Friends+IPL+....................

Sunday evening
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Friends
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IPL
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Your own Cheese burst Pizza

DON'T
Google on how to do it
(Some super geek asked us to soak the base for a softer pizza and we had to have lasagna )

Use normal tomato's to the topping
(Unless you want a reddened pizza)

DO
Butter the base super generously

Disclaimer

Please ensure all emergency measures are in place before you venture. It helps to have the nearest Dominos/Pizza hut number handy.

Yes people did eat it :D (Suddu boy with the first slice)

Goa - starters for now

To do justice to the serene picturesque landscape I must call this post - Madgaon. A little more than 24 hours is all I had to offer to this place and trust me, was a steal. Met some absolutely cool people (other than the super-cool people who got me there ), had adventurous bike rides, hunted down veg restaurants when the timed calls would not stop coming.But the highlight of the evening - PARA-SAILING - a detailed post on this later. Next day,we also managed to squeeze in a couple of intro-talks - Prabha & Vaidehi taking center-stage - me chipping in towards the end aided by a couple of videos. Soon it was time to bid bye, the train was on time, and it was freezing and unprepared as I am, spent the night wearing another shirt over whatever I was wearing and headed back to EGB 4A-108, IBM by 12'ish, with a mind still stuck at the beach.

Overall enjoyed this one day starter to Goa and cant wait to have the full course meal.

Check out the complete picture gallery here

Bannerghatta

After the shady post prior, I am back to what I do best - more photos.
What was marked as an eventful day (in ways more than one - my best friend was in town, a bad exam result bringing an unceremonious end to a year of preps) also saw the duo (Thomas n me) venture out in accordance with the pre-planned itinerary.




A quick drop @ Maddy's for the lens, and a bumpy 14 km bus ride, we were there @ Bannerghatta National Park. Green (by Bangalore standards) and definitely hot(Jan it was), 125 bucks each and we were in.

What was to follow was some shameless clicking on burst mode (guided by rules of probability more than anything else)-peacocks, snakes,macaques,elephants, pelicans, and quite a few more. Yes - all caged.




Next, it was said was the time to make our tickets worth - a safari to the tiger park - an enclosure targeted to provide a feel of the forest(had nice marked roads with more tyre-prints than pug marks ) - on a really rickety bus (resembles the old blue colored police vans used in tamil movies).


We had waited 10 min for an empty bus and rushed to find a sweet spot for the camera. The 25 min ride - Unimpressive - except for this 'okay' shot of a tiger and a decent shot of this deer. We saved the Butterfly park walk for Thomas's next Bangalore schedule, bought packets of Lays and rushed into a nice VOLVO, another 30 minutes and we were home, editing the day's catch (on a serious note this time, with Thomas around)

View the full set of photos here

MahaSivaratri @ Kollam

Back to Bangalore after 2 days of bliss. An adventure at the start, followed by some carefully inflicted sun shots ( inspite of having lived in Kerala for long, I just could not stand this one around ) and culminating in a blissful SATSANG with GURUJI. HE spoke, sang, danced and took the crowd along on an amazing journey.

Pictures speak more than words. Enjoy them and yeah yeah COMMENT them ( for better pics the next time )



and More

A Moonlit night

Credits :

Prabha & her car :) - popularly called the seva car
Ankur - sheer patient steering skills
Vivin - for waking up@3 & Sushma for not having slept :)

After a gratifying satsang with the Guru @ the Ashram, the journey began. We started off with a brief 5 hours halt @Maddy's, where we put Ankur to sleep & discussed on the camera settings for the night's shots.

(1:00 am ) Next, we were all loaded and set to go.

Things to carry :

Lots of Chocolates & I also prefer Natura
Water ( a bottle of warm water would also be nice )
Biscuits
Music player ( in case your car does not have one )
Emergency Lamps & Powerful torches
A GPRS enabled phone - u ll know why


What to wear :

Loose fitting clothing
Sneakers
Sweaters
A Cap as well


Headed for :

Skandagiri, an utterly scenic paradise (especially for photographers) with breathtaking views of the peaks surrounding North Bangalore and a spectacular glimpse of the Sunrise.


The Way :

Drive past the silent city of Bangalore & head where the Meru cabs head to - the new airport. Now dont take the diversion to the airport but continue on the Hybd road till you hit the town of Chickbellapur.

Now ask the man( or woman) on the wheels to slow down because we would need to find the hidden Vishweshwarayya statue( we did not manage that and then what happened is worth another post.GPRS phones can come in handy here :) when you lose your way )

Wikipedia had asked us to take the left at the vishweshwarayya statue and then head towards papagni mutt & find your car a cozy alight for the night.

A two and a half hour trek, ( army men and Ankur could possibly get there in less than that time ).The ways are marked except at a few places but chances of getting lost are as good as nil. Half way through with the trek, all of us ended up tying our sweaters to our waists, gulped up a bottle of water each. With Ankur virtually pushing us up to the summit, we ran to get a nice spot for our tripod.

January nights are really cold and trust me, even with gloved hands I could hardly sense the buttons on my camera. But then ego rushed in to do its job, Maddy had began taking night shots and I had to get into action. We always fancied something out of the stove to eat but then, the 3 vegeterians had to be content with biscuits ( they had only omlettes on top :( ).

And then finally the hero for the day decided it was time to call it a DAY :) and the crowd went WOW. Never realized people could be so happy just be seeing the sun :).

Some decent shots ( nothing for a WOW here :( ) is what I had to be happy with. we trekked down in less than 45 min and we had to rush. The next destination was again Ashram where we handed over the car keys to Manisha and then Ankur babu states that his bike keys are @ home. A three wheeler takes us all home, I sleep off@Maddys till 4 and he then drops me back to the place I call home ( only call .. not really ).



Enjoy the pics and would love to go with a bigger gang soon and we can have a lot more fun. And hope I get some nice shots as well.

Yes!+ @ Koramangala

Wake up : 5 00 am
@ IHA-Koramangala : 6 15 am
. . .
. . .

This was how my day started for the past week ( though that 5:00 got to 5:30 and even 6 today :) ).. 7 days of absolute FUN, FUN and more FUN. 21 bubbling YES!+ grads passed out today - the first morning YES!+ batch in Bangalore. With Sampath and Madhuri on the leads, and quite a few of us playing our roles, the band ROCKed ON! ( adding more to the band-wagon).

A detailed post on the course can wait I guess ( already got a few calls, asking when the photos would be posted), so finally here they are.

and yeah - don't forget to comment

The Shobana Nite @ the Ashram

Little did I know when Swati n me (Swati - the new entry into the YES!+ wagon .. a passionate fashion designer and a budding volunteer ) bumped to Maddy's place asking for the lens, waking him n sushma ( n probably even sushma's mom ) up from their late afternoon nap , that I would be treated to a truly celestial display of classical Bharatanatyam by none other than Shobana. All I had in mind was that there were many celebrities around for the International Womens Conference, and that my DSLR must not miss them.

For someone who grew up watching Shobana movies ( almost every Sunday evening on TV ), this super-talented National award winning actress was to my senses - the epitome of beauty.

After a really really short trip up the gardens and a quick munch @ vishala, we ( swati, lalit n me) rushed to the Yagnashala ( for now the pro-show arena ). The chairs were already occupied and the security volunteer was in no mood to let me in and that was when the 70-300 lens came in handy ... ( all I heard was someone shouting - unko andar bhej do, photographer hain , and then there was no looking back ). I quickly hogged on the seat on the top stair ensuring a nice view of the stage and then the magic began.



Shobana .. in between the performance walked on to the stage .. explaing through her elaborate gestures which enthralled the blessed gathering (by then Swati as well crept her way into the cordoned area some how .. ask her how). Shobana's depiction of the Indian woman through mudras is still afresh ( pic 6 n 7 ). The curtain raiser was followed by depiction of the Dasavatharams, then followed by a display featuring tales from Durga stories. The talented performers also tapped foot to some Classical western music, bringing the crowd to a standstill.

The stylish beautiful shobana was then honored by the Lady-in-Charge, our own beloved Bhanumaa, the sensous performance was followed up by some scintillating rendering of Sufi Music by Zila Hussain Khan ( to know more about her, I would advise you contact Prabha, she was her escort for 3 whole days ). With me n Swati shouting Atif at the sound "Sufi", this show was rather dull. Adding to that was the hunger, we rushed to the canteen to find it closed.

We had made up our minds on a Dominos order @ Bhaskars place, but as always in the ashram, everything was taken care of, Abhay messaging us to get to the Kitchen first floor. Tell u what, even dal n roti tasted as good as hand tossed cheese burst pizza's.

We munched dinner as we discussed the performance and our plans for the next day's followup, with Shailendra da giving us the instructions, Abhay chipping in his thoughts and Jasminder ( a YES!+ teacher from Chandigarh, whose sweater Swati would later borrow for the ride back to Bangalore ). Tt was almost 10 : 30 and we were set to make our 30 km ride back from heaven to earth.

Finally after dropping chwati, got home by 11 45 to find a full scale interview on with Lamboo (a tall classmate of mine) on the hot seat and Greg (my room-mate)n Kumsim (another batchmate), playing the bad guys. I ran into connect my camera to the computer and could not wait any long to see the pictures. After breathing a sigh of relief I joined Lamboo in bullying Greg n later Kumsim as they took the hot seats, finally hitting the bed @ 4 setting an alarm for 8 for the sunday follow-up :) .. a long interesting blessed saturday (extending into the sunday :))