Khajuraho - City of Love

Photos uploaded at: http://picasaweb.google.com/sriswami/Khajuraho

Mesmerize me!!City of Khajuraho (place where the palm dates were in plenty and derived it's name) was one of those wonder marvels, which has a nice romantic history and excellent geography! From what we hear in the folklore, the King Chandela was born out of a "extra-marital" affair between the Moon God and his mother. His mother on her death bed, wanted the King to build a magnificent temple, signifying the fact that love between a God and a Human (in more generic terms, the act of love between two humans) is something which is "unavoidable" and hence, he set out to build in all 85 temples (himself and his successors). They were majorly towards Lord Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma and most of the temple "gopuram" as they call in tamil, had innumerable sculptures of the "only confined to four walls" act....available in open. However, if you wear the spectacles of a historian or a person who admires art, each inch of these temples, you would find beautiful sculptures. When remembering the fact that this temple was build around 1900 years back, it even seems to make you more awestruck!

We had a good plan for this city's tour though as we did some homework. We would cover the North/South and East part of the temples first, and finally converge on the Western Side, which is very famous for it's artistic expressions. We exactly did that, and we also took a room right infront of the Western temples, had a quick shower, and started off in our cab. The night's rest in one of the dhaba made sure that I am not going to sleep in one of my life's best day!

I just couldn't resist from taking picture after picture. Also, it was quite amazing to see the number of foreign tourists swarming this place, while only a handful of Indians were present. As I read in most of the websites, Khajuraho is a "must-visit" place for any foreign tourist visiting India. It is a pity that we Indians, still talk that act as a taboo, and hardly speak out, and neither we encourage the tourism sector. After emptying my camera chip and writing it into a CD, I had my task cut-out to enjoy this trip every second. Money is not going to forbid this once in a life-time opportunity. With Subodh, I went to the Lights and Sounds Show in the evening, which happens every day around 7 PM. The "narration of the temple's history" by Amitabh's voice was informative as well as entertaining. After having a blast of an experience, time to pack up things, say a final good bye to the "world of love" and wish I could come again! Reached Bhopal as planned on Jan 22 at 8 AM. We were infact, the first to reach in Anju's wedding!!!! We were ready to welcome the bride and the groom.....

"Madhya Pradesh" has still lot more places to visit, but the visit of Sanchi, Khajuraho with double delighted Anju's wedding, is one of the best moments to have happened in my life!

First Puncture....

So, there was a series of punctures on our way from Sanchi to Khajuraho. Total 5 in all. Isn't it amazing? However, it was poor Naushad, who had to replace the tyre, then get to the nearest Dhaba, fix the punctured tyre, and lo, after sometime, another tyre punctures.

We had bit of good fortune that we didn't had more than 1 tyre punctured at the same time, else I just cannot think of what would have been our situation. Talking about situations, how can I ever forget some of the situations we encountered on the way!!! After travelling from the Dhaba for some distance, Subodh was sleeping in the backseat, and myself keeping awake so that the driver doesn't sleep. There was a significant reason too, as in the beginning of the journey itself, this fellow had narrated a story where he slept while driving and took it into the fields!!! Who would dare to sleep after hearing it?? ;) In some 100 feet away, we saw a car flashing it's tail lights. The driver hinted us, "Sir, be prepared, therez going to be a bloody fight now". Also, he made us aware that he had a long knife just under his seat....a chill ran through our spine!!! He too switched off his lights, enabled his side lights and got down the car. Immediately myself and subodh swung into action, I also had my purse hidden somewhere, etc etc. All precautions, just in case we are indeed in to be robbed!!!

To all this melodrama came the anti-climax. This fellow was a friend of our driver, and nothing more than that!!! Until the car moved 100 feet away from that person, I couldn't believe that we are not going to be robbed out here! I have seen so many bollywood flicks, where hero show their heroism and thrash the villains, but in real life, I don't think that is possible unless you are equipped with some self-defence techniques. An urge still lingers in my mind, to learn an art of self-defence, just in case, as you don't know you would be lucky everytime!!

So after all the trip surrounded with punctured tyres, we reached Khajuraho at 8 AM local time. The city of love and affection has affectionately dragged us towards it!

A Visit to Sanchi

Photos uploaded at: http://picasaweb.google.com/sriswami/Sanchi

So, it all happened on Jan 20 (Saturday) at around noon. We were hunting for a cab driver who would take us to the re-discovered city of Khajuraho. A shabbily dressed guy approached us, and the offer of Rs. 4 per km was good enough for us, to immediately jump into his cab and tell him, "let's GO". He was Naushad and without wasting time, I quickly noted down his cab number, sms'ed to Raju Kaka (just in case if we got robbed) and then paid his initial payment for diesel and started off. The first pit stop was Sanchi.

It was around 46 kms from Bhopal, and the road was reasonably good until he took a left turn. It was a pathetic road from then on, but he promised that by our next visit, this would become a good road as construction was on, in full swing. I had an excitement that I am going to visit a place, which is not only protected by the UNESCO's heritage site tag, but also one which I always used to admire when seeing in a rupee note (The Sanchi Stupa). Myself and Subodh didn't do much homework, about this trip and hence, it was all improptu, meeting people, arranging places etc .

We got down the cab and went into the Stupa, a hemispherical structure, and according to the folklore, it was ordered to be built by Ashoka, and all the stupa's that were built, had some or other Budha's relic (a tooth, a nail or any of that sort) which was preserved and a stupa was built around it. We do not know what is inside Sanchi Stupa, but we were awed by the architecture and the stone carving capability some 2000 years ago. Ofcourse, it was bit of shame for us, that a foreigner from Canada explained the significance of these Stupa's but yeah, though we claim to be Indians, for a moment, I thought that we haven't discovered the beauty of India as yet!

It was a serious eyeopener, to see the world around you and the rich heritage it carries! As we walked through the Sanchi Stupa, every inch that I moved forward, I was seeing something amazing sculptures around. There were innumerable stone carvings, of peacocks, of chakra, of horses etc. and it was all associated in one form or another to the life of Budha. We also looked at the monasteries which had a room size as big as my bathroom, and I was not sure how simple their life would have been around those days. I did feel an inner feeling of satisfaction, that whatever money we are going to spend on this trip, is worth in millions in return! Unless you feel this experience, it cannot be understood! I also dropped a 10 rupee note in the "Big Begging Bowl" which was placed near the stupa. The Budha's sculptures, one of them behind bar'ed room was amazing and was almost life-like. The Ashoka's 4 headed lion, the Chakra, it was all a fantastic experience altogether. At around 7 PM, we started off from Sanchi and then it was going to be a 6 hour trip to Khajuraho. However, we decided that we would have some rest on the way, and then reach Khajuraho in the morning, so that accomodation can be easily available.

Second leg of the tour, we proceeded forward. At around 9, we were already travelling through a forrest-like place, and there was pin-drop silence all around. You hardly get to see people for miles and miles. I for a second, imagined the same 9 PM at Hyderabad, I would have got up from my office seat, for another cup of coffee........My goodness, you got to feel this experience man! At around 10 PM, we hit upon a Dhaba, a speciality of these northern states, wherein you get some hot rotties, and variety of side dishes. Also it gives an opportunity for the driver to stretch a bit, and give the car its much needed rest!

I jumped onto the Makke the roti ;) and it was direct delivery from the fire. I first thought, how could you make a roti by throwing it into the fire, but my goodness, it was amazingly tasty and awesome curry together, in almost no time, I had gobbled up a half-a-dozen rotties. On recommendation of the driver, we also had Kheer over there, and it was a great dinner! I looked at the sky and was stoned by the number of stars I could see. They were in thousands!!! In city landscape, because of the neon lights, you hardly get to see a couple of stars, but in that dark night, in the midst of a national highway with no lighting around, it was as if the stars were saying, "you better see me now, else you will never can". We then proceeded in the darkness towards Khajuraho. A couple of stops to ask for direction, and then the first "tyre Puncture" :) :) as it happens in every bollywood movie, the future journey details after the break ;)

Anju's Wedding....

Photos uploaded at: http://picasaweb.google.com/sriswami/AnjuWedsKapil

Yes, back to some fun moments that I had in the past 2 months. Anjalee's wedding was fixed on Jan 23, Tuesday. Myself and Subodh decided, we would leave during weekend, have a nice Madhya Pradesh trip and then return to wedding. So we started off on Jan 19 (Friday) and reached Bhopal on time. Raju Kaka was there to pick us up, and yeah, Bhopal hasn't changed much since the last 8 months, we had dropped in for her engagement. Ofcourse, this is a city which is thousands of years old, and hence, you couldn't expect to see any change in a miniscule 8 month period.

We reached her home, and got fantastic Poha and some sweets to eat as breakfast. As being on bride's side, it goes without saying that we are expected to render our hands on some of the tasks at hand, and ofcourse we enjoyed doing this activity. We reached the bus-stand by noon and as we did not have any pre-determined packaged tour, we decided to try out a visit to Sanchi and Khajuraho, the temple town which is an epitome of love and harmony. We reached the bus-stand and then to our satisfaction, we soon entered into a deal with one of the cab-driver, who promised us to take us to both these places and drop us back in Bhopal to attend the wedding. I would post the entire journey in my next post, as I believe I need to cover each day's experience in complete words than mixing it with this subject.

We had a life-time experience and were back in Bhopal on time for the wedding ceremony. Had a sumptous reception dinner, almost tasted all items that were presented in the stall, and had a very good time, dancing, playing with kids (yeah, specially Bittu and one more cute kid, who never allowed me to be away from them). This prompted one of their grandmother to say that, "lagta hain poorva janam ka rishta hai in bachon ke saath" :) I love kids, and hence it was easy for me to mingle with them and show them lots of affection!

So, coming to the bride itself, Anjalee, my best friend (among females ;)) and one of the best collegue who always with her bubbly behaviour, I saw the excitement of wedding in her and Kapil, her fiancee and wished them all the best in their lives. Particularly, as she was working for Purchasing Intelligence, the same team in which I am, I was very happy that she was getting settled to a good guy. In the evening, the makeup person almost transformed our "rough-and-tough" anjalee to an "angel". I couldn't resist wishing the makeup women for her excellent work! The couple were definitely made for each other. Had a great time that day and then packed back to my home. However, lots of adventures are lying waiting in Hyderabad for me. For now, congrats to anjalee for "chakifying shaadi ka laddoo" :) :)

A Pause....

Yes, this post is not about fun and frolic. I want to highlight one of the person whom I admired in my life, and who has been laid to rest to have peace. She is my aunt's mother-in-law, who is sort of a grandmother to me as well, as I was raised in my aunt's house when I was in my pre-college. She has some special place as well, as I was told that when I was about to be born, she was the one who led my mom to the hospital. She was one of the person, whom most of us admired for her sheer grit and determination, and who thought it is enough only after turning 92 yrs.

I always had interesting discussion/sometimes argument with my own grandmother whenever we used to talk about my aunt's mother-in-law. However, I always believed that she always used to wish me with full-heart and I will miss this grand old lady of our family. May her soul rest in peace!!!