Ae Ganpat...

So sometimes a song, a word, a phrase, a look seems to get associated with a particular incident/event/ trip.

Such is the case with my weeknd sojourn to Yercaud and Hogenakkal falls near Bangalore. Some basic facts before we get to the meat of this post.

Saturday morning we left for Yercaud, a nice idyllic hill station located 230 kilometres from Bangalore. The team comprised of RB, RG, AB and me. On the way back we also took a small detour to Hogenekkal falls (No idea, how it is spelt. In case this spelling is wrong,..er..well..too bad)

Right, got your pea-sized brains around this? Now to the main thing.

Ok, so while we were starting off from bangalore we had the radio playing obscure songs. AND it started blaring this song "Ae Ganpat..chal daaru daal" from the rather sinister yet good movie - 'Shootout at Lokhandwala'. Read about it here http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0811066/

(You really expect me to write about it?? Sheesh, I'm lazy, get it? Even this blog wouldn't exist if I could find someone willing to tap into my thoughts and articulate them for me. What I need is a pensieve to store all these thoughts till I can get a proper interpreter and presenter of these thoughts.) [You don't know what a pensieve is?? DIE ...its from the Harry Potter series... read about it here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pensieve#Pensieve] {WHAT?? if I wrote about it I'd be contradicting myself, Jeez, guys think, use those noodles a bit...}

Anyway, the crux is that this song just got stuck on my tongue and it spread like a virulent disease over the others as well. And by the end of this trip we were asking each other to "ae ganpat...chal window khol" ; "ae ganpat...chal paani de"...and of course "ae ganpat...chal daaru daal" on Saturday evening while we set up our mehfil on the valley facing balcony. (It was beautiful. Our cottage overlooked the valley, mist and clouds swirled over the peaks surrounding the valley. And as the night progressed it was brilliantly awesome to see the grey-white clouds race across the silver disc of the moon.)

So this triggered a thought process in my mind. From my childhood onwards, can I associate one thing (song, phrase, item of clothing, incident) to each of my trips/vacations. I'll list a few and will add more as I think of them.

Warning: Following list is primarily for my use. Not many people will know about the things in the list. So you can skip the following if you're so inclined, I won't get mad at you.

Family vacations:

1. Ooty 1991 or 92 - the red shorts my Mom made me wear in the freezing climate, I'm told I was turning blue on Dodda bedda peak (Tallest peak in Ooty)

2. Mysore 1991 or 92 - Barefoot on the hot marble floor of Tipu Sultan's palace

3. Goa - Weird looking palm tree in the resort we were staying at (yeah, I was with family, so not many interesting memories of Goa, those'll come later :) )

4. Jaipur - Jhoole jhoole lal, dam mast kalandar (Don't ask...pls don't ask)

5. Shimla - Nope nothing

6. Andaman and Nicobar Islands - View of the different coloured currents from atop the lighthouse.

more later, as memory unfolds

With friends:

1. Manali 2000 - Rock climbing, Snow Shiv ling, long long slide on snow leading to almost frost bitten fingers (So? Should I have sacrificed my derriere??...I think not)

2. Dehradun Survey camp - Lost our way and got trapped on the mountain face with night approaching...fast. I've written about this before, will link to that post

3. Dehradun - Forest Reserve Institute vs DCE. I took four wickets :). (1 caught behind [AGC took a brilliant catch diving to his right], 1 caught by R {current roomie} in covers, 1 caught by Sishir - fine leg I think, 1 lbw. And my slower one worked brilliantly that day)

4. IIT Kanpur for Udghosh 2003 - The return journey where we, or rather Mohit Chahar, commandeered one entire 3rd class bogey for our contingent. We travelled like kings, Awesome.

5. Manali 2003 - THE most awesome trip ever. Have dedicated two posts to it. Most interesting memory - easily the SP-drunken-crying-calling-AD-in-Delhi-fit. He shall always remember it - I'll make sure of that !!

After College:

1. Chandigarh : Bhopu bringing the car to a dead stop in the middle of the highway...gulp

2. Bihari wedding: We were "happy" in the train. Brilliant.

3. Rishikesh - The first crash of water into my face while river rafting at Shivpuri

4. Auli - The magical, violet hued coniferous trees from the ski lift. The first flakes of snow floating in the air.

Near Bangalore:

1. Goa 2006 - Kicked out of Mambo's without even letting us complete our sentence. The dreadful banana ride. The exhileration as the para-sailing took off.

2. Pondicherry - Nothing

3. Nandi hills - AK, RB and me, A bottle of exquisite white wine. Nostalgia.

4. Bhimeshwari - Getting on NK's nerves so much that the normally mild-mannered Nikhil turned on me "Pehle tu bata tune kya kya kiya hai?". The look on his face - Priceless!


Wow, I HAVE been living an interesting life. I'll add more as I remember.

In the mean time you can goto the link on the right and rate my blog a perfect 10 :)

Bye kids.