stupid thing they did in kulu. Yaso with his great knowledge of surrounding areas, asked the autowala to go to market expecting to land in kulu market but was off the target by 13kms in a market of a neighbouring town. He even boarded Himachal Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation’s Bus to get to Kulu Market

Later that night we had a pit stop in chandigarh. No sight seeing. The gridded city looked good

Day 7: April 11^th 2008

Nothing much this day. After breakfast and farewell among ourselves (for some of which I became a villain by hurrying them ), the entire convoy started towards New Delhi Railway Station. That evening some of us boarded the AP Express back to Hyderabad. Some went home from that place and the rest started their scheduled trip to Agra.

Day 8: April 12^th 2008

Fully battered by a week’s adventure, most of the day was spent sleeping and playing UNO. (blah!!!) The interesting part of the day was the so-called ‘interaction’ session of some of our class girls with me. They called it ragging, I called it boring. They finally got vexed with my apathetic behaviour and “decided” to let me go .

Back to campus to stay there for a few more day

Memorable Moments

• Rafting
• Trekking to Taradevi
• Adventure on Snow
• Fight in Shimla
• DumbCharads (several times in the entire journey)

Lessons learned

• Never work alone.
• Never ever follow Yaso
• Never start a verbal dual with a group of girls.

Good friends became better ones and acquaintances became good friends. The main purpose of batchtrips was served at least in my case.