Prathap B Nandakumaraiah's Personal Weblog

'Amritavarshini' - A poor story - poor film

Sun, 04 Jan 2009 18:31:12 GMT

Recently while browsing through UPenn's video library catalog I was surprised to see forty one Kannada movies in it. Last time about four months ago there were only a handful. So I decided to checkout and watch some movies. This post would be the review of one of the popular movies made some ten years ago called 'Amritavarshini'. I would post the reviews of other films in subsequent posts.

'Amritavarshini' I feel had been quite a popular (hit) film with its name floating around lot of tongues around that time. After watching it I realized that it was solely for the reasons like good music, presentation and a descent star cast and nothing else. I feel the primary flaw of the movie is its not so impressive storyline. Again story has the same essence of triangular love involving 'husband', 'wife' and the bad 'friend'. The plot is very very simple. In short 'Husband'-'wife' in love with each other, 'friend' develops liking for 'wife' and kills 'husband' hoping to marry the 'wife'. 'Wife' comes to know about it and denies herself to him and as a martyr kills herself in front of him. Though it doesnt look so novel and interesting, it definitely is a typical Indian film story. So whats wrong with story in the first place?. I think the flaw is in the portrayal of the 'friend Abhishek's character played by Ramesh Arvind. Apart from the fact that he killed his best friend, from start to finish he has been portrayed as a very good, innocent, peace loving poet hearted person. Its very hard to imagine how such a naive, quite personality suddenly turns so cruel so as to kill his best friend 'husband' Hemanth played by Sharath Babu for the sake of immoral likeness he develops towards the 'wife' Veena played by Suhasini. Its very hard to imagine the existence of such a personality in real world who is a savage murderer and at the same time a very shy and dumb headed person as enacted by Ramesh. Two extremely contrasting behaviors mixed up in one personality.

Ok, lets take the story for granted. Story is a story, good or bad. Lets try to see if it really makes any sense. There are two possibilities. Firstly its possible that because of some circumstantial reasons Abhishek developed love towards Veena and was so mad in love that he became very inhuman and killed his best friend. But nowhere in the story there are convincing circumstances or events which strongly suggest towards that. Also dumb-headed personality played by Ramesh never convinces anyone that he was ever madly in love with Veena in the first place. Abhishek develops likeness towards Veena just because shes an active personality , sings well which are good reasons in any love story, but not in this scenario involving a married woman that too who is the wife of his best friend. One more possible but weak and poorly convincing reason given is that Abhishek still deeply depressed by the loss of his beloved lover Shruthi, finds Shruthi in Veena and begins to like her and goes mad about her. For me it seems very unnatural for such a quite, naive and important a sad, depressed person to love his friend's wife and upon that grow into a insane killer. Its a reason, but realistically a very very poor reason.

Second possibility is that though Abhishek was a quite, poet hearted person, he could have had a dark side. Outside he was good but from within he was very very bad. People like that generally fit the role of a villain, not a good, soft spoken guy. The role played by Abishek should at least have given some indication of that villainous conduct. The Ramesh's portrayal of Abhishek gives a clear picture of a very very good guy who somehow by chance suddenly commits a dastardly act. It rather feels as if he is a perfectly good guy who is drawn by some sudden evil force or demon outside his control to commit such acts.

Second flaw is again in the story sequence near the end where Veena foolishly commits suicide as a symbol of revenge. The not so convincing reason given by her is she wants 'Abhishek' to suffer all his life from the pain of not having her. This makes no logic at all. She could have as well done that by simply not marrying him and alienating herself totally from him. The most practical thing to do as a brave single woman instead of simply dying would have been to handover Abhishek to police and see that the justice is served. By committing suicide she sets a very poor example and its a rather cowardly, senseless act. But who cares about practicality in films?
The guy who wrote the story is not a literary person, hes just a filmy guy who is after a populist climax sequence as desired by majority ordinary public.

Standout performance is by Suhasini as Veena, very bubbly and expressive. Though technically Ramesh as Abhishek acts well, he fails remarkably since his portrayal doenst do justice to his character in the context of the real world for the reasons I mentioned earlier. Personality of the character itself is uncertain, confusing and unrealistic. I have high regard for Ramesh as a talented actor, but probably he was simply not a good choice for this villain's role. Sharath Babu as Hemanth is good within his limited scope. Direction is good by Dinesh Baboo Other good aspects of the movie are the music by Deva and presentation of sequence flow of events in the movie.

Overall the film suffers from a very much illogical, poor story and poor, non-realistic portrayal of 'Abhishek's role. Its unfortunate that a film has to become popular because of secondary reasons like music and presentation rather than the practicality of the story. All the audience wants is a sensational sequence of events no matter how improbable or meaningless they are. Film makers exploit this public immaturity and feed the people with such non-nonsensical stories which are no good. Instead even in commercial cinema if filmmakers come out with novel, meaningful stories or adapt stories written by adept writers and do a descent job in presenting that through the film, masses will definitely like it and its good for everyone. There are lot of examples of that too. But who cares? majority of the people are just after money and populist ways to earn fame.

Prat/h/ap with a speling mistake!

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 13:42:31 GMT

The charactar Poli Kitti in the famus TP Kailasam's kannada play 'Poli Kitti' argues with his ticher 'Sir, I am confused about English all the time. If 'c' 'u' t' is CUT, 'b' 'u' 't' is BUT why 'p' 'u' 't' is not PAT???. My case is also not less confused eether.

I am too pour in spellings. I just didnt care. I dont care now too. I am not a native speaker and just write stuff as I read.. try to keep things simple. Also when I am writing online wat helps always is thier spel cheker or as I more approprietely call it as 'Google speling mystake korrecter':P. I pity them they dont advertaise so much on thier such a spectaculor servise. They shout so much abt some of thier other products, but I think this is a gem for disabled people like me, because that makes my job of remembering spellings less painful.

Couple of funny insidents about my spelling heroics. When I was in school there a was a Scince teacher for me who seemed more like an English teacher. May be one day she steped into a wrong class room and unfortunately was no looking back. She was so particulor about spelings, she used to screw me up royaly in all tests and exams becose most times I used to write Photosinthesis for Photosynthesis or equilibriam for equilibrium or even sometime as horible as Phisics for Physics. Though all my Scintific facts were correct all the time my langvage used to let me down. She used to coment, 'Prathap everithing is rit, the only problum with you is your spelings'. But I never thout speling shoud be a problum in Scince, for the simple fact that Einstin didnt have a MA in English. I even tried argueing with her once going to the extent, 'Why worry about the spelings until meaning doesnt change?'.. and got blasted. Iam stil a good proponent of this argument even today. That was a bit of a battle, I would say I lost it.

One more interesting thing is I have been learning correct spellings of some of the words when Iam doing some technikal, academic or profesional work off late. Good example was I actualy learnt the spelling of FRIEND not by atleast watching the dumb F.R.I.E.N.D.S with dots in between TV serial, but during a C++ class during undergrad through 'Friend class/functions'. The funy thing was I teased my prof in my mind that he was writing the rong speling 'Friend'!!!. Later someone mocked me and told me what was right and what was rong.:P
While recently doing a project implimenting 'Link state routing protocol' I actually learnt the spelling of the word 'Neighbors'. (Link state routing protocol has abundant usage of words like neighboring nodes). I used to just write it as I would prounounce it like as simple as 'Neibor'. In the code all comments and variables had this spelling mystake. Later my perfectionist devoted project partner actually took time to clean things up by using the right spelling!. Well, for me 'Neighbor' with the complicated 'gh' was too complicated to remember:P. Thanks to the project work I now am a relatively good speler even if it means by a minute amount:P.
One more stupid thing is when I was working in industry and rite code and send code for peer review I used to get comments like
1) Weather on line no 34 file FileGenerator.java
2) ....
at first sight i would be confused.. 'wat comment is this??' wondering wat the comment would have been on?.. for me the word 'weather' and 'whether' just sound the same!!!

Some of the other facts worth noting about my speling heroics is firstly even after learning some of these spelings though some very opurchunistic insidents, I am still confused sometimes for eg I am serius even now I get confused wheather 'e' comes first or 'i' comes first in 'thier' and 'freind'. See as the LJ red mark shows 'e' and 'i' take different positions in two diff words. How wierd!! Secondly the vowels are the bigest killers for me. In different words how differently, complexly and convolutedly they get jumbled up. Sometimes when I get confused on which vowel to put, I just put all of them, whatever that sounds in the prounounciation :P just like the word i just wrote!!

After all of this I do owe my opologies to all English prefectionists and Science-cum-English school teachers if I sound like I am murdering the language. For me written English is far more complicated to wory more about,, I can speak good English.. so atleast it sounds good. Or may be its not good to be so neglegent of speling in respect of the languvage.. I may need to reform myself... Does anyone suggest a easy way to remember speling which kind of answers the unsolved mysteries like.. if 'c' 'u'' 't' is CUT, 'b' 'u' 't' is BUT why 'p' 'u' 't' is not 'PAT'???

between the title says theres a speling mistake in my name itself which got in due to a clerical mistake when I was in school!!

Credits : Images courtasy of http://www.cartoonstock.com

Disclaimer : All above is ment for fun only, pls dont interpret it seriously like murdering the languvage:)

Good news! : Java 1.6 latest release has added spel checker on code coments.. devine boon to me!!! hope they soon bring the spel mistake correctur servise too!

Making History

Tue, 25 Sep 2007 04:24:24 GMT

Congratulations to Indian Cricket Team on winning the twenty twenty cricket world cup!

Finals against an equally spirited Pakistan team, has to be voted as one the most exiting and thrilling cricket matches played in contemporary cricket.

Update

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 14:50:26 GMT

I want a long break from online hibernation. Hope to keep things up.
Currently in Fast and Furious Philly, United States on a study mission. So far so good in here. Lots of first times and experiences. So more exhaustive updates should follow.

The Dream !

Fri, 15 Jun 2007 11:35:50 GMT

First Step in fulfilling the dream to become the Chief Minister of Karnataka:P. And there are more contenders in the queue!

Day Out, FOOD and THEATRE @ Kamat Yatri Nivas 'Jowar Bhakri' and @ Rangashankara

Sun, 03 Jun 2007 12:58:18 GMT

It was sometime back. A sunday. It was great fun. Suddenly in the afternoon I decided to visit the famous Kamat Yatri Nivas Hotel's 4th floor restaurant 'Jowar Bhakri' , GandhiNagar to feast on the famous 'Plaintain Leaf Jowar Roti' or in Kannada 'Bale Ele Jolada Rotti Oota' meals of North Karnataka and style. Things are simple here, in the afternoon you get only 'Jowar Roti meals' either 80 Rs or special 100 Rs per meal. Me, my mom and my aunt had to wait for 20mins to get seats. The place just like MTR near lalbaugh is always fast buzzing with activity. As you enter the hotel you are transferred to an entirely new world. North Karnataka style Dhothi and Kurta and topi clad waiters almost running taking orders , serving hungry people is the scene always.

Coming to the actual meals, here how it is served. Already clean and washed plaintain leafs are laid out. One by one items get served to you at different times by different people. Just when you think that waiters have forgotten your table and you are just about to open your mouth to shout 'Waiter.. next Item', somebody suddenly appears from nowhere and decorates your leaf with next subzi or sweet. Firstly along with two kinds of 'Kosumbaris' and 'subzis' a butter cube and methi leaves are served. Then comes the main course. Hot, very soft and delicious Jowar Rotis served with famous North Karnataka dish 'Badanekaayi Engai'. It is a dilicious spicy curry made with Brinjal or 'egg-palnt, the highlight of the whole meal. Rotis are so yummy and soft it feels like eating with no end. You can have unlimited rotis and there are waiters all around you all the time hoalding a plate full of hot rotis and checking if anyone needs rotis and serving them. There will always be a 'thatha' (old man), hoalding the 'Badanekaayi Engai' bowl carefullly scanning each customer's leafs to voluntrully check himself weather anyone needs the side dish. Once he finds a victim even with still some 'Engai' left on the leaf, he suddenly springs up from nowhere and asks 'Swalpa Badanekaayi Hakla?'.. 'Shall i serve little more Badanekaayi?! Thats too cool!.. I've never seen any waiter in a hotel, who enthusiastically and voluntrilly checks customer's plates and offers to serve more of a side dish! That too he doesnt pour any little amount of Badanekaayi even if u tell only little. He swings the 'sautu' atleast twice/thrice between your leaf and the bowl that has Engai.

This is the story of the jowar rotis. While burying our stomachs on a downpour of rotis, you will not feel like having rice (the actual main course of any south indian lunch!). So after the highlight of the meal is over, rice is served with Sambar and ghee. I totally had 5 rotis and some rice and even that too was good. So after a warm and hearty meal with out stomach filled to no end we left the place around 3:30. Everytime I come out of YatriNivas I always think they should have had resting area of some sorts to catch up with unbearable sleep one gets after such a wholesome meal:P.

Feast more of Jowar Bhakri here!

Suddenly idea of going to the English play 'Anklet' or 'Shilaapadikaram' splashed in my mind. So i dropped my mom and aunt at a relative's place and went straight to Rangashankara @ JP Nagar. Play was at 7:30 sharp.

Anket or Shilappadikaram is a ancient Tamil story written by a famous writer, poet Ilango Adigal who lived almost 2000 yrs ago. Its a saga of a brave and strongwilled protagonist woman who fights and avenges for justice. I knew about the legend from the copy of the old Amara Chitra Katha lying at my home which I have read countless times over long time. 'Shilapadikaram' is considered by many as a great Tamil epic, one that gives the strong message of fight for justice, justful revange, faithfulness and strong will.

It is a tragic but inspiring story of the couple Kannagi and Kovalan. Kannagi, a beautiful daughter of a wealthy mearchant is married to son of another merchant Kovalan in the town of Kavirippattinam. Sometime after marrige Kovalan deserts Kannagi for a charming court dancer Madhavi and throws all his wealth for her. But he returns to the uncomplaining Kannagi devoid of all wealth after learning that Madhavi was faithless to him. Penniless, Kovalan along with Kannagi migarates to the town of Madurai in Pandayn Kingdom in saerch of a better livelyhood. There they stay at a kind Brahmin's house. The only welath they pocess are a pair of anklets given to Kannagi by her parents at the time of her marriage. Kovalan goes to city to sell one of the ankets at Royal Jeweller's place. In the meantime a similar precious anklet belonging to Pandyan queen would have been stolen by the King's Royal Jeweller himself. The cunning jeweller after seeing that Kannagi's anklet exactly matches the stolen one of the queen, hatches a evil plan and reports to King that Kovalan was the thief. Pandyan King beleiving in Jeweller's fraud words without doing much investigation decides the innocent Kovalan as thief and executes him.

Once Kannagi learns of the incident, shes heart broken. But suddenly she makes her mind hard as a rock and with immense avengeful rage marches towards the King's palace to demand justice. With her eyes buring red with justful anger asks for a hearing with the King calling him a murderer. King obliges and asks her what proof she has to say her husband is innocent. Then Kannagi gives the proof in style by showing the other anklet that had dimonds inside it where was queen 's anklet would have pearls. King realizes his folly of executing a innocent and commits suicide to honour justice. Queen too follows him. But Kannagi's anger is still not soothened, she curses the city of Madurai to be burnt. The city blazes in flames and only the good, poor, sick and old people survive. Kannagi is reunited with Kovalan at Heaven.
As a symbol of her glory Kannagi statue stands tall even today at St Marina Beach in Chennai.

Coming to the actual play at Rangashankara, it was directed and performed by a theatre troupe named 'Bangalore Little Theatre ' which promotes mainly Enghlish Theatre in Bangalore. It was two hours of gripping journey through a great Tamil epic. It was very well directed, enacted by a group of young and talented actors and script was the highlight of the play. But some conversations like when Kovalan returns to Kannagi leaving the court dancer and conversation between Kannagi and the King seemed very very strechy. Everytime when the King screams 'Show the Proof Woman!!' everyone felt the play had reached the climax where Kannagi tears open her another anklet, Kannagi starts off with one more Philosophical dialogue and the saga continues . One more visible shortcoming of the play was that there was no adress of contemporaryness relevence in the play. Kannagi we saw was a woman who lived 2000 years ago. Some of her actions like meekly accepting an unfaithful husband who had caused her so much suffering look rather submissive and outdated. Instead some aspects in her principles and behaviour should have had the qualities of a brave, confident woman of 21st century. But anyway the play is considered as an epic and continues to be adressed with honour.

Though the role of the Protagonist Kannagi was very well done by the actor, to corrolate and be consistent with the immense justful anger and hardwill for revange that one expects in Kannagi after reading the story, the signs marking those traits were not there in its entirity. Little more anger filled expression would have been good and just. Other actors did a good job, but not perfect though. Sometimes actions looked a lilttle exaggerative and facial expressions not perfectly relevant to the context. But overall it was good show and perfect way to end a weekend evening.

Taxi 9211's Meter up ! : A Comic Relif

Wed, 16 May 2007 13:39:25 GMT

In my invented craze to watch Hindi movies off late that come up with a different outlook and some inborn novelty in story and presentation much different to the usual mundane masala and SRK type love tales of Bollywood which i have never watched, I got up with this refreshing Entertainer produced by Ramesh Sippy 'Taxi 9211' starring John Abraham and Nana Patekar directed by Mithun Luthria . Idiom 9211 is a slang type usage in Hindi to refer to somebody who runs away. The best thing about the movie is its novel story with a comic touch and director never diviates from the main theme. This way the movie would be rated above many such endauvers where film makers charged by criticisms from film critics (like me?) that Bollywood without coming out of its traditional Hero - Heroine - Villan and love , dance, item song and etc (old wine in new bottle kind of stuff) can not woo a larger mature audiance(like me?)(may be Western viewers) towards it, try desparately to come up with some new story and presentation and though novelty exists to some extent, but everytime end up somewhere somehow finding it difficult to resist thier inborn urges find themselves forcibely drawn n tempted towarsds squeezing in a irrelevant love song screaming Diwana Dil Dil Le gaya Hoto pe Dil (the same old words) or fighting or cabret dance etc.

The story is about the comic collision between two persons of contrasting extreme personalities. Raghav Shasthri played by Nana Patekar is a short tempered taxi driver who after an array of frequent job changes finally resorts to driving a taxi. But he lies to his gullible wife that he is an LIC Insurance agent. Jai Mittal played by John Abraham is a rich spoilt brat son of a dead buisnness tycoon who feels his father has cheated him by rewriting his will in complete favour of his old friend Arjun Bajaj at the time of his death. Accompanied by his greedy Girlfreind (Sameera Reddy) whos interested only in his health he sets out in court to proove that the second will is false and all his property should belong to him as per the first will.

The main scene starts with Jai Mittal going to court to show the first will which would be in his favour. On the way he needs to pick it up from a safe locker. He boards the taxi plated 9211 driven by Raghav Shastri. Jai demands that Raghav drive very fast and they end up meeting in a accident. There starts the collision course between the two dudes. While Jai looses the safe locker keys in the confusion (which are picked up by shastri), shastri lands up in jail. Jai is desperate to get the locker keys from shastri cause the time is running out for him in court. Shastri anagered by his plight cunningly hides the keys from Jai eyes in Jail. Then Shasthri escapes from police. Jai goes to his house telling Shasthri's wife about the incident. After knowing the truth that her hubby was lying to her about taxi, Shastri's wife angrilly decides to move out to her mother's. Then mayham breaks loose between the two. They destroy each other, leaving one another hopeless and defeated. At the end as a sudden twist of events, both realize thier folly and help each other which brings back everybody's smile.

So one has to say the story is very well wooven and prooves to be both reality and entertainment worthy. Both Nana Patekar and John Abraham perfectly fit to thier roles and have done a commendable job. Also subtle humours like making Sanjay Dutt narrate the story in his typical mubaiyya style accent and Shastri's son's silly drawings hung over in his cab and chunk old filmy style 'love at first sight' scene at the end etc add suitably to the comic health. Music and singing by Adnan Sami fits well to context. Overall a really cool refreshing entertainer. Though it seems like a simple entertainment flick, I see it as real signs of Indian Cinema coming off age and gradually coming out of its inbuilt clutches of old style polulist mundane masala entertainment and love stories's influence, so that it can draw attention of wider audiance across the globe. I rate it on par with similar entertainment flicks in Hollywood.
But the best thing i liked about the movie was that the heroine Sameera Reddy had a very less significant role in the movie and most importantly she was not 'made up' to look good:P. These are good signs that direction is getting entirely focussed on the story rather than ir-relavantly putting some stuff to glorify one induvidual's stature or popularity. It is a unwritten cluase in Indian Cinema that no matter how out of context and remote it might seem in terms of story, there has to be scene where heroine smiles showing all her teeths and its closeups, she has to dance with Hero or sing with her arms wide staring at the sky!!!

Server always Busy ?

Thu, 10 May 2007 05:41:32 GMT

In KSRTC website, the URL itself of the link to e-ticket where u can book tickets online is http://ksrtc.in/ServerBusy.htm.

Its like putting a permanant board in front of your house 'Under construction' LOL!!!!!!!!!

World's Most Cruel Animal

Sun, 25 Mar 2007 15:41:13 GMT

Me and indianerd suddenly on one sunday afternoon decided to bike to Bannerghatta. The place is no more than a park.The safari they take sucks and here and there you spot one or two lean and weak looking tigers and lions. But Arun liked it a lot. For he has the tendancy to like something in even the most borest trips!:P. You can call it tendancy or ability to like something in nothing. But the only thing that brightened my spirits for a while was this!

Ya.. Now i know Arun is the Most Cruel animal in the world!

Flowers @ RS : Great Show by Rajit Kapoor

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 18:18:58 GMT

On March 11th in front of a jam-packed auditorium Rajit Kapoor performed a monoact at Rangashankara in the play 'Flowers' written by Girish Karnad and directed by Roysten Abel and produced by Arundhati Nag's Rangashankara itself. So the production was a sort of joining of hands of some of the highly acclaimed names in the theatre, coming from different parts of the country to give one memorable performance. 'Flowers' is one of the highly acclaimed plays out of Girish Karnad's pen off late, one that poses hard questions to conservative Indian society and in it gives a deep, profound contemporaraly significant message to a wide audience.

Story revolves around the life of the protagonist priest and his love for his God and equal fondness for his mistress Chadravathi a courtesan. He is a master in decorating shiva Linga with flowers for pooja. Everyday he decorates the linga and performs pooja when the King arrives.After the God's pooja is over he goes to his second love Chandrvathi's house and decorates her in exactly the same way and precision he decorates the God. In other words, he treats her like a Goddess. People call his actions uncalled for and criticize him for loosing his sanctity. On one night when the arrival of the King is delayed beyond midnight, he without performing pooja to the God walks to Chadravathi's house during night and offers her his daily dose of decoration from the flowers that were meant to be for the real God .

After he returns to temple that night, King delayed by an urgent commitment arrives late at midnight. The priest has to now perform pooja on the main god. But he now has to use the same touched and corrupted flowers to decorate the God. At that time his two Gods, the real God and courtesan both collide and appear as being one. King is left with awe and lots of questions unanswered. Seeing long hair projecting out of the Linga, the King fumbled asks the priest with wonder and also fury 'Does God have Long hair'. Priest with firm tone answers 'If you believe that God has long hair, he will have'. Hence this way the play throws a tricky question to audience on what God is?

To say the least Rajit Kapoor was simply superb in his performance. Mind you he is a national award winner for his role in the film 'Making of the Mahatma' by Shyam Benegal. Basically Rajit just sat and occasionally stood up and just went on narrating his story as a priest for 80 minutes. But he did the role very professionally and held the audience's attention without a moment of difference throughout those 80 mins thanks to his superb dialog delivery, eye movements and expressions. As director Roysten Abel would have it to physicalize the metaphor of his mindset between his two beloved Gods, the protagonist Rajit was made to stand on a suspended platform with a little water pond below.

Though a very serious and silent play, it was truly a great experience to watch one of the highly acclaimed, extremely talented actors of India, my favorite, the famous Bhymokesh Bakshi himself live on stage!
Useful link throwing light on Rajit Kapoor's work in theatre - http://www.hinduonnet.com/mp/2004/12/28/stories/2004122800690100.htm

G - Phone !

Fri, 16 Mar 2007 06:31:00 GMT

Its true! After Apple, Google in comepetetion is entering the gadget market in style with Google Phone

KSRTC in New Awatar!

Wed, 14 Mar 2007 07:03:19 GMT

Online booking facility 'Awatar' has been introduced by KSRTC. Now you can book ticket from anywhere to anywhere online. Dont know how secure the system is though. One funny thing was, while creating the account in giving the password i gave '%' as one of the characters. It gave error saying ' Invalid character %'!!. I hope something like this will never happen 'Sorry the password 'ksrtc123' entered by you is already used by this user 'ksrtcUser'!!! or something like 'Password 'ksrtc' does not have any numeric characters!' Also i saw that the password fields were not cleared when i did a go back on the submission sheet.

But anyway another feather in the cap of KSRTC.

Update 1: Ever since KSRTC online Awatar System was launched there are many complaints from users mainly saying their money was deducted online but they didnt get tickets. Please call the KSRTC customer care number - 99809 15077 / 080-22385848 (bangalore) . If it doesnt work, try visiting a nearest KSRTC online booking center and ask for further guidance

The Menu that scared our shits out!!

Fri, 16 Feb 2007 03:12:00 GMT

We were a little amused when we saw this.

We somehow didnt feel comfortable. So we asked for a change in Menu. We were horrified and scared to death when we saw

To be on the safer side, we inquired at the Manager weather Jade Garden Hotel really specializes in some unexplored traditional Malnad dishes such as 'Idli Snakes' which incidentally could have been tender baby snakes (non-venomous) stuffed into 3D circular shapes and cooked in hot steam or 'Dosa Snakes' could have been prepared from a liquid flour made by grinding non-venomous water snakes adding baby lizards and tiny white rats and kept overnight for chemical reaction and many other unknown dishes with unimaginable ways of cooking.

To our relief we finally found out that, it was a SPELLING MISTAKE!.The Manager had a long story to tell. We learnt that when the Hotel started some 5 years ago one dumb guy wrote the first menu with a spelling mistake. Some customer discovered and complained about it after two years! Then the Hotel management decided to withdraw those menus and assigned the job for preparing the menu to some other guy who had learnt some English supposedly better than the first guy. But to everyone's horror this guy made it from BAD to WORSE !. Nobody had complained about the horrible and scary menu to the Hotel Management till now. The Manager promised me, that when next time we are here, 'We will surely have SNACKS to eat!'. Now after some 2 months still I dont know weather the new SNACKS menu has been introduced there or still people are being tricked into consuming SNAKES camouflaged as Idlis and Dosas!!

Anyway looking at the horrible and scary menu anybody would think twice before ordering the SHAVIGE BATH or NOODLES there!!

At the end, if at all there was a 'Masala Dosa SNAKE', I wonder how would you prepare it. Any wildlife or snake experts here?

Note : This was a real incident that happened at Hotel Jade Garden, DurgiGudi, Shimoga Dist, Karnataka. No offenses meant. Just for laughs!!

Trek to Kodachadri and ArishinaGundi falls : Adventure Ultimatum! (Part 2)

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 11:15:57 GMT

Continued from last Post : Trek to Kodachadri and ArishinaGundi falls : Adventure Ultimatum! (Part 1)

Arishinagundi Water Falls

Getting there

There are two ways one can trek to arishinagundi. One, once getting to Kaka's hotel hiring a guide (highly recommended) one has to take a deviation just half a KM after Kakas along the path to Karakatte. Trek down in the steep and treacherous path for 6-7 KMS to reach the falls. Regular trekkers can do it cover it easily in 1.5 hours. This is longer and difficult path. Just half Km before you get the falls you would hit upon a jeep track that continues to main road. At that point one has to still descend down further for abt 10-15 mins to reach the falls.
Second path starts from the main road itself. After Karakatte just 2 KMs before Kollur to your right (if coming from Karakatte side) there is a abandoned jeep track that goes into the jungle with a gate and board pointing to 'Arishinagundi falls' The track is no longer motarable and purposefully blocked by Forest department and even trekking is banned (rule is not serious though). From here to the spot on the jeep track which i mentioned in the last previous paragraph (where one has to further go down for some half Km to reach the falls) it is around 4-5 Kms. This is the more easier and safer path since the jeep track is wider and chances of getting lost are rare. One can either reach the falls through the path from Kaka's and return via the jeep track or vice versa.

Off to Arishinagundi

So after the fun at Kaka's we had to decide what to do next. We had two options, one to go to Karakatte and catch a transport to kollur, may be visit a beach nearby (there are a lot of beaches in and around Kollur like Baindur, Kudle, Marwanthe etc which are at reachable distance) and be back at Kollur by evening for the bus to Bangalore at 7 (we had booked return tickets as well). Second, we could trek again to 'Arishinagundi falls' at the base of the hill. Wanting more adventure, I was inclined on trekking again. Then later we learnt that if we start now at 12, it might be difficult for us to cover beach trip by 7 since availability of buses could have been in question. When we inquired at the kakas about the second option of trekking to the falls, he said he can arrange for a guide and it will take at least 1.5 hrs to trek to reach the falls. The falls is around 6-7 KMs from the Kakas deep inside the jungle and one has to trek down along a steep treacherous and unclear path. It is strongly advised in any case (how brave and experienced you are) to hire a guide to trek to the falls, thats what we found out while trekking there, there is no definite, visible path and it is very very easy to get lost. For most part of the path, it seemed like wandering aimlessly in a dense forests. Since we were all in good enthu and wanting more adventure, we scrapped the beach plan and everyone voted to trek again.

We hired the guide for 200Rs. Guide's name was Mr.Eeru just like Mr.Bean he dint have a second name:P. He works for the kaka (hotel owner). He looked like a simpleton and was soft spoken. He was short but strong and well built for a hard day's work in harsh forest conditions and walked barefoot all the way till the falls in such trechurous forest terrain (Iam still not able to get how could he do that). So with Mr.Eeru leading from the front we were marching along the trekking trail again! During the walk Eeru would recount many wild experiences he has had over the years. He spoke about his sighting of bears, bisons and even tigers.

Treacherous Jungle trek

Just 10 mins walk from kaka towards Karakatte and one has to take a deviation to the left into the forest. It looked like Eeru simply took us into woods, there didnt seem to be any specific path into the forests. Path (if there was one) initially looked easier along a smooth trail surrounded by dense growth of trees and bushes, but got more and more treacherous and steeper downwards as we gained more depth into the heart of the forest. Many times the path goes up for sometime and down again. In the middle we had to adventurously cross a small stream with rocks everywhere which some people mistook as the real falls! Silly guys!! Because we had so many first timers in our group progress was very very slow and the group just remained stagnant for long durations at numerous points waiting for first timers to catch up or taking good breaks. Yes! there were traffic jams in the middle of the forests!. We Bangaloreans carry our esteemed culture all the way to the heart of the peaceful virgin jungles!

(Complete Photo Gallery)

(My Friend Amber's Gallery)

Those very very long 10 minutes to Falls....

The path seemed like going no where even after 2.5 hrs of trek. It looked like a very long and tiring trek. We kept asking Eeru, Still how far ? Everytime he was telling (wholly from his perspective and experience) 'Enn Ondu Hattu nimisha ashte Saar' ('Just 10 mins Sir'). Every time we ask he was giving the same reply. At this point one guy in our group thought that the guy was lying and was a cheat. He would dump us in some remote part and go. I could only laugh for such imaginations. I knew Eeru was a simple and honest guy. The problem was the 'perspectives'. He just tells what he knows. Whatever duration he would tell to reach a spot is wholly and solely based on his experience, his pace and his ability. The 10 mins he tells is the time that he takes further to reach the falls. We fat city dudes are crawling at such turtle pace that for him in comparison with his pace it seems like we have hardly moved an inch in the last half n hour or so, thats why it seems like he is repeating the same 10 mins dialog for a long time. He cant estimate how long we bunch of lazy, fat Bangalore Buffoons take for the same distance. Such thinking is beyond his imaginations. He is a very simple village paw. He only knows what he is and his work in hard woods and nothing beyond that. He would very easily take 1 hr to trek to the falls, but we fat guys might well take 2 or even 3 folds of that. It was our mistake in estimation that we failed to convert his time of 1 hr to our time of 3 or 3.5 hrs.

The Return of the Vampires of Kodachadri

Leeches got onto us big time here. As we entered more and more deep into forests more and more leeches got hungry. The base of the hill is a leech lover's paradise even in winter primarily because of the dew factor that remains fresh on the ground for most part of the day. I have to say, we didn't have a clear action plan to counter the leech attacks. We had taken one full KG of premium TATA salt and didn't know how to apply it!. Poor guys just sprinkled salt on their legs only to see it flow down the knees in couple of minutes. The Chuna or limestone (sunna in Kannada) that we brought was a big help but again only to some. It was in a small box and with some guy and only some people applied it sometime. They got good protection, others including me who didn't take the issue seriously had little luck and generously offered the bloody vampires our precious blood. It is a painful experience (mentally) to see somebody forcefully sucking a bit of your life out of you right in front of your full view. I would rather die being bitten and blood sucked by a vampire in some fairy horror tale once in for all than slowly offer my helpless emaciated body as part of those blood sucker's daily, hearty meal while iam still alive. The only matter of relief in such hard times, was the fact that there is nothing like a leech that is infected with AIDS. May be the leeches in the city might have been, iam safe i never trek in the cities.
Now to the count, those lucky guys who got the lime got away with only handful of leech bytes. The unlucky me, received a record number of 29 holes bored by leeches!! Even as I write this blog, I write with only one hand using the other one to occasionally sooth those tell tale pug marks on both of my legs. Some people tell that the scars will remain for some good time. The leeches are gone, but their seals and signatures and memories still remain. Forever? Oh God!!

At the feet of the Majestic and the Beautiful Arishinagundi

After 3 hours of hard, sapping trek through a treacherous terrain most of the group were dead tired and seemed like giving up. But through refreshments and motivating words from other experienced folks somehow managed to keep the spirits high and we went on. Around 3 we hit a old jeep track (which is no longer used now, covered with fallen trees and leaves its not mot arable either). From this spot, if one continues down after some 4KMs you would hit the main road that leads to Kollur. This forms one more route to arishinagundi falls from the main road. Eeru said we need to trek just some distance little down (1/2 Km) and would take 5 mins to reach the falls. His 5 mins easily turned out to be half an hour for us and we finally made it to the falls at 3:30. We started at 11:45 and took a good 3.5 hrs to trek here, well beyond thrice the time we anticipate we should have taken.
Just few steps before the spot that lets you into the main waters there are couple of very short but steep and slippery rocks. With so many people dead tired, overcoming this final obstacle however small it was, looked mighty difficult and most people dropped the idea of getting to the main course of the falls and rested on the rock banks just below the main waters. Only few guys (including me) managed to reach the base of the falls and get into water.

Cold, Sweet and PURE ! PURE ! PURE! not that crappy silly Thunda!

The waters were feeling truely divine. Cold, pure and sweet. I drank lots and lots of water, refreshing myself. The sight of the falls was breathtaking. Water was falling from a good height of more than 200 mts with a big hood formation on top. That seemed like symbolizing its majestic power. The scenery of roaring waters hurling down majestically overlooking its sub waters flowing down through the long valley ahead surrounded on sides by huge green ridden boulders was a real treat for the eyes. It was like a virgin falls totally unexplored by the civilization deep inside the heart of thick secluded and mysterious jungle. That feeling really makes me thrilled and exited.

Beautiful Natural Formations at Arishinagundi

The reason it is called ArishinaGundi, is because, true to its name, tip of the falls (point from where water drops down) is positioned at such an angle that during parts of the day dominated by bright sunshines, the topmost portion of the falls turns yellow colored like turmeric because of just enough golden sunshine. At that time, it presents a beautiful scenery of golden colored droplets majestically descending down. One has be lucky to see this natural appearance in terms of timing. In Kannada 'Arishina' means 'Haldi' or turmeric powder and 'gundi' means large pit or s ditch (into which water falls in this context). We didnt see it. But what we did see soon after reaching the falls, was the spectacular rain bow formation right across the falls. It looked very beautiful.

I wanted to rest in Heavens forever!

The roaring sound of the waters was pleasantly musical and melodious. That really turns me on. In such heavenly atmosphere, it really feels like spending a whole day playing in water, drinking gallons of sweet water, hearing to the ever rocking water music, enjoying the lovely sight around and resting on the rocks like dead dudes . Alas ! we could not afford that, we were already late, it was nearing 4 and we still had to first trek to the jeep track and then trek 4 KMs along the jeep track to reach the road. Once on road we had to catch some transport to Kollur and catch the return bus to bangalore booked at 7. So after spending just 5 mins in the waters we hurriedly got ready and were on the return trail in no time. While retreating, i just looked back at the falls and felt 'This is the place!. I will comeback here again!'. It was a memorable experience though very short lived.

Scary adventure at tea time

Eeru decided to take us through a different path to reach the jeep track again, that would take us to a spot much ahead of the spot from where we descended down to the falls. But this idea seemed to backfire since at one place the actual route was shutdown because of a massive tree fall. So we had no option but to take a detour along a very steep and difficult path that never existed.... we had to invent one ourselves!. The short but treacherous path that would take us again to the main jeep track was very narrow and even dangerous. Since we were deep inside the jungle covered by dense undergrowth of large, tall trees and vegetation, at 5 itself it was seeming very dark and scary. Our group got stranded and jammed here for a good 15-20 mins. But we managed it very smoothly and well so that nobody got injured and slowly crawled onto the main path. Finally when we reached the jeep track, it was 4:45.

The Simple, Poor Village paw

Eeru decided leave us and said he would not accompany us till the main road since for him getting buses from the main road back to Valur would be difficult at night. Now he had to go back along the same difficult path to Valur before it got dark. The guy would cover 5 hrs of tiring sweat bathed trek we did in just 1 hour that too with no shoes or protectives on! We had settled for 200 as guiding charges. But since Eeru had successfully and skilfully guided us, we decided to make him happy and gave him twice that amount at 400 Rs!. (since we were 19, induvidually it was nothing extra). While I was commending his good job and handing him the bucks, the poor simple guy simply said ' Sir no matter how much extra you give me, my master would only give me 100 Rs Sir'. I didnt know how to react to this. I could do nothing but smile at him and also feel for his simplicity and commend for his unexpected, unseen honesty. He is such simpleton he doesnt even know, he need not tell his master that we gave 200Rs extra. I told him clearly, not to tell this to his master, the extra money is for him for his good work. Then the guy realized what he had to do and said 'Ohh.. Ok sir' nodding his head.

The crucial strategy that saved the day...

Eeru bid goodbye to us, clearly showing the path that would take us to the main road. We had to just continue down in the abandoned but clear jeep track for 4-5 Kms and we would hit the main road to Kollur. Easier said than done. It was already 5 and we had a bus to catch at 7!. We swung into action quickly, realizing the high probability of worst case of we ending up missing the bus, split our team into 2. The most 6-7 agile and strong guys would go first leaving rest of the first timers and girls with couple of strong guys. The first group that included Venkat, Karthik, Balaji, Ambar, Piyush and others would walk fast and reach kollur and stop the bus for others. The second group that included me, Venki, Gagan, Kruthi and other novices would take its time and steadily cover rest of the distance. The great idea was Venkat's.

Scary moments at numerous Road Blocks

The first group left us. At the same time, we too (second group) started our walk along the jeep track. Our progress was slow since most novices were already tired of a hard day's trek. Soon on the way, we hit upon road blocks (fallen trees) purposefully laid by forest department to prevent the usage of the road. These blocks would initially scare us a little, since it was getting dark and we dont want to get lost. But there was no need to panic. All we had to do was just look for the side way and go in it and soon we would be back on track again. We came across many such blocks. At the first and second blocks our first group had left a paper directing towards the short detour. At the latter blocks no such direction papers were found. Poor Guys! It seemed, they just ran out of paper or ink!. Any case we didnt need their help. Every time it was easy to find the short detour back to the jeep track again.

Adventure in the dark

Around 6, we had covered some 3 KMs and were half the way towards the main road. Darkness was descending on us very fast. We feared we might have to do a moondark trek (there was no moonlight!). And soon darkness fell on us and our worst fears came true. Around 6:15 we were still 1.5 -2 KMs off the road and it was already pitch dark. Initially people little were little apprehensive of trekking in pitch dark with only torches at hand, because anything could go wrong. You can get lost. We were 99% sure we had not deviated into other path and were still walking on the correct jeep track, but still in the dark it was possible to deviate from the main path and get lost. We knew we were closer to main road but there was not a single human at sight around since it was night. Secondly the animal attack stories Eeru was recounting earlier scared us a little. Occasionally we would hear some scary little noises of somebody or something moving, from the bushes, that would make us little scary. But we knew that animals wont attack when you are in a group. In pitch dark too, we came across couple of tree fall road blocks, but easily found the detour even in dark. In the middle of all such fears, confusions and anxieties we kept our cool, mustering all possible courage and strength and praying to god we carefully went ahead all together.

What added to some confusion and little anxiety were some old milestones on the track. They were reading 'Dandina Hole' (some other place) 24 KM, 25 KM etc which really baffled us. Why would a 24-25 KM stone come here when we are so close to road (I still couldnt make what they were pointing to) To add to this, for some time the path seemed like going down and down possibly into the valley. We were a little afraid weather we had gone off track into some other unknown route bound to some unknown place?!. The mystery was prevailant for sometime until the track got more flatter and we came across an a man made cement bridge. That was the first small sign of civilization and everybody heaved a big sigh of relief, that we were not lost. Soon we found the track going up.

Finally some light and Joy of realization!

After a good 45 mins of trek in the dark and harsh conditions, to our amazement and joy we saw somebody in front of us with torches, shouting at us. It was actually Venkat who had gone ahead of us in the first group with Karthik and Balaji. We were all very happy and relived to see them again. They had reached the road at 6:30. Instead of all of them going to Kollur, stop the bus and wait for us there, they had rightfully sent Kuldeep, Ambar and Piyush in a auto to Kollur to stop the bus while rest of them (Venkat, Karthik and Balaji) would either wait near the road for the second group (mine) to arrive or again venture back to the forest looking for the other group if it got delayed and once everybody had arrived at the road gate, we would board the bus from the road itself than going to Kollur since the gate was on the way. Under such difficult times, it was a very good decision in terms of soothing and comforting our dead tired minds if not tired bodies to venture into forest again looking for us. Seeing the first group again instilled the much needed feelings of instant safety, security and lots of joy of achievement in our group which mostly had sensitive first timers. From there the road was just couple of furlongs away! With full spirit and big confident steps we trekked the last part of our momentous trek and finally reached the road at 6:50! There is a gate here. Everybody was dead tired and needed lots of water and comfort.

Carrying the Leech Legacy into the civilization..

Me , Karthik, Neha and Venki went in one more auto to Kollur. The other guys (Piyush, Kuldeep and Amber) had stopped the bus which was all ready to go. Neha was feeling bad (mostly psychologically), fully tired and with lots of leech bites that could not be checked during darkness. Soon after reaching Kollur, she drank enough water and we tried to address her leech bites. At this time i realized leeches on my legs too and began to clean them off. After she felt little comforted and got inside the bus, we bought more water and led the bus to the spot on the road where others were waiting. Venki who was strong willed to take a bath and do a Darshan of Goddess Mookambika after having come this far decided to stay there and come alone later. (Later we learnt he boarded another bus to Bangalore via Kundapur the same night after visiting the temple). Soon the bus reached the spot and all the other trekkers too boarded the bus. Thus bidding goodbye to the mighty Kodachadri and the ever beautiful Arishinagundi we retreated from that magical place which had given us a great adventurous experience!! an unforgettable trek of our lives !!

Once inside the bus, in spite of cleaning off during the 5-10 mins time we had (before boarding the bus) soon after the trek, still there were leeches on couple of people's legs and hands too! We plugged off those bastards and stamped them with our boots to make sure they all died because if not then they would get onto us again and might also get onto the gullible other passengers of the bus too!!. So the adventure that started in Karakatte a day ago continued all the way into the bus while retreating! We left the leeches and the adventure, but the adventure and the leeches were in no mood to leave us!
Everybody refreshed themselves drinking loads of water. So it took some time for us to settle down inside the bus. Then we purchased some bananas and biscuits on the way for temporary relief. The bus stopped for dinner at Hosanagara. We reached Bangalore at 6:30 in the morning. After a quick redistribution of luggage, we bid goodbye to each other after being part of what could be called as an 'Adventure to remember all our lives'

And Thus...

Thus was over, an epic trek. Great fun ! Great adventure ! Something that all 19 of us, would remember life long. At the end of the day people were dead tired and thought we are lucky to be safe and alive back into the clutches Bangalore, but still we loved the adventure and all the time wanted more of it. I could hear many people repeat while trekking down to Arishinagundi, 'This is the real trek Man ! This is the trek!'. Renowned trekker, naturalist and adventurer Steve Irwin once said 'What is life without adventure. And what is adventure without Risk And what is Risk without leeches to suck you up' (Hmm... I am mistaken may be he never told that.. somebody else would have.. for example me:P )
Some lessons to learn from the trek were we dint estimate correctly as to how much time our group with so many freshers at hand would take to trek along the treacherous arishinagundi trail. Something, which a regular like Eeru could do in 1 hour, we did that taking 3-4 times of that time. We were not serious enough to analytically transfer his effort to ours and underestimated the huge difference in effort in terms of time. Secondly there should have been a more protective and ensuring plan in our combat against leeches.

In spite of couple of such mismanagements we had the satisfaction that we as a team had accomplished something challenging and tough and faced and managed the difficult situations very well and professionally taking the right decision at the right time so that nothing major went wrong. Except for leech bites , some bruises plus the usual aftermath cramps n pains nobody received any major injuries. Result, we had great adventure and fun. Thats what matters. That is the beauty of any trekking expedition, no matter how tired you feel, at the end of the day the fun and thrill that you experience along clearly overshadows the tiredness factor and makes you forget it and converts the fact that 'I am really tired' to a more lively fact that 'I archived something challenging' and instills good confidence of some achievement however small it is, in you. I can only laugh at one of my non-trekking friends commenting, 'Why do you need to travel 400Kms to walk 20 Kms?'. Any trek is not a mere walk, more than the physical asppects it is fun, adventure and the sense of accomplishment of some achievement and most importantly coming face to face with our mother nature.

My feelings and thoughts..

From my personal side, what i can say is , I really loved the adventure of both Kodachadri and Arishinagundi and the tough times during dark and always wanted more. Even more enchanting is the beauty of the place. It is so great and beautiful. It seems like crying looking at and feeling it. There is definitely a sense of life in those great mountains, falls and ever green forests (and of course the leeches:P). I remember one famous quote in a beautiful picture depicting nature, 'God's voices can be heard in many other ways'. The mighty Kodachadri and the gorgeous Arishinagundi which rest ever silently and peacefully in a beautiful bed of roses ie sahyadris away and unmindful of all the traffic and chaos in the city definitely were giving me a message, a message of peacefulness, unshakable strong resolve, immense strength, sturdiness and a strong enduring message of how majestic and powerful are the creations of nature are and how small we humans and our little creations are in front of it. Jai Hind!! Jai Sahyadri!!

Arishinagundi Falls 'Blair Witch Project' like Footsteps in Scary Jungle

Some advice :

1. Take good protection against leeches, the base of the hill is ruled by leeches and they dont like to entertain the intruders in their territory. The area is flooded with leeches even in post rainy season or early winter because of wet ground.
2. Once near the temple at Kodachadri peak, for accommodation and food, always ask in either of the two Bhattas, the authentic Parameshwar Bhatta whose house is at an elevation and Nagesh Bhatta who lives just below. If you are more in number or dont get in Bhattas, then ask in guest house.
3. The guest house accommodation is descent and well maintained but the guest house guy Rajendra is a bit greedy and tries to find ways to extract money out of you (For not taking food at him for the dinner the guy charged 20 Rs per head for the morning food though he had agreed for 10Rs earlier, we fought n didnt give him what he demanded though)
4. Each suite in the guest house has 4 beds and extra beds he gives are no better than mats and blankets he give s arent washed for ages!!!. So in anycase better carry your own blankets.
5. Theres no electricity on top, everything runs on batteries. Lights go off by 8-8:30 at the guest house.
6. Contact Numbers
Guest House Guy - Rajendra - 9242892299, 9242647805.
Nagesh Bhatta - 9448647947
Parameshwara Bhatta - ?
No Hutch coverage, But good Airtel, BSNL signal on top. Better book in advance because during the season, lot of gangs trek to Kodachadri.
7. At Arishinagundi, one has to be a little careful while getting into water. At the end (boundary) of the swimming pool kind of formation into which water falls there is a flat rock ground (beneath the water). One can/should get into water only here. Moreover the flat region is small too. Just few steps towards the falls and it deepens. So be careful not to go beyond that boundary region. Swimming is also discouraged since waters near where falls drops are harsh. We heard from Eeru that, some two weeks before wen went 2 ppl while trying to show their extra swimming skills to nobody had got drowned right there!!!
8. The other easier route of trekking to Arishinagundi via the jeep track into forests 2KMs before Kollur is actualy banned but theres no forest guard or anybody to enforce this law. Hence the rule is not that serious but always restrain yourself from speaking about your trekking heroics through this path to any police or forest personnel whom you could find before, on the way or later.

9. Route map to Kodachadri (Bad drawing regretted:)

Trek to Kodachadri and ArishinaGundi falls : Adventure Ultimatum! (Part 1)

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 10:24:33 GMT

Last November we at office decided to trek to Kodachadri. What was expected as a would be moderately good trek later turned out to be an adventure of our lives with a little bit of risk factor added to it.

The place and the legend

Kodachadri (altitude of around 1800 mts) is a beautiful relatively unexplored hill station in the Western Ghats (Sahyadris) in Shimoga dist along the boarder with Dakshina Kannada dist in Karnataka. The hill rests in 'Mookambika Reserve Forest' and in the backdrop is the famous temple town of Kollur of deity Mookambika. Atop the hill theres a temple too and half an hours climb from the temple takes you to the the peak of Kodachadri, which is most famous for sunrises and sunsets.

It is believed, Shankaracharya once meditated at the peak of the the hill at a place now called 'Sarvagna Peeta' and installed the 'Moola Mookambika' statue translating to 'The Original Mookambika' at the temple below. Since some rare herbal and medicinal plants are found abundantly in the hill, mythologically it is believed that Kodachadri was the actual 'Sanjeevini Parvatha' carried by Lord Hanuman as a remedy for Laxman's injuries. Hence Kodachadri is also largely a place of religious and mythological significance too apart being a heaven for trekkers.

Getting there
The base of the hill is around 380 KMs from Bangalore and 20KM from Kollur.The peak of the hill is around 8-10 KM from the base and should on an average take 4-5 hrs to climb (comfortable one day trek even if you start late). Base of the hill called Karakatte gate can reached in two ways. There are buses (KSRTC Rajahamsa) to Kollur from Bangalore via Mangalore and Via Shimoga. If you take the via Mangalore route, once in Kollur you need to hire a jeep or an AutoRiksha to Karakatte. If you take the via Shimoga route (which goes through towns/villages named HosaNagara , Nagara, JayaNagara, Karakatte is on the way (hence you can save time). 20 KMs before Kollur you need to get down (asking the bus to stop). The bus drivers and conductors of KSRTC should be mostly aware of the Karakatte stop. There is no gate as such at Karakatte gate, there is just a mud path to your left (coming from bangalore side) that goes into forests and continues on to Kodachadri.

Karakatte is the place that is exactly the boarder point between Shimoga and South Canara dists. You can find a old broken stone board mentioning this and also theres a board few steps ahead showing this area as 'Mookambika Wild Life Sanctuary'. In the present conditions, via Mangalore route takes longer with terribly bad roads in Shiradi ghat (technically theres actually no road!), hence via Shimoga route is strongly recommended which is largely good.
There are numerous other trekking routes to Kodachadri, but the Karakatte is the most easiest, well known and usually preferred one. For other routes which could be more challenging please read this post. For the Ooty and Kodaikanal trekkers theres even a jeep service that takes you all the way till the temple along a different jeep track (21 KM), (not sure where exactly the jeep track starts but i guess jeeps start from Kollur and the forest check in point must be closer to Kollur). But be ready to spill out thousands of extra bugs into the tummies of those greedy drivers who are ever ready to take good advantage of the fact that you are too fat to trek.

I beg the authorities not to asphalt the jeep track and develop Kodachadri as a popular Hill station though theres big big scope to do it. Otherwise the beautiful Kodachadri would soon loose its chaste and charm and gradually become a waste dumping place for silly people. It is great as it is on now, peaceful and very beautiful never visted and corrupted by Ooty and Kodaikanal trekkers from cities like Bangalore. .............................

(Complete Photo Gallery)

(My Freind Amber's Album)

Date : Nov 25, 26^th weekend 2006

Kodachadri War Heroes: The war heroes consisted of 19 people mostly from our clan and some friends' friends from other clans. The team looked crowded with some last minute additions. We were all in full enthu, geared and ready to go armed with all the Artilleries and 'Weopens of Mass Protection'. The 'War Heroes' of Kodachadri,

Pratap (me) Venkat Karthik Gagan Venki

Balaji Piyush N Piyush D Manisha Kruthi

Sindhu Harshita Kuldeep Nirmal Amber

Neha Sumeet Nitin Puneet Eeru(our guide)

Things we carried : Lots of fruits, cucumbers, chocolates, bread, chapathi-roti-curry, salt-chuna for leeches, kerosene (we forgot to unload and left it inside KSRTC bus!), 11 sleeping bags for 19 ppl(some ppl dint want:P), first aid and many other trekking utilities. Detailed referral list.

Plan : Reach Karakatte through Via Shimoga bus by 8AM and start trekking. Reach the top at least by late afternoon. Climb to the peak for the sunset. Rest at the guest house on top. Return early the next day, either trek to Arishinagundi falls near the base of the hill or visit a beach nearby.

Here we go !

On 24^th Fryday night we couldnt get full 19 tickets to Kollur in a single bus that goes via Shimoga. So we booked tickets to Shimoga in a RajaHamsa bound to JogFalls. The bus left Majestic at 9:30 and reached Shimoga early in the morning at 3:30. Then we had to catch a bus to Hosanagara at 4. We were at Hosanagara at 6. Then had to catch a private bus to Nagara at 6:30. Had tea at Nagara at a hotel that could even specialize in Gobi Manchuri ! (but no baby corn or paneer manchurian!) and boarded one more bus to Karakatte at 7:45. With all these drama and delay we finally arrioved at Karakatte our start point at 9:30, a good 2 hrs beyond our plan schedule. After quickly distributing the luggage we started our trek.

The Initial Forest Trek

The first 5 KMs of the trek is though a jeep trail kind of path under the cover of dense ever green Sahyadri forests. The late morning walk was a very pleasant experience with lush cheer evoking greenery everywhere and just enough number of sun rays penetrating through the little holes of the thick canopy cover over our heads. To add to this the ever present melodious background score from the trees and the birds they housed made our walk very very healthy. Here and there during this stretch we were welcomed by leeches which could only amazed us as tiny little never before seen new species!, leaving the horror stories reserved for the latter part of the trek the next day. Once in a while we would get short stretches of open land exposing to our eyes the first sights of the mighty Kodachadri in the backdrop.

Late Breakfast at Kaka's

After continuing for 3 KMs along the thick green forest path around 11 we entered a small village called 'Valur' which welcomes us with a large open space out of the forests. Things visible are a school at a furlong away, some houses and the famous (among trekkers) Malayali Hotel 'Hotel Santosh' or 'Kaka Hotel' and of course as always standing tall the mighty hill in the backdrop. Some distance into the forests there is a ISCON ashram, we didnt visit/see it. Just half a KM before Santosh Hotel, a small and mysterious path (if there is one) goes to the dreaded ArishinaGundi falls deep deep inside the tropical jungle. Will cover that (mis) adventure later. We took some good rest at Kaka's. Drank and filled loads of water at the water tap. Had a late breakfast of bread, jam, cheese and Venkat's Grandma's special lemon rice. After re-energizing ourselves we left the place at 11:45.

Uphill Climb in the woods and open grass

After Valur the wide jeep trail shrinks down completely into a small, narrow trekking path into the woods again. Just a furlong from Kaka's into the forests there is a confusing Y point with paths onto your left and straight. We need to take the path that goes up and straight to your right. (the other path would join the uphill path sometime later) The uphill climb becomes relatively tougher and steep. After some 2-3 Kms uphill trek under the forest cover one would enter the open grassy hilly area. The open grassy uphill climb continues all the way till the top with regular short stretches of valley tree cover when we cross from one hillock to another. With ever present view of the vast stretch of majestic Sahyadri mountains on all your sides, the open hill climb was very thrilling and exhilarating.

We took a good number of snaps at many vantage points on the way. At some places the path would get tougher and steeper slowing down our pace considerably owing mainly to the presence of good number of freshers in the team. Supporting each other and taking numerous good breaks in between we finally arrived at the temple or Kodachadri village at around 3:30. Huh ! we had reached our first pit stop!.

At the Temple, the Magical Peak, the beautiful Sunset

We quickly checked into the PWD guest house room which I had booked 3 days back via phone (numbers at the end of the article). The accommodation we got was a decently maintained suite having one big hall, veranda and a toilet. Apart from the guest house there are couple of houses near the temple which serve food to trekkers. At 4 we quickly had our lunch of chapathis, rotis with curry, chatnipudi (everybody wanted more of it, it was very tasty) and jam. Around 4:45 we left for the peak for the famous sunset. Some people out of tiredness opted to stay at the guest house. That was kind of good for others too since we had so much package left at the guest house. From the guest house the peak is roughly 30-45 mins walk and relatively easier. Heavy mist had already set into the high mountains ahead. We were at the peak at 5:30.

There is a small temple like structure on top housing a small statue of Shankaracharya. This is the 'Sarvagna Peeta'. There is a priest too. There was a good cloud cover all around blocking the sun. For sometime sun played hide and seek with clouds occasionally appearing brightly for short times. We patiently waited till sunset hoping the clouds would go away completely just in time for the sunset. Sadly nature had other ideas. At the end under cloud cover we were slightly fortunate to get a small glimpse of the famous sunset of Kodachadri. Also the large cloud formations engulfing the small hillocks below us presented a fantastic view. We left the peak around 6:30 or so with darkness descending very fast on us. With torches in our hands we arrived at the temple base around 7.

The (in) famous Bhattas of Kodachadri and their Rivalry

Once down we had to arrange for lunch. We knew that there are two Bhattas families which serve relatively good food. Even the guest house guy also serves food in competition to the Bhattas. Through my research I had learnt that only one Bhatta ie Parameshwara Bhattaâ serves good honest food (he is relatively a old man) and people had advised against taking food from others. But there we learnt that the good Bhatta could not afford to cook for us that night since he didnt have servants and his house itself was flooded with relatives he said. So thinking any Bhatta should be somehow good and honest, we en quired in the second Bhatta's, Nagesh Bhatta who lives just below. I dont know weather hes really a Bhatta or somebody who just renamed himself as Bhatta after the popularity of the original Parameshwara Bhatta primarily to compete in a lucrative mountain buissness to serve food to assumably rich walleted people who come from Bangalore. By appearance he was looking like a honest Bhatta though. Alas ! know way of proving the Bhatta authenticity. However crookish you look, just wear a saffron lungi and some Vibhuti on your body - you are a Bhatta!.

To add to this, one thing that made me laugh uncontrollably was when some other trekking group guys who were having the supposedly bad food given by the guest house guy (his name is Rajendra) calling him as Bhatta !!. For us the guy finally turned out to be a greedy crook harassing us and trying extract maximum money out of us. For everyone Bhatta, Bhatta seems to be a nice word to say for the caller and nice word to be addressed in for the callee ! But that does not mean you go on and start calling everybody you see on road as Bhatta, Bhatta ? !?!

'Kodachadri Simple meals' at Chinese, North Indian, Multi National, Multi Continental (enough!) Cook Nagesh Bhatta's

After boolking dinner for 19 we returned to our guest house and had bath in chilling cold water. Some people also had bath in open tap outside!. Around 8:30 food was ready. We went to Nagesh Bhatta's small Hotel converted house. Amazingly he had seeting for all 19. He has converted 3/4 of his small house into a hotel. Have to say hes giving the original Bhatta (Parameshwar Bhatta) a good run for his money!. The dinner was simple rice with Sambar with alu and rasam. For Bhatta making rasam is very simple, just remove the alu from sambar ! you get tasty rasam! Our host Nagesh Bhatta even had a name for the meal 'Simple Kodachadri Meals'! Anyway you have to say the food was very good whatever the athenticity of the Bhatta was. He charged 25 Rs per head.

One funny thing was, while settling the amount Nagesh Bhatta proclaims he can do all kinds of North Indian, Chinese dishes !!! but we have to tell him in advance!! I was about to ask what about Arabian and African ?! Poor guy ! He thinks we Bangalorens come to Kodachadri to relish his famous beyond the boundary buffets! What marketing strategy yar! I just forgot to ask him to put up a board in front of his home. 'Kodachadri Bhatta's', Mutilicuisine specialists in North Indian, Chinese blah blah blah (Have to book 3 days in advance) !

Night falls... Whoooo.... Cold!!!

So after the humorous endeavor at the second Bhatta's (Now i can call him authentic Bhatta since he provided quite good food) returned to our guest house. Waiting there was the new self proclaimed Bhatta (fake) of Kodachadri Mr Rajendra urf Mr. Guest House Greedy Guy. The guy after learning that we had food outside, harassed us for not taking food at him and called the Bhattas good food below as stale. Not willing to argue with him more, we booked the forced morning breakfast with him for 19 of us at a cost of 10rs per plate.

Now after a tiring day of trek we all wanted to throw ourselves onto bed. But there were less beds. In the hall there were only 4 beds, but we were 19 of us!.. The fake Bhatta ie Rajendra agreed to supply extra beds (or were they still raw materials of beds?). We spread out the the extra bed kind stuff (raw jute) and covered them with thin bedspreads he gave. Upon that we placed the horribly dirty unwashed blankets he supplied and upon that our sleeping bags. Like this we somehow managed and slept through the night. The night was very cold.

Morning and Descent

Morning I woke up around 6 and quickly finished the shit buissness before it got crowded. We had just one toilet to share among 19 ! Early morning some people were more eager to climb to the peak again in for the sunrise including me. But out of tiredness, many were in no mood to get up early. So the good idea had to be scrapped. In the little time we had me, Venkat, Venky, Piyush N and Kuldeep decided to trek to Agasthya Theertha falls which is a half KM simple walk into the forests from the temple. The path starts just behind the authentic Parameshwar Bhatta's house and one has to just keep folllowing the long water pipe that that has been connected from the falls to the habitation near the temple. It turned out there was not much water in the falls. We returned and had average breakfast at the new born Guest house Bhatta's.

Without wasting much time we quickly packed and were ready to climb down. During the previous evening there were some cries from some members in the team of hiring a Jeep to go down instead of trekking. To use/misuse such human weaknesses, the hungry and greedy jeeps were always there waiting. Many were against to it, but had felt only those who wished to do so can carry on and others would trek and the two groups meet again later. But later somehow everybody came to a consesus that we came to kodachadri as trekkers and should bid good bye to it as trekkers and we descended down. It was 9. Our target was to reach Kaka's in 2 hours. The descent was faster and fun. The first group (mine) reached Kaka's well ahead of the target at 10:30. The second group arrived late at 11. While climbing down, some people suffered minor bruises due to slipping at places.

Puttu Feast at Kaka's

We spent a good 1 hour at the Kakas cooling ourselves, during which we flooded the Kakas kitchens. Seeing couple of people having Puttu (Traditional Kerala food having rice and cocunut cubes served with Channa curry) and Idlis, everybody bounced on and had countless plates of them. The hotel owner-cum-supplier-waiter and his wife cook-cum-supplier were kept heftily busy running

The nineteen hungry souls had gluttoned so many plates of Puttu and Idli that the Kaka forgot the count and we had to count individually and tell him, how many plates were ransacked. Food was Ok to say the least. It was first time for many feasting at a dark shabby place like Kakas totally unmindful of the aftermath that could follow! ( I have even darker memories like this during past treks).

Thus..

So like this, our great trek was finally over. My everlasting dream of scaling Kodachadri which has had a very special place in my heart and minds over a long time though i was 400 KMs away was fulfilled, achieved and DONE!.. ................................................. Or was it really? As they said in English movies and still continue to say in most Indian movies, the Real Adventure had just begun !!!

Read on to the unforgettable trek to arishinagundi falls in the next post.

To be Continued.... at Trek to Kodachadri and ArishinaGundi falls : Adventure Ultimatum! (Part 2)

January 2007 Rangashankara

Wed, 10 Jan 2007 12:49:29 GMT

Major plays to watch out this month at R'shankara which Iam eagerly awaiting to watch,

Jan 10, 11th
HELL'S BELLS & FURTIVE FOLLY
A Dance Theatre Improvisation
Compagnie Drift Switzerland

Jan 13th, 14th
Shakuntala
Kannada
Kaalidasa,Suresh Anagalli

Jan 18th
A MID SUMMER'S NIGHT DREAM
Kannada
Rohit R Padaki

20th, 21th
JUGARI CROSS
Kannada
Poorna Chandra Tejasvi
Nataraj Honnalli

23, 24
NEENAANAADRE
NAANEENENA?
Kannada
Adopted from Sheksphere's 'Comedy of errors'
S Surendranath

26,
HUTTADALLI HUTTA
Kannada
Kailasam, Dr. B V Rajaram

27
MYSOORA MALLIGE
Kannada
Dr. B V Rajaram

Complete schedule at : http://www.nettigritty.com/rangashankara/newsletter/2007/01/
you can subscribe to monthly schedule newletters at : http://www.nettigritty.com/rangashankara/

New Phone !

Wed, 10 Jan 2007 08:36:43 GMT

The person that is me, who once a year back was of the sound seeming opinion that having each major gadget separately in its entirety is ideal than having bits and pieces of each of it in one thing now finds himself at the feet of the cool and fancy linux running 'Motorola Ming'.

Mr. Bean, Elementary Dating

Mon, 09 Oct 2006 17:32:16 GMT



"Mr. Bean, Elementary Dating" on Google Video
Rowan Atkinson, Elementary Dating This a very hilarious Rowan Atkinson Live Performance.

Trek to MullayanaGiri

Sun, 08 Oct 2006 07:25:51 GMT

Last month on 2nd Sept, i trekked to MullayanGiri during a family visit to Chikmaglur. The first trek of the season. Last time in Nov had been here on bike. MullayanGiri is the tallest peak in Karnataka. It is a part of Bababudan ranges of the western ghats in Chikmaglur Dist. Along the same range one would get BababudanGiri, Kemmangundi hills also. Atop there is a temple of Mullaya or God Shiva. MullayanaGiri literally means 'Mountain of Mullaya' or 'Mountain of God Shiva'.

We(me and my uncle Mahaveer) started at around 11 in the morning in a bike from Chikmaglur. In less than 15 mins we were at the foot hills of MullayanGiri. Road goes through coffe estates all the way. The road actually goes to BababudanGiri. After some 10 Kms from Chikmaglur town one would get a deviation to the left, which marks the tar road to MullayanaGiri that goes almost to the top. Just a little distance from the deviation one would get the foot route to the hill called 'SarpaNadi'. It is a age old route made by devotees to walk up to the Shiva temple on top of the hill.The trek route is still in a good condition with moderate difficulty levels with some parts of the climb being steep. Its is not advisable to trek here during rainy season. Its is actually 'Sarpana Hadi' which in Kannada translates to 'Snake Path'. It is called so since the path till the top goes very twisted and curvy like the way snake moves. Hence the name.

(All the Photos);

We parked the bike on the road side and started trekking. The path was bit slippery because of last night's rains. At times we had to be very careful. One thing that catches your eyes all the way is the cheer evoking, lush and complete greenery everywhere. Giant serene mountains clothed in thick carpet of greenery is a wonderful sight. And moreover the weather was good, no daunting clouds above, gentle breeze of air at times and just enough presence of sunlight to enjoy a perfect day trek.

After a short climb from the base, at many places there are deviating routes from the main path. These can be very confusing. We lost our way twice entering into these routes which would end nowhere. We went into a region of the hill which was very very steep. But later somehow managed to join the main route. While trekking one can get a good view of some 3-4 giant rocks above covered with greenery which look like untouched Rushmore hill rocks. They look bit scary too. Also one would get a good view of Bababudan Giri and the microwave tower on top of it in the far left.

Three fourth the way up there is a old statue of Nandi in a cool, cozy place enclosed by trees. Thats a good place to rest and eat. After roughly an hour and half climb we could see the ancient compound of the temple wall. Just before the peak there is a cave. Cave looked spooky, but provides a fantastic view of the scenery below. All in all it took less than 1 hour and 45 mins to scale the tallest peak in Karnataka. One should note that the base of the hill (chikmaglur town) itself is at a high altitude.

The vantabge point welcomes us with breath taking views all around of the landscape below. We spent sometime walking around the temple. The priest's family alone lives atop. The tar road that leads to the top is clearly visible from the top. Also one could clearly spot the trekking route that goes to BababudanGiri.

We had our lunch of apples and bread and soon after started descending down. Our target was to reach down in 1 hour and we could do it. While we had to be more careful because of slippery terrain and at some places i slipped and fell too. At about 4:30 we were at Chikmaglur.

Along the deadly curves of Charmadi

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 13:37:56 GMT

Is that an accident or a rubbing of shoulders gone bad ?!:P or simply an amazing piece of photography?!:P

PS : This was taken in Charmadi ghats on the way from Chikmaglur to Dharmasthala. Thankfully nobody died:)

Shameless Childishness

Fri, 29 Sep 2006 06:28:25 GMT

Meke Datu 013
Originally uploaded by PrathapBN.

This was a sign board presumably officially put by Forest Dept near the start of the mud road that leads to the beautifual natural spot of 'Meke Datu' in Kanakapura Dist, Karnataka.

The board reads
Line 1 : 'Prati Obbarige pravesha shulka 20-00 Rs(Bharatheeyarige)
Line 2 : 'Prati Obbarige pravesha shulka 80-00 Rs(Videsheeyarige)

If we translate it, it mandates different entry fees for 'Indians' and 'Foreigners'. You dont need to guess why a diff scale of people of diff races for the same mud and water. Here the intended defenition of a Foreigner means, some rich, sunglass clad white traveller who comes from a rich country like US or Europian. But thats not spelled out here.
Now the question is what if a middle class Pakistani or Srilankan or Nepali or Bangladeshi makes a trip to Meke Datu by chance. Poor fellow though his income is less than an average Indian middle classer, does he have to pay up 4 times what we relatively affluent Indians pay up???

So the boarding should actually have been '80-00' for 'white foreigners' or even more specifically like '80-00 for those people whose country has a per-capita income of so and so or above'.
For the people who shamelessly practice such racist policies, why the hell they wont be more elaborative in the defenition of who a 'Foreigner' is. From this atleast 'poor tourists' from Asia and Africa would be spared of paying up more than what they can afford.

Its really sad that such childish, racist policies are in place and that too with Govt's full consent. Is this the way he hospitallize foreign tourists to our country ?? We have heard of petty minded vendors duping gullible foreigners charging excess amounts. How different our honourary govts are?? It is a shame that a supposed to be hospitable, respectable and a responsible establishment itself follows it.

My Favourite film dialogue/scene

Mon, 25 Sep 2006 02:30:13 GMT

This is from the movie 'Mr.Bean Ultimate disaster Movie'.
Scene, ceremony to mark the arrival of famous painting 'Whistler's Mother' to American soil painted by famous American painter Whistler. Poor Mr.Bean or rather Dr. Bean, the famous arts scholar:P from 'London school of Art' is called onto the stage to say few words about the significance of the Painting 'Whistler's Mother' which incidently would been disfigured by him. Dr.Bean walks to the stage trembling with fear. He doesnt know what to say.. He doesnt no a thing about art. Then he gathers all courage and strength and makes his most-infamous, most hilarious and very very true and relevant to Mr.Bean's famous eccentric character with Beanism oozing all around it.

Hello...., I'm Dr. Bean. Apparently.... And.. And.. my job is to sit and look at paintings.
(All Audiance clap in appreciation thinking what he said was a mark of a great art lover, but in reality by sitting and looking at paintings he meant he was a watchman in a art gallery:D)

And.. So, what have I learned that I can say about this painting?.. Hmm.. Well...Well.., firstly, it's quite big, which is excellent. If it were very small, microscopic (you know), then hardly anyone would be able to see it. Which would be a tremendous shame.

And Secondly...., and I'm getting quite near the end of this... analysis of this painting... (struggles, looks around to get some idea what to say) , secondly(some pause again..)...., why was it worth this man here (Poiting to some Military Guy who bought the painting) spending fifty million of your American dollars on this potrait?... And.. and the answer to that is, well.. this picture is worth such a lot of money becaaaause..(pauses as if to think a lot), it's a picture of Whistler's mother. And as I've learned, staying with my best friend David Langley and his family, families are very important. And even though Mr. Whistler was perfectly aware that his mother was a hideous old bat who looked like she'd had a cactus lodged up her backside (unusual smile in the audiance) he stuck with her, and even took the time to paint this amazing picture of her. It's not just a painting, it's a picture of a mad old cow whom he thought the world of. And that's marvellous. Well that's what I think:):):)

Then Dr.Bean with a very chubby and cute face poses for photo with press. All ends well:)

This scene is a perfect example to show what a alround comic genius Rowan Atkinson is. In his episodes he hardly speaks In the form of a innocent, childish buffon who often falls in trouble, made some mind blowingly hilarious comedy out of nothing. Many would have been sceptical of his skills with verbal comedy. Through this he has shown that he is no mug when it comes to talking. And he does it in style speaking all out but at the same time without loosing a bit of his famous eccentric Beanism. Further he also showed his verbal skills in 'Johny English'. Watch out of new Bean movie in 2007... 'Bean 2'

PS : 'I practice these dialogues everyday in my bathroom, particularly his description of Whistler's mother as a ' hideous old bat who looked like she'd had a cactus lodged up her backside'.

'SeaGull' at Rangashankara

Wed, 13 Sep 2006 12:10:21 GMT

Last weekend had been to Anton Chekhov's play 'Sea Gull' staged at Rangashankara by RangaYana of Mysore directed by noted Theatre director Baharul Islam. Anton Chekhov is a noted and acclaimed playwright who lived in the latter part of 19th century. 'Sea Gull' is regarded as one of his finest works. Play is translated to Kannada by Dr.Hema PattanaShetti. I was a bit tired after a day of cricket near office, still managed to go for the play in the evening. There wasent much rush, still the auditorium was 3/4 full, still i had bought a ticket in advance via Madhur (lots of thanks to him) who stays very close to Rangashankara. Not being conscintious enough i could not get tickets to last week's comedy 'Heegadre Hege?'.

The play revolves around the life and troubles of four theatrical and literature personalities living in a cozy small village resting on the banks of a peaceful river full of SeaGulls somewhere in Russia. Cast, first, Irina is a famous actress who mostly cares for a luxurious, pompus way of living. Her begginer writer, playwright son Treplyov. Budding actress Nina whos is not well looked after by her step mother. Finally Trigorin, a famous, young, acclaimed writer whos always discontent and contemplating on why people and press dont recognize him on par with the likes of Tolstoy.

Treplyv has a bad start to his writing career with his plays getting caustic reviews but none closest and dearest around him show any concern for him. Especially his own mother Irina always makes fun of him instead of trying to help him out. Irina always would compare Treplyv to Trigorin to mock and insult him. Irina would have lots of fondness for Trigorin. Once Treplyv writes a play and stages it where he lead casts Nina, his childhood sweetheart. The play is ridiculed by his mother and Trigorin who interrupt it many times in the middle, which sets Treplyv into a state of depression. He once tries to kill himself by shooting. To add to his woes Nina being a ardent fan of Trigorin's writings falls in love with him after metting him for the first time. Nina flees with Trigorin to Moscow. Irina too sets off to the big city with her aging brother leaving her hapless son impoverish in depression caused by contempt hurled at him from all sides. In the course of time unfaithful Trigorin abandones Nina in pursuit of other women leaving her in a state of mental unrest. Finally after two years when everybody arrives at the village for a gathering, poor Treplyv who would have spent much of prime life time in depression unbale to bear the ignorance just shoots and commits suacide.

As we see, the play in itself doesnt have a strong storyline nor does it have a central figure. Its not a flaw but actually its meant to be that way. Anton Chekhov intended the play to focus on lifestyle and conflicting mentalities of four artists and writers by taking a leaf out of thier lives. Its not intended to be a typical melodrama of those days. Hence the play assumes a tag of being far ahead of its time. When it was first staged in Russia it was written off by melodrama loving public of that time as rubbish, but later it recieved high critical acclaim and today its regarded as one of the best plays penned by a Russian playwrigh during the pre-modern era.

Iam still perplexed why the play was named 'Sea Gull'. May be just because the events in the play took place amidst the scerenity a place full of SeaGulls around or is there something else to it. During the play i also saw noted Theatre personnality, teacher, actress and columnist Laxmi Chandrashekar who was amongst the audiance sitting in row next to me, taking down notes during the play that would probably help her in her review of the play that would hit a newspaper's art segment soon.

Funky City Darshan Buses in Bangalore

Wed, 26 Jul 2006 08:40:54 GMT

A private transport company is soon to introduce these new nice looking double deker buses with a funky open top seating in Bangalore. They look very attractive. They are named 'City Swaps'. Open top sounds really cool. This is new age over the top riding, teasing the village folk in rurals who climb the roof tops of buses and have a deadly ride.

They are just like the 'Tourist friendly Bangalore Darshan' buses KSRTC has, but tickets are a bit costlier at 300 Rs per head. The buses would be frequent and would stop at some designated places.

(Click here for Full Story)

'ART' and 'Hysteria' : Evam's Two plays at R'shankara

Tue, 25 Jul 2006 05:29:50 GMT

Last week i made time to match two plays being stages in R'shankara by Evam a promising theatre company from Chennai. They have become quite popular particularly amongst youth doing both serious and comic plays. Last time they had staged 'Chapter 2' which i missed.

ART

The First of the plays 'ART' was staged from Tue JUly 18th to Saturday 22nd. I watched the show on Wednesday. Accompanying me was my friend Manu (i incidently intentionally:P inflicted the doose of theatre into his blood). I was quite exited about the play because of good promos and publicity. The play narrates a comic yet conflicting situation between three best friends Sarj, Marc and Yvan over a piece of art. Sarj is a kinda of art lover. Marc is a contemplative guy. Vyan is a simplton whos holding on to a fragile job and is just about to be married.

Sarj buys a painting for a whooping 200,000 Francs. Marc sees absolutely nothing to talk about in the painting. Calling it just a piece of 'White Shit', he criticizes Sarj as a fool to have spent so much on virtually nothing. But Sarj doesnt agree, he sees a great piece of art in the paintingand calls it a masterpiece. Most of the play revolves around the comic war of words on this silly issue between the two friends. Poor Yvan, caught between his two best friends is confused and doesnt know which side to take.

First half of the play was dull and looked more silly than comic. It was feeling like i was audiance was trying to laugh or rather forced to laugh than laugh genuinely. Second half was somewhat better and had some good funny moments.

Overall i would say, the play didnt live up to its pre-performance hype and expectations. I expected comedy to run riot, but that didnt happen. The problem here is the subject they have taken is a silly, small issue. The issue seemed fit to be a funny part of a larger play than the play itself. When you build an entire one and half hour play revolving around the silly, small issue, its a challenging and harder task to insert comedy all along the play, because the scope is restrictive, subject is small. They failed in it to some extent i would feel.

Right throught, the play mainly consisted of too lengthy, expressive, animated dialogues filled with complex vocabulary and words on the silly issue of painting, which although abstractly sound comic didnt really specifically make me laugh. Plus points, there were some incidents including those of Yvan which made me laugh genuinely. Performance, dialogue delivery, stage were exceptional. Evam have a novel idea of having the audiance attention all throught in having a boy enact playing violin during back stage re-dressing done inbetween the play.
So overall i would say, a good time pass play that didnt live up the pre-performance hype it created.

Python Hysteeeeeria

Python Hysteria was a series of sketches adapted from the 'Monty Pythons' or 'Pythons' , a popular British Television comedy sketch show of the 60s. Sketches were enacted by only 3 actors Karthik, DMK and Sunil. They were more funnier than ART and almost ran a laughter riot all throught.

The last sketch was a comic adaption of the legend of Hamlet by W'llm Shakesphere. Though most parts were very humorous, sometimes it felt they kind of streched on a single comic issue for too long. One completely different thing was, they involved audiance in making the comedy more livelier. They promoted as comedy, making audiance to do silly stuff like waving hands, shouting sketch dialogues and even had two of the audiance come on to the stage and play characters!! They made them to do silly things. Now can you call all of this genuiene comedy ? or they are trying to promote something silly and sensational as good quaility comedy.

Its new idea having the audiance involved, but did it have anything really special or spectacular in it? Sure it made us have a great time shouting dialogues like Ofilia( Hamlet's sweetheart) character saying 'CUT THE CRAP HAMLET!!. MY BIOLOGICAL CLOCK IS TICKING!!. I WANT BABIES NOW!!' True, we had a great fun in it, but is that real comedy?.. I mean anybody can do such stunts. In that way the other sketches were better off than the hamlet sequence. But i dont back from saying, it had numerous very very funny moments as well. The best i liked was, when Hamlet jumps onto the stage from behind with the background music of a latest Rajanikanth's movie (Chandramukhi? where he rides a chariot). Also doing backstage acts on front were also refreshingly funny.

Overall it was a great time out, had lots and lots of fun. It was rocking and worth every penny.