The Week that was...

Boy what a week it has been met up my schoolmates after 8 long years, but did not seem that way, an instant connect with them and had a good time. Also watched Bhool Bhulayia the previous night kudos to Akshaye Kumar for his superlative dialogue deliveries and keeping me entertained in an otherwise lack luster script, he had to play what Rajni played in Chandramukhi and Mohanlal in Manichitrathazhu.

We also saw the BSE Sensex take 2 of its highest intraday falls caused due to selling by FII's following SEBI's draft on P Notes, a corrective measure to put a check on the cash flow in the markets which might have caused problems later on, one direct impact would have been the rising rupee hurting the exports. I had so waited for this correction so that I could enter the markets.

But, what made my week was my trip to Mysore. After some dilly-dallying I decided to take off on Friday, with the evening showers that are a norm these days I had to leave in the afternoon. The Man, his machine a Pulsar 150 and his index helmet. The onward journey was pleasant barring one or two accidents not involving me close to Srirangapatna due to the rains and speed breakers on the SH 17. Yeah speed breakers on a highway.

It was cloudy throughout my ride and I reached Mysore at 5:30. I crashed into the Coffee Day on Kalidasa Road where I happened to meet a freak named Belly aka Bellapa an avid biker who told me about his many forays on the Enfield, this as I waited to be met by Muddu who was my host for the weekend. One of the main reasons I went to Mysore was to see the Dussera celebrations and the much talked about procession that culminates the festivities at Mysore.

Spent the evening at "The Roost" because the rains would not let us get to Planet X which was what Muddu had in mind for that evening. So after 3 Haywards 5000 aur thode Chicken thodne ke baad we called it a day we had to cause we were too drunk to do anything. I did not have the slightest inkling that this is how the remaining nights at Mysore would be spent, throwing a spanner on all the jogging and weight that I lost in the past 2 weeks by exercising.

Saturday we were a feeling a little lazy and a little hung over from all the guzzling, and the only thing we got around doing was to visit the Chamundi hills n a sumptuous lunch at Olive Garden. The food was good and I would recommend this to anyone who visits Mysore. After the heavy lunch it was time for a nap to and let the digestive juices kick in and break it in peace :-) and then by the time we woke up it was 8 and yeah dinner time, the venue was “The Greens”. A decent place I would rate it at 4 out of 5.

Sunday it was Saturday whizzed past in a hurry and I was looking forward to Sunday. We went to Devaraj Urs road at about 1 only to find out that the procession was to start by 3 and so we headed off to a Cafe Coffee Day at the end of the road. Coffee mele thumba aagathe, that’s their punch line.

The procession started around 3 and there was a mad rush of youngsters trying to get onto roof tops so that they could watch the festivities without any hustling. Saw them climbing the plastic pipes to get to their vantage points. If I was the owner of those buildings I would not have thought twice before pouring water as they tried climbing.

The procession starts from the Mysore Palace and ends at Banni Mantap which is about 5 km from the palace. If you want to read more about the procession check this out. I was a tad disappointed with what I saw and I fail to understand how this could be such a crowd puller heard that there were close to 14 lakh people who had come to watch this much talked about procession.

I also used my time in Mysore to get some focus and did some thinking about myself and what I wanted in life, so have a little clarity on that, how I balance my career and my passion I still haven’t got that figured.

Icing on the cake was Raikonnen winning the race to become the 2007 champion and it was as if the script that was written was played to perfection.

I was supposed to start early on Monday, but on our way to dinner the previous night something got into my eye and caused it to swell up quite a bit and I had to wait for the swelling to subside before I could leave, needed some medication in the form that i hate the most. Tablets.... I finally left at 10 am in the morning and reached Bangalore by 12:30 the wind did cause some irritation in that swollen eye of mine initially but as I saw the pristine surroundings along the stretch I forgot all about it there were so many places where I would have liked to have taken pics and would have gotten some good ones for HDR, but that has to wait for my next trip.