Bicycle Diaries

Link these snaps and make a story-line.
What is it some kind of puzzle? Yes. And the answer is just at the end of the snaps.







Well, one Sunday morning I found the life bit too much on the boring side and started out on the back of my holy bicycle.
As the route map suggests, I traveled around 70 Km all in all. The journey was (surprisingly) pleasant. The sun was bright but the weather was cool. The only time I felt any perspiration was when a large buffalo tried to shove me off with its giant horn … ‘holy cow’ I sighed!
When I started the ride, I thought it would be crazy but I can’t possibly say it was an adventure. At the end, it was still boring Sunday! On positive note, I had some good exercise.

Apple-to-apple comparioson: Analytics way

When you are blessed with a baby - most people would ask -
Whether the baby looks like the mom or the dad?
Scenario-1
The answers would vary - depending upon who is answering the question. If I am the one who is answering, it would be I with whom all the features of the baby are in complete resemblance. For J(wifey), it would be her nails with which the baby's nails are matching! (Why only nails?)
Scenario-2
At work, we do analysis (of anything). And provide fact based information which can be used for making decisions. And I thought, it is a good idea to analyse the baby's photographs in comparison with his parent's snaps. But if I compare baby's today's snaps with today's snaps of the parents, it wont be an apple-to-apple comparison. Hence, I had to extract some copies of our younger snaps.
Here is the sample of the analysis made -

Calorie

“That's the name given to this Hercules Blazer IC. Bought it on 15-June-2008.
I started going to office by Calorie soon after that and was feeling just great! I even saw a Treck (one of my favorite brands - http://www.trekbikes.com/int/en/) model in the office parking!
It feels like I am meeting a loving friend after a long-long separation. Last time when I used to cycle regularly when I was a student at IIT Bombay. Gap of close to five long years.
Bangalore has pretty nice weather for bicycle I guess. At the least it has a few good cycling communities here and there. Home to office is 6.5 Km but I hardly feel any stress. A friend cyclist says that he starts feeling tired after approx 20Km drive. I'll have to explore more to know my stamina :)
Planning to post a few more pics of the way to office.”

These were my thoughts ~one year back. I was in Bangalore at that time. Similar experience I had during my stay in the little town of Pori in Finland (that’s worth another blog post). But Gurgaon does not have that benevolent weather and commuting to office by bicycle stays largely out of scope. Or so I thought until recently.
Sometime back, I just returned from my hometown on a Monday morning and found that the darn motorcycle have a flat tire. The weather was awesome that day –
‘With slight drizzles, which ended with but fizzles,
The breeze flows but the weather sizzles.
The birds go high and I wanna try,
The cloudy sky which encourages me to fly.‘ - Author unknown
And fly I did on my calorie towards the office. The scenes en route were not as sweet a candy-to-the-eye as it used to be during my Bangalore/Pori days. But nevertheless the ride was enjoyable. I continue coming to office by bicycle since then and the experience have been pure joy that I thought I would be at fault by not sharing it with a greater audience.

No comments!

When I started writing blog, I did not know why I was writing it. I just wrote it for the sake of it.
Later I realized that it is a good to keep a diary of important events/thoughts of life.
But you can keep a diary even to yourself - why on a public place? May be because you would want your friends/fellas to know "what's up?" on your end.
But how do you know that they read your blog? By the comments they make at the bottom of your blog.
Do people write a comment at your blog? Or just read it and walk away? Well, in most cases - they just walk away!

Well - then that's an issue.

Guys, we share information/ideas/thoughts/fun/life through a blog. We are not paid for it. The only incentives is when we see the comments from some folks on the blog. So, keep commenting if you want us to keep writing. Even a simple comment like "Good job buddy!" is fine. But no comments is not fine.


PS:
I read this thought as a blog and found that myself a believer of that thought.

PPS:
Have a look at this link - "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lurker".

Ggn to jaipur 'n back

I have traveled to many parts of India as a tourist except my home state and the neighboring states (Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan). At least in Gujarat, I have been to the world famous sanctuary of asiatic lion and had a lucky chance of watching a lion family closely.
Thanks to my company, I had a chance to visit Jaipur last week. The experience was very relaxing as the city has its own pace (which is slower than most cities) and the ancient beauty.
The place we stayed was Trident on the road to Amber (pronounced Aa-me-r) fort. The fort itself was the old capital of the empire which was later shifted to Jaipur city.
The city have a long market road which has pink stone structures on both the sides of the narrow lane and surprisingly all the shops have uniform sign boards.
A few pics of Amber fort.


Apart from the fort, other attractions were the eateries like LMB and chokhi dani.

The training was interesting as we got to meet many members whom we would never meet except for this type of training. I liked the quality time shared with many of those .
A few pics -

A herd of tigers

I just got a herd of tiger (barbs) in my aquarium. Only that some people would call them a shoal!

There are eight of them. Also, a single serpe tetra is visible in the background (there are six of them in the tank).

The Victoria Park

Disclaimer: This experience was so exciting that I am unsure if I will be able to put everything in words.

I just finished my heavy lunch around mid afternoon and was planning to enjoy a quite siesta. The weather was cool and the air was wet with moisture. I hoped it would rain. It started suddenly. A sudden heavy downpour without usual warning drizzle first. I was really pissed off due to the ascetic weather of Gurgaon and hoping to restore my sinews in Bhavnagar. So I pulled the camera from the tripod, got into the hawai-slippers and decided to take a stroll.
Little did I know that the stroll would stretch towards the Victoria park and I would live my adolescence again.
For some mysterious reason, the gate of Victoria park was locked. It didn't matter though. I display great flexibility on such occasions and jump over the wall. The forest inside was probably in the same mental state as I had. The lush green trees were dripping with humility. The budding sprouts raised their chins with arrogance. And the army of big ants was on their way to conquer some unfathomable cavity of the great neem-tree.
My existence was kind of merged with that of the jungle.







I could not take many snaps as my camera resents getting drenched - so unlike me.

Context -
Victoria park is a small forest area in the Bhavnagar city - just like the Sanjay Gandhi National park is in the Mumbai city limits.
At one time it might have lions and other predatory animals - but now it has nilgai, fox, and some species of snakes. It is not very dense jungle now.
Around a couple of years back when I visited the place, I was so disappointed looking at the health of the forest area. It looked like a dilapidated garden with all the big trees rotting and most of the vegetation disappearing.
But last week, I saw that it was back on the growth track.