Mumbai deluge

It was an unusual tuesday.I had my best clothes on . It was raining heavily - and to the people around it seemed normal. I did ask a few people does it rain so hard in Mumbai. Most people replied in the affirmative, so i in all the non-chalence went to the computer lab. Here u are insulated from the vagaries of the weather. Water had started to fill up on the walkways as the drains had begun overflowing.It was a just a heavy rain.

The real power of the rain flew in my face only at about 8:30 when I decided to end my cyber-adventures. Water had entered the coridoor leading to the lab. I started walking back to the hostel. Workers were trying to prevent water from entering the library , mind u its at a high level and the sheer force of water was forcing it up the walkway into the entrance. As I made my way down in the incessant rain - the roads were full. Walking was getting dangerous - luckily i got hold of a buddy amd we made our way thru the roaring road.

As we neared the hostel , the water was unsually rapid.The grounds had overflowed and water was going over the roads. I had a feeling that hostels would be saved - we had the lake nearby and its can be relied upon to keep its level. But the hopes were dashed people were wading in knee deep water. The hostel lounge had become a big dirty pool. My heart sunk - i knew that with so much water and a lot cot that i had i was sure to have a drenched bed. I was so sure that i decided not to try to save it. I went to the mess.

The mess was in a mess , but luckilly they had made us food unlike other flooded hostels. As i was having food the power was switched off. Dark in the flood is terrible feeling. Mobile phones with torch lights came to the rescue and i was able to get out of the mess. I was still a bit afraid to go to my room. I went to the porch to find no one and a survey of the people i knew turned up negative. So all alone in the muck (alone in the crowd) i decided to rtry my luck with checking my room . I navigated by stray lights on the street (the street lights were'nt somehow affected. and feeling the walls. Found my room with the plywood in the cot detached and floating with my bed on it. Found a torch , i made my way back to the porch. This time i made a quite a lot of friends as people wanted the use of my torch. The next few hours were spent assessing the damage in other rooms. Computers on the floor were in a nasty condtion so were boxes and bags. Luckilly i had thought those of mine to be an eyesore and put them up safely on a high shelf.

No power , a lot of mumbaiya mosquitoes - they have a different kindof sting. It would't alloew our group to sleep. We had thought of going to other hostels, but had dropped it as dangerous in the flood. The water had begun to recede and the rain to stop. We were refugees in the hostel 5.

Dawn broke - i returned to my room to find it filled with slush ankle deep. Cleaning it is another story.

This was just about a thousand times less tham what Mumbai suffered. Not only did they have water in their room - no power , no water even to drink , toilets that did'nt work . It was hell to most of others. Thank God that it was just small demonstration of Nature's powers here at the IIT.

The way on the Konkan

Travelouges are not ending yet , i'm still teavelling. This time up north along the pristine railroad up the Konkan. I was on the Netravathi express starting at 14 hours .The beginning is uneventful as in it was still passing through the familiar sights of Kerala. The deep rivers near the end of theirs as i was to begin mine , sense of apprehension of new things that is always there seemed to get over me , we crossed the Periyar deep and swift turned into the hinterlands to Shoranur.

Here was our tryst with the Nila the beloved of the poets and the cradle of many a Malayalam poem. The river though in middle of July had not yet filled up to the brim. I must mention that the lean season is a real sad sight with un-connected streams and wells in the river bed. Things were good , the full Bharatapuzha seemed to mirror my heart full with dreams and wishes. Twilight had a strange effect on the water as the train moved along kissing the river. Darkness had fallen as we neared Kadalundi , a train had jumped off tracks here, it did send shivers down my spine, as we are to travel the whole length the Konkan rail - so dangerous in the rains.

The day went down as i made my bed amidst the clattering of the train.

Third Day

The third day was mostly spent in the College, we set out around 3 in the afternoon , it was racing against the night and the harthal.There had been rumours that an all India harthal had been called for the next day.It was against the oil price hike that had taken place.The funny part was that there was a harthal for the very same matter a few days ago in Kerala.But no one there had any inkling of what was happening or even the call.But we cud'nt afford to be stranded for a whole day in the middle of somewhere.

So the race had begun, we wanted to get out of Tamil Nadu by 12 which was supposedly the time where it should begin.Palani was reached in no time and it had only started to get dark.We refilled the car and our stomachs on the way to Pollachi.Dark in TN is dark indeed,even the vehicles are dark indeed.None of the lorries we met in so great numbers along the road had any tail lights.Driving into the back of a lorry was the best or rather the worst was of knowing it was there.Thankfully we never had to do that.The derserted roads were some consolation.

We were within the "Kerala sphere of reach" and very upbeat, the only problem was that the road we took when we came here was in too bad condition to force us to take it again,moreover we would have wanted a better approach to Palghat. So we took the direct route to Palghat ,it was a great road except that we lost about an hour at a railway cross due to an overzealous bus trying to get through the small crossing along with two other vehicles.The signs of the hartal were showing up ,as trucks began to thin out and eventually disappeared.It was much easier to driver and more nervous too.A drizzle had started already itching our frayed nerves.It was like driving through ghost towns - not a soul in sight.Our speed was broken occasionally by few invisible gutters on the road that had lay hidden in the water of the rain which had now grown stronger.As we neared Palghat the rain stopped leaving us wondering wheteher rains occured only in tamil country.A heave of relief and entry into kerala, but no sign of a good settlement.

We had a break 25 km from Palghat and learnt that the harthal had been dwongraded to a lorry and bus harthal.It had struck 10 and we were wavering on whether to spend the night there or press on.Though we did enquire into a hotel - the rates forced us to seek refuge at home 115 km away.It was here the fun started.

Nature decided to remind us that it does rain in Kerala , that too the hard way.It began to rain real hard, the roads began to get flooded and visibility was going down ,the only way to know a vehicle now seemed to be it bright headlights.It rained so hard that the shoulders (the sides of the carriage way) had been washed away and any hard left turns could end up in big messes.

A new phenomenon had begun to cause us trouble - trucks in huge numbers lying on the road sides had begun to stir as on disturbance from an invisible hand.They took to roads in convoys kilometres long - slowing the whole highway down. Not only were they slow they were too hard to overtake in the rain, a good stage for frustration.One convoy led to the other as news spread that the strike had indeed been called off.There was no respite untill the Kuthiran where the trucks slowed down too much and let us pass easily.

Sleep was beginning to get us after the tiring 3 days of driving and the shops showed no sign for satisfying an urge for a tea.We drove on to Angamally the 4 lane point and soon to Kochi to reach home by 1.30 in the night. The end of a 831 of road ,the first on our Maruti Omni at a stretch.

Next day

The next day we had the darshan of Sri Subramanian and took a ropeway down the hill. The off-season did remove the long queues and we even had time for a double darshan.Later in the day we set out towards Madurai.

I must say i love the roads in Tamil-Nadu , they are not like the ones you will find in Kerala - surrounded on both sides by human settlements .They are straight to a degree and cut thru vast open terrain. The Western Ghats make a wonderful scene all along the NH-209. Majestic mountains capped by peaks clothed in dark clouds emptying their contents on the green forests on the other side.

It seems the people here are used to the clouds cheating them, Any kerlalite wid expect a good shower from the dark masses u see in the sky but wud'nt rain a drop.No wonder people live around sources of water .The next things that really caught my attention were the windmills. Its very windly down there with winds catching out car. No wonder they put these huge posts to catch the wind. They are few score metres tall with a single blade of the rotor fitting a big trailer truck. U can imagine the sizes now ? Its not one or two rather hundreds dot the flat hilly landscape. Then we caught a glimpse of the college which my sister is to join and later took a turn south on the NH-7 towards Madurai.It did'nt even seem that this road would be part of the important North-South corridor. A road thru the same kinndof land but without the comfort of roadsigns that lead our way on the 209.

It was a happening city - the ancient capital of the Pandyas.The 16 acre 16 storey Madurai Meenakshi Temple left us spell bound on what could be accomplished in stone.The size and beauty of each pillar and slab that adorns temple are beyond description.So are the shrines of Meenakshi and Sunderaswar.

One thing i remember well was tat we locked ourselves out of the car at Thirupurakundram. All efforts to slide the glass and open the lock were failures.Untill a clever guy in crowd got a piece of hard wire that he managed to prise in between the now slightly open window. The best thing was that he twisted the key out of ignition. That was a real help without which we could have been stranded in the middle of Tamil country without any Tamil on our lips - a very unenviable position.

The rest of the day was uneventful and we proceed to the rest house of the college to spend our night.

Driving

I had always hated to drive around untill last week. I had gone on a long trip (by my standards) to the heart of tamil nadu. It was a 800 km round spread over 3 days.It really got to me to start liking to drive around , feel the pulse of the car as it goes thru a novel experience.

The trip upto Thrissur was uneventful , just the plain old road with rains in between , things got interesting with the 'kuthiran' a difficult hill crossing on the highway. It must have been routine for the rest of the folks but to pass thru the mist did change something in me. Rains that pattered heavily had reduced to showers and drizzles as we moved towards the plains of Tamil Nadu.We did have a glimpse of the Coca Cola factory in Plachimada a reminder of a similar transition in the lives of people in Perumatty. Tamil boards started to appear and we officially crossed into Tamil Nadu thru a broken down checkpost at Meenakshipuram.

The next point on the route was to be Pollachi - a realtively wet place indeed as we go to know. It did look almost like the other side of the lofty Western Ghats which always loomed in the background. It seems that the palms which on the other side had failed to bear a few fruits are here weighing down heavily with them .Vast tracts of light green signified rice growing .Food for the Malayalees now has to come from outside the state - for they have grown too lazy to produce it themselves.The rain still drizzlled and churned the chocolate under the tyres. The road has been removed to lay new one ! The delicious paste stuck to our horns making them blare hoarsely and shorted wires that lay exposed under the vehicle. It beats a hurdle race to drive without a horn in Pollachi.

Our destination for the day was Palani a good hour's drive away.The landscape had dropped to the standard tamilian plain though the mighty ghats were visible to our right.The vegeation had dropped to bushes and people got to be scarce things to be seen . The roads grew better , smoother and faster as night fell. It was earlier than usual for us on the west coast. The tiredness of it all had begun to take it toll . the lights of the holy hillock did keep up our spirits fron afar.We entered Palani late into the evening and had a good night's rest.

The fear factor

I'm on way to a place quite up north , about a thousand kilometres off, but anyway it has managed t o start giving me the creeps. The fact being that it not even due untill a fortnight.

The creeps are a mix of hope and apprehension. Its going to be a big city , with lots of things to see and know and after all the institute being one of the best in the country does fill in a lot of hope.

But certainly i'm not exactly fearless - not after u see the hindi screen this time around ;). It not that , its the inertia to change thats affecting me - one of being far from home for the first time for such a long time. It may be rather a decrese in the level of hope that i wish cud fill up to clear things up.