Me, my fotos and my stories

high in Valparai

2011-08-17T21:47:00.005+03:00

It was Friday, 12th of Aug ‘11, I was busy decorating my bay for independence day. After a while we had 2 hours of celebration. It was not fun!! I didn’t wanna wait any longer to go Valparai. I and a few other friends have planned to meet at valparai and spend the long weekend there. It was tiring, bumpy, sleepless journey for me and my friend Thiru from Chennai to Coimbatore cos’ we got place to sit only in the last row. He just came back from UK and he didn’t forget to buy primary things for duty free for our celebration ;) Yes we had some fine quality of spirit. It was between 4 and 5 am on Saturday morning we were still on the way to Coimbatore. And we both woke up; He looked at me thinking what the hell happened? And I was on the way back to the seat after we both jumped out of the seat on the bumpy road. Sleep was gone and we called our other friend, Harish who was traveling in another bus from Chennai to Coimbatore. He got a nice deal on his bus ticket in the last moment but I planned well and got a shit deal on my ticket. finally we all reached Coimbatore around 7am and my other friend in Coimbatore, Bala was waiting for us to pick up and get started for road trip ;) Bala introduced his friend Santhosh to us and he also joined us for the trip.

After quickly refreshing and having breakfast at Bala’s home, we started our road trip. How come a road trip will be complete without beer? But our deal was driver should never get drunk ;) And I believe we followed that till the end. Little sips once in a while doesn't count :P We called our friend Jegan who stays in Valparai where we planned to stay for the night. He said he was near Athirapilly falls accompanied by some of his work mates. I badly wanted to go to that place as everyone else traveling with me has seen it many times and said it’s an amazing place. But Jegan said he had different plans for us, he directed us to go to someother water falls near by valparai itself. But to our bad surprise, forest guards didn’t let us go interior and we couldn’t see the falls. We all got disappointed and started back to Jegan’s place. It was late in the evening; we did some shopping and bought some food for dinner. We went to Jegan’s place made his Kitchen Nasty :P He said he’ll come by 7 Pm. We thought we could surprise him by keeping the dinner ready and welcome him with a vodka coconut cocktail. But he was very late and we couldn’t simply stare at the brand new Vodka and Scottish Whiskey bottles and wait for him :P We all started partying and jegan joined us around 9Pm. He was glad to get welcomed with a vodka-coconut water shot. I didn’t like the taste of it though :(

All 6 of us were having great time discussing the past and sharing our secrets. I bet won’t share any of them to these guys here after :P. It was embarrassing when I heard the next morning what I told them the last night:P Later that night, I was very eager to go out and kick some ass of an Elephant or Leopard. I forced my friend to take me out for a walk and show something really wild.. I meant wild animals. Don’t confuse ;) He said its really very dangerous to go out at night as wild animals would definitely wander around for prey. He said He’ll take us in car, but we all were scared as he was also drunk, without knowing seriousness, we all got ready for jolly ride in the jungle at midnight. I was so excited as I thought I might see a Leopard or Elephant but we could only spot a mouse deer and a few rabbits. After this crazy adventurous drive in the jungle we came back at 3 am. Woke up the next morning with little head ache and got ready for Parambikulam.

We started to parambikulam from Valparai at around 11 am and we thought we can easily get to see something at parambikulam sanctuary. But again it was a bad surprise awaiting us. since it was a long weekend, there were many people waiting for the Jungle Safari. We returned from there as it seemed to be hopeless to wait there. We came 3 kms down and it is called Top slip. We thought we might get ticket for elephant safari. Again we couldn’t get any. All we got in Top slip was nice scoldings from forest officer. We sneaked in to the forest and clicked fotos. But later when we came back to the place where we parked out car, all were looking at us as if we are poachers :( Forest officer inquired us for sometime and advised and left us :) :P With much disappointment we all came back to Valparai. So we had another night to celebrate at jegan’s Place ;) We started partying on the way from Parambikulam to Valparai. We found nice villages on the way which looked like a typical shooting spot for a Tamil Movie. We took some snaps and got back to car and enjoyed naughty talks and boozing all the way to Jegan’s home. We went to the same mess where we got dinner for the previous night. The Mess owner is a mallu and he is from Ernakulam. I was making fun and asking him something in Malayalam as I wanted to test my Malayalam skills which I learnt a few months back from some “omane’s” :P I asked him to tell me a Luttapi story, which is a character in a Malayalam comics. He simply laughed and ignored my request and he was busy doing parcel of our dinner. I didn't didn't bug him anymore. That time, I thought alcohol was bit less for the night so we quickly went to a liquor shop and bought some more beers and some vodka and Rum. I was wrong actually it went beyond the limits. And after a few hours of crazy, nasty talks I, slept. The next morning I didn’t remember anything after I spoke to Mess owner. The next morning guys were making fun of me showing me a soda bottle. I didn’t get what they were trying to say. Actually I threw up the previous night and asked Jegan to get me some water, He gave me soda and I drank it and said ”Thanni en ippadi irukku?” and Jegan replied "Dei idhu soda" LOL at me :P And many more funny things happened which are non sharable :P

The Next morning we all got ready to go to Athirapilly as I convinced other guys that we are going there ;) But You know what happens if you drink too much previous night, I woke up late and rushed for Athirapilly drive. But it all got delayed in Valparai itself, we left Valparai at 1.00 Pm only. On the way we changed our plans and canceled it as things might get worse if something happens to car or due to unavoidable delay, I might have to miss the bus back to Chennai at 9.00 Pm. You might wonder what I did in this trip actually, nothing other than getting wasted. Even though the plans to Parambikulam and Athirapilly got flopped, the trip was very exciting and full of fun, fun, fun, fun, fun and fun :) Guys we must meet again!

Everyone's a Philosopher!

2011-06-08T20:15:00.006+03:00

It was 7 in the evening, I was about to leave from office but got struck in office for a while cos' of zoozoo menace so got little late to leave. when I was about to leave, it was 8 and very windy and raining outside. It is pleasant to experience summer rain here. But I was little worried and confused about how to reach home by riding my bike over 20 kms without rain suit. I waited for a while and when I left from office, it was almost 9 and heavy rain stopped and it was drizzling. I lost my patience totally on way home waiting in the traffic. Water blocked on many busy roads so it was a huge traffic jam in the city. A 45 minutes ride took 2.30 hours to reach home. It was just pain riding my bike in rain and traffic. And when riding my bike, I was reading the lines written in the motor bikes rear mudguard and in license plate. I understood everyone likes to express their philosophy in their bikes. Some Auto rickshaw drivers are philosophers too. Here are some of the lines that I still remember..

"Back seat is reserved!"
"I love my mom and dad!"
"Yes, Its my Dad's road!"
"Don't love!"
"Love is a sweet poison!"

I have read many more , but these are the catchy ones and still remains in my mind. The ultimate one I think is "Don't love!", I feel its just funny. I guess the bike owner didn't meant that for fun.. Reading these philosophical lines was the only fun riding my bike

A Beauty undercover..

2010-08-20T21:57:00.019+03:00

I happened to see one of the most beautiful Indian "thing" last week. The beautiful thing I meant here is one of the most stunning places I have ever seen in India. I apologize if my title misguided you ;) I hope to write something sooner like what you expected on seeing this title. It is over 500 kms from Chennai to this wonderland called Valparai. I took a afternoon train from Chennai to Coimbatore as Valparai is just over 100 kms from there. I had my friends to receive me from railway station. I met my room mate in Sweden as it is his hometown and he came for vacation. We had nice chat after a long time face to face, though we spoke on facebook and skype regularly. I then went to stay with another friend that night. I had plans running on my mind for the next day which would be a mountain drive up to Valparai. So I wanted to sleep early, but couldn't.. I kept talking to Joshua..

The next morning I thought I will wake up and even ring to other guys to get ready for the trip, but I didn't remember that it was a saturday and my alarm doesn't ring on weekends :P Anyway atleast of the guys woke up early and rang up to us. He finally showed up very late to the trip, but we excused him just for one reason, He was bringing his car :) We started started from home by 9.00 after breakfast. I totally admired even the way to Valparai. Beautiful scenery all the way. Those thousands of coconut trees stopped our drive and made us to feel the hunger for coconuts. Those pollachi coconuts are the best known coconuts in Tamil Nadu. Quickly we wanted to reach the top of the hill and admire Valparai but we couldn't resist stopping our car for once in life time pictures all along the way.. lol we later found that we spent too much of time down just on the way. As we reached the foot hills, we were stopped by Forest department for toll. It was wonderful scenery of Azhiyar Dam from the toll plaza. Being a resident of Chennai, One would definitely enjoy where ever pure water is found natural. So did I!

I was surprised to see waterfalls all along the way up till Valparai town. Many small streams were pouring down everywhere. We couldn't resist getting wet in the falls. It was enjoyable since there were no other people around us. I then realized that It was not commercialized and promoted as tourist place like other hill stations that I have seen. We the started driving to the top. I was amazed to see many more small streams and even big falls in a few places. But couldn't stop everywhere as it was getting late. We finally reached the top and contacted our friend who works for wild life conservation. He took us to his lonely house in the top a isolated hill. It looked so from the house, but we had nice but narrow roads to reach there. I saw it on TV that that place is famous for Leopards. In addition to monkey menace, people have started complaining about leopard menace. I couldn't imagine a encounter with a leopard when I'm alone. my friend said he is educating people and creating awareness about leopard's habits. I forgot to tell that all the people whom I met in this trip were all my Internet friends except my room mate in Sweden. So it was the first time we all saw each other face to face. Conversations were like beyond "Internet friends". We truly enjoyed the place, Our friend friend Jegan, the wild life guy, took us to famous spots in Valparai. We were thrilled to see 8 huge waterfalls from one tall cliff. I cant explain this more, Check the fotos!

It was getting late and darker, we wanted to go before it gets too late as we thought we could spend time talking and drinking. I strictly told my room mate Dina to get a bottle of JägerMeister as no one in India would have even heard about it. Cheers to him, as he brought us the drink. We started funny discussions and later I don't fully remember what we were speaking, I just remember something now, but I cant write them here! Please understand! Privacy needed :) Thank God and Thank Jäger for not giving me hangover. We planned to leave the place at 7.00 am. But as we all know when we drink we keep our words up 100% so we just left 5 hours late the next morning. We started at 12.00 pm :P We had to really depart unwillingly as everyone had plans for the evening and myself, I have to take a tiring overnight journey by bus to Chennai. It was a thirsty journey coming back, Pollachi coconuts came again for relief from my sour throat after taking shots of jäger last night.

After admiring this place, I felt that that it is good that Valparai is not promoted like other tourist a place since this promotion will have severe environmental impact.

Here I come! Another short trip..

2010-08-20T21:39:00.003+03:00

How long its been since I posted something on my blog?? It just went through my mind that I blog my travel experiences. I have traveled to couple of places since my previous post. One was to Thirupathi to attend my friend's wedding. It was pleasant to meet my friends who studied with me in Sweden. Nice memories were coming like slide show during our conversation. same old saying after we get such a feeling "good old days!" Its the first Telegu wedding I have ever attended. It happened just a few hours after mid night. Its been 2 years since I saw my clock ticking those hours.. The auspicious wedding time was set around 3.00 AM. I reached thirupathi along with one other friend from Chennai who also is a Chalmarist. After refreshing in a few minutes, we were ready to greet our friend in the wedding hall. The ceremony happened for about 3 hours. Those traditions were all little to new to me. So enjoyed watching it and there were a Swedish couple who were also keenly looking at every rituals happening. For the first time I felt hungry at 5 in the morning and ate my breakfast at 5.30. After spending a few more minutes there, I took a bus back to Chennai. I remember how I slept in the bus while coming back home. It was a crazy, short, sleepless and memorable trip.

Wedding at Pondicherry

2010-04-27T10:07:00.003+03:00

It was my friends' brother wedding in Pondicherry. I got another invitation for a engagement ceremony but I was first inivited for the wedding at pondicherry, as I committed to come to pondicherry I started at 15hrs on 24th from my home. I got ride to pondicherry with a few other guys who planned to attend the wedding. We reached pondicherry at about 18hrs. We were all little tired after 3 hours car journey. We parked the car and entered a restaurant near the high way. You know its Pondicherry ~ famous for alcohol and tourists. There were plenty of Europeans seen around, one European girl stading just infront of the restaurant was waiting for the meal to get ready and parceled. we were ready to dine and till then admiring her, You know its been some 1.5 years or more than that I have seen some nice white chick ;) She got he meal parceled and we got our parotoa, dosa and Idly ready. The waiter made fun of us, we ordered 3 plates of parota, 2 plates of dosa and 2 plates of idly. He said we were just 4 people...

From the restaurant we drove to the wedding hall and attended the wedding reception. On the way we didn't forget to buy some alcohol. As we all know there is no use in going to pondicherry with out having some alcohol :) So after the wedding reception, I and a few other guys in the wedding hall whom we met went to the hotel room. It was a nice Saturday night to remember. We all had a few glasses of whiskey and some beer. After a while, when the whiskey got over, we couldn't stop going, it was around 1.00 in the night we rang up so many times to the reception for unknown reasons and disturbed them. They got pissed off and let us know in the morning. I and another guy went for a walk. I remember what I did then. I rang up to my friend in Sweden and started talking bull shit. I eventually lost all my credits on my mobile :( I don't know why I wanted to talk to him that moment. So after a while we returned to the room. Some were sleeping, a few other guys were searching for other room we booked. All we remember at that moment was we booked 3 rooms, thats it, and we didn't know what were the room numbers!!! Nevermind! I got a place to sleep, took an extra mattress and laid down... slept.....

It was 7.00 am, I got call from my home, "Oh no! its my parents I can't speak like I'm drunk! I must be very confident of what I say and understand them clearly" With little hangover I said to myslef and picked up the call. "Hello, (mom's voice) when are you coming?"...... "The wedding time is between 9.00 and 10.30! mom... I'll come after it gets over" OVER!!! cut the call.. No bye nothing... I noticed that I was on the floor and someone else was occupying my place. LOL...... I then refreshed and waited for others to get ready. Finally we all went to the wedding in time. Greeted our friend and got ready to return to chennai.

whats that luck between me and radio stations?

2010-03-08T16:48:00.003+02:00

I have been targeted by radio stations twice in last 6 months to participate in competitions. One of the stations is RIX FM which is from sweden, who offered me US$ 500. And i already posted about that a few months back. Yesterday, I went to a newly opened super big shopping mall in chennai, Sky Walk to buy sport shoes. I just entered the mall and there were bunch of people gathered in the center of the mall looking at some competition hosted by some local FM station. I just went there to see what was happening. I didn't even see which radio station was doing that, I was busy reading the advertisement boards near by it, it was showing some furniture sale "up to 60% off ". Thats all i read. Immediately one of the guys conducting the competition came near to me and gave me a chewing gum and asked me to participate in the competition. I took the gum and went to the stage. we were 5 competitors with the gum on the stage. I was the last one who just joined the competition in the the final moment. They asked us to blow as many bubbles as we could make with in give time.
The FM jockey made count down. We started chewing it well, till he counted 25 we could not make any bubbles, after 25, I started making tiny bubbles, finally i could make 5 acceptable bubbles in 50 counts. One other guy made 4 and another guy made 3. Fortunately I won the competition. What could be the prize? Its a Surprise for now! They took my phone number and address and I'll get call from the FM station in a few days to collect the prize! My guess is another 500 USD for this great act? :) looks the prize amout is cheap?? hahaha..

Luck knocked the door the next week!

2009-09-28T17:20:00.005+03:00

Yes! yet again. Not through a radio show but in the form a gold ring. It was a fine sunday morning we started from our home. We planned for a short one day trip to a place called Tada which is around 90 Km from my home town, chennai. I, my uncle, Naresh, Karthik, saro and Narayanan went on 3 motor cycles. The place is famous for its water fall. I have never been there before, but other guys who came with me have been to this place before. I didn't expect a big water fall neither lot of water to play around. After 2 hours ride including our breakfast on the way, we reached the foot hills of the water fall. We went by motor cycle to the maximum distance we could possible get inside the forest. We parked the bikes and started walking following the water stream. It was soothing experience on a weekend. We always expect to stay away from the sound of vehicles and other pollution atleast for a while. What if you experience the same with some flavour. The flavour i meant is the sound of birds and just the sound of trees raising its voice for the tune of wind. I was surprised to see such a clear stream of water in India. I have never seen such a crystal clear water stream here. All of us changed our clothes and got ready to play in the water. I must mention about my friend karthik's swimwear. He said he bought his swim shorts in a swimming pool. It looked so awkward. one can not differentiate which is front and back in that shorts. We couldn't stop laughing at his shorts. I can show how it looks but i think I'll get my nose punched if I share that picture here :) That made our day so fun full.
I was wondering if we went there to enjoy the water fall and play there or to eat. We brought plenty of chicken and snacks with us. We kept eating all the way till we reached the biggest pool. We kept on walking along the stream and climbing small rocks. At one point we found plenty of water to play. Saro just was about to enter into the pool. He was focusing at something. the water was clear that we could see even a tiny stone present in the bottom. He saw a gold ring among tiny white pebbles in the water. I could immediately spot the ring as well. My arm was bit longer i could reach the ring by seeing it from above the water. But Saro couldn't do that. I tried couple of times and picked the ring. we all were already so happy to see such a clear water and a nice water stream there. The gold ring was a bonus for all of us :) we kept our treasure :P and got into the water.
A few of us thought we couldn't climb further up, but I, narayanan and saro thought to climb up the rocks and see more. Believe it or not, It was so slippery, I didn't have a proper shoe with grip neither I had good grip on my hand to hold something firmly. Just by chance we all could go up that big rock. It was over 30 feet. Just with very little grip we made it possible. We saw a deep lengthy pool and we heard the sound of water falling but we couldn't see from there. We could see it only when we get into the pool and swim further. One of the guys who climbed with me, knows to swim a little and the other one doesn't even know that. So i was the only one who could see the actual water fall. It looked a place shown in Anacondas :P It was dark and water was getting colder as i kept swimming close to the water fall. I was the only person there swimming alone. No one came to swim there. I was little scared to be there, Thought some big fish or crocodile might be there :P So after swimming there for about 10 minutes, I came out of that place. I thought to capture some pics there as the place really looked creepy and dark. We didn't even have grip to hold firmly and climb up so i didn't want to risk taking my 4000 kroner DSLR camera.
The next big task was what? Can you guess? How to get down? :P I was thinking in my mind when i was climbing up that rock, With no climbing gears we are just kidding to climb up. I was thinking, how to get down if climbing is this hard. But as we were thinking to get down, we spotted some other way to get down. It was much easier to get down and climb that way. We reached the big pool where other 3 were playing in water. After a while, we packed our things up and started our way back home. It was a adventurous trip and a lucky one for all of us. Luck knocked one of our doors, but it didn't know that 6 of us were inside. We shared it and made our trip a free one ;)

Does luck knock your door only once?

2009-09-27T19:59:00.006+03:00

I was surprised to see today that i haven't written anything for past 2 months. So bad on me. I had something on my mind to write but didn't find leisure time to write it. But i always had time to check my wall posts on facebook. One of my friends from sweden asked me if I'm staying in India these days and asked my telephone number? I answered yes thinking that he is tripping in India and needs some help while travelling here. He replied the next day saying that one of his friends working in a radio station might call me and will ask a few questions. If i answer them correctly, then i could possibly win 500US$. I just took it like it could happen once in a bluemoon and for one in a million. I remembered his mail though. One afternoon, I got a call from Sweden saying that they are calling from RIX FM from stockholm. I thought someone from Taiwan will be calling me. Because my friend is in Taiwan right now.
He started recording my call. He started with a casual conversation . As usual, like every other person, he asked me if i saw a cow that morning. If i eat cows. These kind of questions are equivalent questions like "do polar beers live around you?", "Do you live in snow?" for a swede. He then went on for questions. The real question which i could win 500$. The answers for the questions were very tough. Yes tough for someone who dont have a clue about sweden. The answers for all 3 questions could be either Sweden or Switzerland :) Tough answers right ;) The first question he asked me was not clear, I asked him to repeat twice, i didn't know what to answer. I said is it switzerland? It was right. I made it by chance ;) The 2nd question was "Christian Heglund, sweden or switzerland?" Anyone who lived in sweden for atlest 3 or 4 months will be aware of surname "heglund" such a swedish name. I said its absolutely swedish. He asked me to change the answer to "i think its swedish" :P I said so. The last question was bit tricky. He asked something like penga ponga something like that. Even now i didn't get what he asked. I said it could be switzerland. He repeatedly asked me what did i say. I kept repeating Switzerland. He turned off the microphone and asked me to say sweden :P I said "I think, I think , I think its sweden" So I got all answers right. I was surprised and happy. I couldn't shout but i wanted to shout. I was in the office. Meanwhile in our conversation I said "hur är läget?" He was surprised. He didn't knew that I was in Sweden. He thought that I met my swedish friend in taiwan. His tone gone down when i said that i was in sweden for 2 years. I was bit sad if he'll offer the prize or not. He was expecting someone who is totally unaware of sweden. But finally he offered me 500USD prize money. hurray!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was sponsored show by western Union to promote their business in Sweden. Thanks Western Union, RIX FM, RJ Joakim Bäckström and above all my friend Johan Svennung. I owe you a party mate! Cheers!

Million dollor snake!

2009-06-20T21:31:00.006+03:00

Sand Boa, one of the common snakes found in India is usually seen in dry land containing loose soil. I heard a rumour a few months back saying that sand boas are sold for unbelievable price. Then I saw this news on news paper and a short report about this business on television a couple of times. Want to know how much it costs? The price ranges from 10000 Indian rupees to 3 million Indian rupees. Yes indeed! thats a jack pot snake! Was thinking for a while to search for one after i heard the price of this harmless species. hahaha.. But how to get started and whom to approach even if i get one by luck. Questions arise one by one. People say that there are agents who buy the snake for very low price and sell it to the final party for the maximum profit. The catcher of the snake from wild hardly gets 1% of the final price for which it is sold. I keep hearing such stories now and then. People say that they are bought by the pharma companies to carry research on a drug that is extracted from this snake and This drug can cure AIDS and cancer. Is this a legal business or smuggling or simply a rumour? If this is legal i'm in ;) But till now, i haven't heard anyone saying that he/she has got money selling that snake.

Javvadhu hills

2009-04-30T17:31:00.004+03:00

Hmmm.. Most of my blogs are about my traveling experiences. In recent past, i didn't travel anywhere except for one big travel from sweden to india :) A few days back, I went for a short trip to javvadhu hills, tamil nadu, india. I went along with my uncle who had to fix a police communication equipment in the top of highest peak in javvadhu hills. 3 other freinds accompanied us. We departed from chennai at 3.30. we reached thirruvannamali at 8.30. A jeep came to pick us from the bus station. It took about an hour to reach a place called polur which is at the foot steps on the javvadhu hills. We purchased vegetables, chicken and some snacks there. Immediately after shopping, we started to drive to the peak. When it was about 13.00 when we we just entered the forest limits, jeep broke down. Some tube got burst out and started creating smoke. It leaked about a kilometer before we noticed it. We came down the hill and parked the jeep in a safe place.It was unexpected!! But never got tired of that.. I and my friends started exploring inside the forest. No mobile phones were working properly. No proper signal. But manged to call some automobile technician with poor signal.
After having our lunch in the forest, we walked along a dry river. We were eager to see some water there but what we say was only boulders. After an hour or so I and my friends returned to the jeep spot. The technician fixed it! this was not the only problem with that jeep, we used to push it to start :) But even this was fixed with just a piece of waste cloth and the most important thing, a condom. The technician was looking around for some plastic or rubber material to wrap it around the oil tube, the driver came with a condom and asked if that could help? It worked. The tube didn't leak and even we didn't push the jeep after the technician serviced. He didn't change the batteries or refill it will distilled water. We all were wondering how a condom could save you from risks! The risk i meant here is your vehicle getting break down in the middle of no where.
We started to drive up the hill. At about 17.00 we reached Indian institute of Astrophysics. They didn't allow to us to take snaps inside. The environment was so pleasant. Fresh air, beautiful flowers, trees and soothing cookoo bird sound. I saw the biggest telescope in Asia there. The telescope had a mirror whose diameter is 93 inches. It was huge and the setting to observe stellar objects was massive as well. It was a informative trip in short.
At about 18.00 we reached a town called jamunamathur. We waited there for a few minutes and relaxed. meanwhile I and my friends went to buy some booze(my uncle didn't know that). It was long journey indeed. You see, we started at 4.00 hrs and still we didn't reach the destination. All the time my uncle was telling me about the rough terrain that we have to take to go to this place. The road was ok till we reached jamunamathur. Even after jamunamathur it was ok for a few kilometers. But for about 15 kilomters, the road was terrific. Only rocks and boulders and big pits were seen. Hardly we could drive at 15 kmph. In some places we even thought that jeep could break once for all.
After driving hard through that tough terrain, we reached the peak at 20.30. We had our dinner sitting outside the police microwave repeater office. The weather was pleasant that day. It showered a bit and strong breezes recalled the chill climate of sweden. For your information, we Indians say weather is pleasant if it showers a bit and breezes gently :) Never I will its a great day when its sunny in summer. I'm tired of summer already but yet i have to face the hottest month the year. Hmmm.. You may see my frustrations about anything in the middle of any topic you must get used to it. Well I was saying about dinner. The chicken gravy was toooo hot. I dont have to explain how hot it was. Felt like my lips were exposed to microwave oven. While eating we were eating out, lightning strokes were flashing. The clouds were in the same altitude as that of the peak. The lightning arrester on the microwave tower absorbs the lightening and releases to the ground. I could hear the charge getting arrested. It sounded like "phrrrrrrrr" when ever the lightning stroke and got absorbed. It scared the hell out of me. We all rushed into the office. Never in my life i faced lightning so near to me. It was not just one instant the lightning stroke. It was so close everytime and we heard that sound of charge getting absorbed. It got late and we all went to sleep. We had some plans for the next morning.
We 5 of us went down a kilometer to take bath near a well. We got refreshed there and started walking towards a small village called melpet. We say the oldest tree in asia. We couldn't get the exact info how old is that. But i remember once that tree was shown in television as the oldest tree in asia. people say it lives over 500 years and it looks huge and seems to live for yet another 500 years. we walked back to the peak as my uncle had to work. I and my friends ate our breakfast and packed our beers and snacks to go for adventure in the jungle.
We were expecting wild buffaloes, wild chicken, deer and lot more animals there but all we could see was only a wild lizard that could camouflage itself. I'm happy that i clicked a close up short of that lizard and its one of my favorite snaps. We went inside the forest along with the police chef. He is a local tribe. He took us to the village through the forest. We were little disappointed since we couldn't see any wild chicken or rabbit or anything of that kind for our barbecue :P Hmmm.. But we cold always buy chicken somewhere even in the forest :) The cook helped us to buy some live chicken. He then skinned the chicken. We barbecued it. We thought it would taste good but it didn't. Again this barbecue was just to make ourselves feel happy and give a feel of living in the wild. So i never bothered how it tasted. It was time to booze as well.I also had a 50ml bottle of the swedish pride "absolut vodka". I got used to that taste. I took a 25ml shot and gave the bottle to my friend. He hadn't tried shot of vodka before. He saw me taking the shot easily. So he too tried casually, he just made mr.been face. I laugh even now when i think about it. He didn't stop with that, he puked. That was one hilarious moment in that trip. It was time to move on. We started going back to the peak when it was 1700 hrs.
It was time for photos. Just before a couple of hundred meters from the peak is a nice view point of the deep valley. It was great time to watch the sunset. We clicked enough of pictures there. We all then reached the peak so exhausted since we didn't have proper food for lunch as our barbecued chicken was not good. We ate our supper and then dinner in a hour and spent the evening sitting in the office terrace.
The next morning we had planned to leave early as we all planned this trip for jsut 2 days but unfortunately the jeep would return to the peak only in the afternoon. so we had time to do something in the morning. We walked over 4 km to a village called chinna keezhpattu. One of the police chefs (local tribe) is from this village. We thought to meet him and get some jack fruits. The trees we saw in the wild didn't have ripened fruit. 2 of my friends wanted to climb up the tree and fetch some jack fruit. They cut a fruit and sent it down. It was so heavy it must have weighed over 25 kilos. The chef gave 1 more fruit. We carried 2 fruits. The 25 kg fruit was tied with a rope and looped inside a pole and I and one other guy carried with our shoulder. For every 10 steps we changed the pole to other shoulder. I felt the pain so much because i was taller than him so I lifed more than the other guy. We reached the village back and sat at the chefs house. The chef got another fruit for us which was ripened. We fulfilled our hunger with one full jack fruit :) We got our life back. We were totally exhausted carrying that jackfruit on the hill. The chef said to keep the fruit in his house and when we return home in the jeep we could get it from him. Remember there are no roads to his house as well. It looked like a night mare for us when we saw the fruit when were eating at his place.Fianlly we kept it in his place and left to the peak. It was noon when we started to depart from the peak. The driver left me and my friends in the middle of the forest and asked us to walk down a road. They drove the jeep to the village and got the fruits. We were confused at one point. We didn't know which direction to take. The roads diverged. None of the mobile phones were working. We didn't know which road to take. We then asked for the direction from a guy who drove a tractor down that road. We wanted to get down from hill. He showed the road the to take and we also asked him if he saw the police jeep on his way. H said no. Just after we took 10 steps, we the saw the jeep coming behind us. we took the jeep and got down the hill. It was late in the evening when we took the bus back to chennai. we reached chennai at 1.00 hrs. Felt so tired. Even now i'm tired of writing it this long :P

A lesson on my game..

2009-04-04T20:29:00.002+03:00

Though, i have been playing badminton for a few years, i play once in a while, hence my game looks little bad sometimes. This morning, a kid who is just 12 years old and 4ft tall, was watching our game. He came to us and asked if he can play for sometime with us. I tossed the shuttle cock to him. To my surprise, He gave a perfect cross court smash, which i dont even try to play. I feel this shot needs more flexibility and aim. I went on a doubles match against that kid, He was so impressive. The partner of that kid was losing the points hence they lost the game with us. It was a tough game indeed. It was good badminton lesson for me :)

I wish i were in...

2009-03-21T18:49:00.005+02:00

What is your favorite season of the four seasons? perhaps the favorite season for every human being and even birds and animals must be spring. I have read poems about the beauty of spring in my lower classes, I thought those poems were written just for the sake of students to study in the school. I know there are 2 seasons in India(south). They are rainy season which rains sometimes and hot most of the time. The other season is summer season which is hotter. After staying in Sweden over 2 years, I felt the pleasure of spring. I enjoyed the change over of the seasons day by day, this change over prompted me so very much that time is moving at a pace that you cant imagine. The time hated to stay in Sweden was during winter, it was like a punishment to go out of home during winter. When ever i went out of home during winter, I always thought, I wish i were in India.
I felt so happy as i escaped from damn cold winter, I was so happy that i'll be heading back to Sweden on the first week of march. what stays unchanged in this world? My plan to go back to Sweden was not an exception. I decided not to go back to Sweden, first thing i felt i would miss was spring. Being a nature lover and with little passion to photography, I wanted to capture the beauty of this spring. Hope i'll spend some time in temperate zone in my future. I'm little tired of burning heat in my city. Its not summer yet, 2 more months to go for the perfect summer but I'm getting fried already.. I wish I were in Sweden :(

Worried about that scar! But not anymore :)

2009-03-03T18:42:00.002+02:00

Unfortunately i got pleomorphic adenoma which i had it for about 3 years. I checked it with a doctor before i went to sweden. It was tiny then and just underneath my right ear and was almost invisible. When i returned home last december, my parents first spotted out that big lump near my right ear. It had grown bigger. Later i planned to remove it in my town. After consulting number of doctors, I thought to get it done from Dr. Manikandan, professor meenakshi ammal dental college who is famous for cleft lip correction. Finally i got my surgery fixed on 23rd feb 2009. But i believe the main surgeon was Dr.paul salins. He looked at me before the surgery and said "oh, my god, this is big enough to give me hell! what did you all these days? pray to God. It will be alright." He didn't give up, he did a great job saving all the branches of my facial nerves. A usual 2 to 3 hr surgery went for 5 hrs. Sugery was successful, I'm in recovery phase now. Sutures were removed today. I would say, the incision was made purely like a plastic surgeon. I'm happy that one can notice the scar only behind my ear. Thanks a tonne to Dr. Paul Salin and Dr. Manikandan. I would 100% recommend these surgeons for parotidectomy in chennai. To get it done cost effective (almost nothing), do it at Meenakshi ammal dental college, Maduravoyal.

Adventure with my Nikon D40

2009-02-08T20:17:00.003+02:00

From mahapalipuram

I'm forced to ...

2009-01-23T08:01:00.004+02:00

It was just one week after i came home, I got so annoyed of everyone insisting me to cut my hair and making fun of it. After spending two and half years in Sweden, I felt so independent and No one bothered about how one looks unless he/she has a completely disastrous style. I have seen people(swedes) watching people with crazy styles and piercings especially those "gothic" style teens. For most people gothic looked to far from normal humans. well, why have to say this here? I was looked by others like one of these people here in India. I just have long hair no other piercings or anything gothic. some even talked behind me in my language thinking that i dont understand them. I was very bored one day, I thought to practice a little with my new SLR camera so i went to the zoo in my city. I wore a 3/4th shorts and a white tshirt and a big professional camera was hanging around my neck. To everyone in the zoo, I looked like an alien. They stared at me. Whats wrong with me? May be the long hair! I was capturing a deer in close shot and trying to focus it. There were two guys behind me talking something. Later one guy said to the other that "These people(me) will pay even 150 bucks for the a 100 buck drive". He thought I'm from somewhere else and not the local guy. And the guy listening to him must be a auto rickshaw or a taxi driver. I kept hearing people talking me and my long hair where ever i went.
In another instant, I went to a sweet shop. sweets are so delicious from that shop and i love it. Hey localites!! I'm talking about Adyar Anand Bhavan. I went to buy some sweets. The worker asked me what I wanted, I ordered some sweets. Later he asked me to pay the bill in the cash counter which is in the entrance of the shop. I went to entrance and When i was paying, I looked back. The guy who parceled the sweets for me, brought 2 other workers and they all were watching me. I felt so annoyed. What the hell? Finally i made up my mind to cut my hair... No i'm forced to do so :( I keep asking myself "Why this society bothers so much about others when there are plenty of good things to do?"

A tiny wish came true!

2008-12-23T03:08:00.006+02:00

I have been asking the boss of my restaurant to let me cook some Indian cuisine sometime. Finally, I got an opportunity to cook for my restaurant staffs. I was not comfortable talking a long time to cook for them which i usually do when i cook personally for my friends but at the same time, I must prove that I can cook something that tastes real good. There are a few vegetarians(swedes) in the restaurant. You don't believe me??? You gotta believe in unicorns sometimes.. Some vikings are vegetarians too. So i cooked Chenna masala and Ghee rice. I thought I can make some badam keer as well, but I stipulated my cooking time to 1hr 30 mins. So I stopped with chenna and rice. Chenna was spicy. Indeed it was very spicy, I felt it. I didn't wanna make my co workers to sweat in forehead, I tried my best to reduce the hotness by our usual Indian way of adding sugar :) It worked a bit. A even more addition of sugar would have ruined the taste. Finally I felt it was more than edible, some said that it was the tastiest food ever had in that restaurant but everyone will feel the same if they are introduced to some new cuisine. I would have said the same thing, If there was thai food cooked by some thai in a swedish restaurant. After all who likes swedish food? :P Förlått vänner!! thats the truth, though i like a lot from sweden.... you need example??? Absolut vodka, nobel prize, social security, cute blondes who are pleasant to look all the time and what not?? The list goes on!!! You gotta accept that Swedish cuisine is not my kind of food and definitely it wouldn't be one of the favorite cuisines of many foreigners. hope you agree with it. Potatoes and meet balls??? I want to ask you, What do you do with potatoes and meat balls inside your kitchen? potatoes, you just boil them and add salt, nothing more. meat balls they are already processed, just heating them in microwave is enough sometimes. I agree you do a little more cooking with meat balls, You ask me what? shallow fry them in butter or eat it along with ready made beetroot salad :) This is what i feel about swedish cooking :) I wouldn't have written all these if one of your most common food is that simple to cook.... Infact there is nothing to cook inside the kitchen... I forgot to mention about smoked meat and marinated fishes and sea foods in salt water and vinegar.. Dare to eat them? I sounds little insane for me. And hence I really have to be little harsh saying that "Swedish food is a challenge to eat :("

A pleasant surprise!

2008-12-23T02:57:00.003+02:00

After a long struggle, I finally presented my masters' thesis and hence I'm done with master studies. I went to my part time work place, A restaurant, little late after my presentation was over. My friend who works along with me informed one of the girls working there that I have graduated. I never imagined about having party for my graduation. I felt it was too late to celebrate. In the middle of work hours, everyone stopped working, they gathered around me and congratulated me for my graduation. It was not over. They surprised me with some spritzer. That moment was just overwhelming. Thank you folks for your surprise! I'll remember this moment and you as well!

How to recover documents from secured accounts in windows xp?

2008-12-08T14:24:00.002+02:00

This post is just a open question to anyone. I troubleshoot stand alone computers and small networks. A customer called me make his computer to run faster. I found that the computer had insufficient memory. So asked him to upgrade to 2 gb for best performance. His motherboard supports maximum of 1 gb per slot with max clock speed of 333 Mhz. A customer bought a memory which has a higher clock speed, 400 Mhz. This speed is not supported by his computer motherboard. But he wanted to test that since the shop keeper had told him that higher clock speed memories will just make the performance better. I took the risk even though i know, wrong memory modules can cause overclocking and may affect the other hardware. I saw blue screens with codes 0x0000008E and a few other memory related BSODs. But later, the computer didn't even start with the old 512mb ram. It gave messages c:\windows\system32\... Safe mode didn't work. I tried fixmbr and fixboot from recovery console. It appeared like it worked, i was able to see the logon screen, but immediately, BSOD appeared. I repeated the same steps as above. But same thing happened. At one point after repeated BSODs, there was no message at all in the screen instead just a blinking cursor in the top left corner. I tried copying ntfs.sys from revocery console and tired fixmbr and fixboot again. Didn't work. Finally made my mind to reinstall XP. the customer had another computer. I fixed thid HDD into the other computer and moved folder and files into a folder called backup1, so c:\windows is c:\backup1\windows and similarly c:\backup1\Documents and settings. I installed a new copy of windows in C: Now when i tried accessing two of the accounts(from backup1) which are secured, I get access denied. I checked microsoft knowledge bases to gain access to these folders. They said I have to enter as the admin from safe mode and change the security permissions for the folder which i have to access. When i right click on the folder c:\backup1\Documents and Settings\user1(secured)\My Documents , it says access denied and the security tabs are greyed out, the tabs are not enabled. Is there any way to recover documents from this folder??? I tried accessing this folder from recovery console, i couldn't get into the backup folder nor copy the secured folders to another place. No copy allowed, No openning permission, no users are listed as owner or creator of those secured folders in the security tab of folder properties. Any solution geeks?

Experiments with me!

2008-11-17T01:11:00.012+02:00

Damn... Its 31st and i havn't written anything for this month!

2008-10-31T00:54:00.003+03:00

I was just wondering a while ago that i used to update my blog twice or thrice a month but now I have no stories to write. Its not the truth. Stories are there in plenty but I became lazy :( I was checking the local newspaper in English on the web. I shit you not, you can see atleast one news like this in every 2 days - "Traffic agency bans reverse oral sex" I didn't understand 2 things about that head line.
1. What is meant by "reverse oral sex"?
2.What does traffic agency had got to do with that?

Here is the answer. Dont think too much and screw yourself for the first question. It means reverse of the phrase "oral sex". Its reversed as the mirror image of that phrase. It looks like "X32 lARO". Its nothing but a license plate number requested by some oral fantasizer. The answer for the second question is clear now. Its traffic agency's responsibility to provide the license plate. Imagine if you see this plate in your rear view mirror. you'll think "yes! i want it right now" :) Hmmm.. but the best license plate number would be "3M02 E"

A post on the biggest loser!

2008-09-30T20:38:00.007+03:00

There were immense data of my thesis, some memorable pictures of my trips in Europe, some of my childhood photos, free version of a software which I used for my thesis which I requested directly from the company. You wonder what do i mean? All got stolen along with my only pet, "my laptop". I never cursed anyone in my life so hard. But the theif who stole my laptop takes the credit for being cursed the most by me. I wake up cursing him everyday since the day it got stolen. For him, it is worth just a few thousand kroners but why the hell those laptop theives are not thinking about the data in it and the time people spend on projects sitting with their computer? I felt so disappointed, irritated, sober and jobless after i lost it.

It was 25th of september, I woke up little early than my usual wake up time. I thought to finish doing measurements in my thesis. I already made around 60 measurements. I went to my university library. I started measuring from the morning. I completed the measurements for 100 cases. Just 20 cases were left behind. One of my friends visited me to get his mobile charged. He wanted to get his mobile charged with my USB data cable. We hooked up the mobile and went out for 20 minutes to sit in the sun. I returned to my place, I was shocked to see my laptop was missing. I couldn't believe my eyes. I pinched to check if it was a dream, unfortunately it wasn't a dream. I went to a few people around and asked if they had seen someone taking my laptop. Unfortunately no one saw that loser. I complained to the librarians there, they said they couldn't help. They helped me in registering a complaint to the police. After talikng to my friends for while and venting out my feelings, I went home. I felt so lonely. I couldn't sleep till 5 in the morning. since i was very tired, my eyes rested for an hour or two. All I got was nightmares. I dreamed very wiered things like a mad lady with ugly hair and big eyes threatening me. I woke up a few times, but this ugly bitch came into my dream repeatedly. I woke up, but didn't know what to do since all my thesis documents were in it and all the documents to work on my thesis were in my laptop. I couldn't even tell my professor about this issue, she was on leave till 5th of october. With so much confusion, I woke up that morning. Time passed, I made my mind not to waste anymore time and I ordered a new laptop. It was the worst weekend i have ever had in my life. Let the bastard who stole my computer be the bigest loser in the life! Let his most lovable and precious thing be stolen!

I was lucky to be in Munich.

2008-08-11T21:16:00.010+03:00

It was around 1 pm. I reached Munich. All I saw in Munich after getting out of the Bus was Allianz Arena. It was Huge and beautiful. I looked terribly tired as I didn’t have good sleep the previous night and I didn’t have time to take shower in the morning. I had the directions to go to Justine’s apartment. I took the metro trains and reached “theresienstraβe” around 2pm. I wanted to grab a döner kebab as I was very hungry. I saw the prices, they were damn expensive when compared to the prices in Berlin. I heard a voice behind me calling “karan!” with lot of twist of in pronunciation. I turned back. She introduced herself to me as Justine. She identified me as I had pictures in my profile of couch surfing. But she had one picture of her in which she was looking up completely and only her neck was visible, Her face was in the 3rd dimension. But I recognized her with the dress! I’m just kidding. Unknowingly she was wearing the same cloth that she worn in the picture. One question that was striking my mind was how her name was pronounced. I asked her to say it once again. She said like yus teen eh… Before I met her, I was pronouncing her name as just in. But she was confused after seeing me. I don’t know if she was expecting a Blonde guy from Sweden :) We moved to her apartment talking about this confusion. I went and refreshed quickly. She said she will take me to some place to party. I thought it was going to be a pub or a dance floor. But to my very pleasant surprise, Munich was celebrating her 850^th year. We were down town. And then we entered a park close to the sendlinger tor. Great festival it was! Stages everywhere! cool music, dance battles, variety shows etc... What more I needed during my stay in Munich. I was so lucky to be there during that time.

Who will miss to drink beer in Munich? Beer stalls were plenty around the city like Oktoberfest. I and Justine grabbed beer and walked everywhere and explored what were going on for the fest. We enjoyed watching hip hop dance battle for 15 minutes. But I have to write about the guy who was announcing the teams for the battle. He Sucked to the core! He said the battle would start in 5 minutes but we waited for more than 30 minutes sitting very very very uncomfortably, cramping our legs in the wet ground. He didn't know to entertain during the delay. Later the crowed started "boo.... ing" at him. but It was an excellent competition. I loved it. one of the groups completely nuked the dance floor with its super cool freezes, and crazy head spins. I wanted to see more but I couldn’t resist pain sitting uncomfortably in the crowd on the ground so we went to some other stages and listened to them. Later she introduced her friend Max. He was working in one of the beer stalls. Later that night he brought beers for free :) Justine’s other friends joined the party too. We listened to some rock music and german hip hop that evening. We expected rain but it rained heavily later that night. The atmosphere and music was great with free beers :) It was great experience when we were completely drenched in rain. After 20 minutes rain stopped and we didn’t stop dancing for the music or drinking beer. Justine and her friend drank little more and did things on the road that they wouldn’t wish to do in public or in private normally :) I asked Justine about that the next morning. She was embarrassed. lol.. I'm not going to tell here what they did the other night on the road :) Its a secret ;) Justine’s friend and I were talking all the way to another place where some other show was happening. I don’t remember what we were talking, but she was kind and listening to me patiently and she smiled all the time. After the show over, we greeted and departed. Justine was silent and having her head down till the home. I saw that she was not feeling good after those many beers. But I don’t think they are too many, it should be less than 2 liters of 4.5% to 5%. We reached home after 15 minutes walk. We were very tired and I could resist to sleep.

The next morning, I woke up around 8 am. I took shower and went to walk around the city. The previous evening she took me downtown and the touristic places were around that area. It was Sunday and the fest continued for the second and final day. I saw the monuments around that place where she took me. It was nice and funny to see people there dressed up like old Bavarians. They celebrated 850^th year wearing the traditional clothes. The streets were beautiful and old. I went to the cathedral church of Our Lady. It had a strange architecture. The top of the church resembled like a tomb of Islamic architecture. It is one of the tallest structures in Munich. I was roaming all day around marienplatz and karlsplatz. I went home around 7pm. We cooked together. I made chicken peas butter masala. Justine ate half of the peas before I cooked. She was so curious to cook those dishes. I added the ingredients, she stirred the pan all the time. You see, she cooked along with me! It was very late when we had our dinner. It was around 11 pm when we had our dinner. She made the environment look so great for our dinner. One of the pleasant moments for anyone would be a candle light dinner with Jazz music. It was a pleasant moment and i have to admit that i felt romantic but couldn't express. We talked so much about Munich, Bavaria, palm trees, banana trees and coconut trees in India. I felt funny when when asked me "do you have banana trees, mango trees ?" Since those trees are not common in temperate region, she was so surprised to hear that i have those trees at home :)

The next morning, I woke up late. I wanted to see the BMW museum and the famous castle in munich schloss Nymphenburg. The headquarters of BMW is truly amazing. The architecture of the building reflects the height of technology employed in their products. Modern architecture is lumped on to The Olympia Park, the place where BMW headquarters is situated. I had plenty of time after visiting those places. I went to the deutsche museum that noon. It took more than 2 hours for me to see only the places where my legs found the way inside the museum. There were many more things to be seen but I ignored them as they were not of my interest. When It was around 5 pm, I went for shopping to buy some milk and beans. I met Justine’s apartment mate Heinke. We shopped and walked towards the apartment. She wanted to do more shopping so I went to the apartment. Justine invited Heinke for the dinner that night. Justine came around 7pm. We started cooking together. I cooked vegetarian. I did some desert as well with saffron and almonds. Justine loved it and Heinke too. But sad thing was Heinke couldn’t drink as she was allergic to milk. And the desert was just made of milk. We had nice time talking and having dinner together. We talked till midnight. Heinke left greeting me as I had to leave Munich the next morning. I packed my things talking to Justine. I gave all the extra spices to Justine. She felt so happy as she loved Indian cuisine and she said she would try cooking more Indian stuff in the future. After packing my things, It was 1am when I slept.

I woke up very early the next morning. I took shower quickly and it was all set to come back to Göteborg. I took the metro and reached the Munich hauptbahnhof. I had to take the train till Mainz near Frankfurt just to take my return flight. I just had 9 minutes to catch the bus going from Mainz to the Hahn airport. I had to rush to the bus stop. I ran with all my big bags towards the sign showing bus. A girl ran beside me and asked something in german. I replied "nein deutsche". Then she spoke in English. She also wanted to catch the bus 600 to the airport. I found the bus 20 mts away. We ran and boarded it. It was more than 1 hr travel by bus to the airport. She introduced herself as Teresita. We talked all the way till the airport. She said she was going to Madrid. She shared her travel stories and about her life in Germany and Chile. When it was the time to get the boarding pass, we greeted and departed. The trip almost came to an end...

Not just the hosts I met during my trip, it was a great experience travelling alone and meeting so many new people in my life, On the way to airport in Mainz, in the streets of Berlin, in schloss Nymphenburg in Munich, the trueman guy in Berlin, the gay guy in Vienna who was peeping at me while I was peeing and many more...

My perception of Vienna was right!

2008-07-31T14:38:00.004+03:00

I reached Vienna around 6.30pm. I was hungry and I went to a döner shop; I found the döner shops everywhere in Austria as well like in Germany. It took around 1hr for me to reach Ioana’s home from the railway station. She was waiting for me in the tram stop near her house. I refreshed quickly and presented an Absinth bottle to Ioana. I thought she would not have tasted it since it is banned in many places. But to my surprise she said it was one of her favorites. Damn! I shoulda bought a big one then! We went for a walk around her district. It was my pleasure to walk during sunset in a calm neighborhood. She showed me some wine yards around her house. The famous Viennese wine tasting place “Heurigen” is situated close to her house. She tried to teach me the way to get to her house. It was late that night and I couldn’t really remember the route. Just I remembered a few landmarks which helped me to find her house later one evening. We reached home late and didn’t talk much and we went to sleep as she had to work the next day.

Ioana dropped me in car downtown the next morning when she left for work. It was the most pathetic day in my entire trip. I told you before that Vienna welcomed me with a pleasant weather, it was absolutely fake. It was raining all day till late night. I could only see a church from outside and a few monuments around it. It rained so badly and it cold. I didn’t have a jerkin to protect myself from rain or the cold. I was in sleeveless and shorts. I suffered big time that day. I had the one day pass to go around Vienna. I took trams and buses to go around the city and was sightseeing from the trams. Later that evening I got a sms from Ioana. She asked me to come to a pub close to a metro station. I went 30mins earlier than the time she mentioned. I didn’t wanna round the city in the buses further as I got bored of changing the buses now and then when I felt the buses were getting beyond the attractive places. So I went to the pub and ordered a 1 liter typical Austrian beer. The beer was cheap there as well but not as cheap and tasty as in Czech. A 40cl of any beer in a pub like that costs the same price in Göteborg. Ioana and her friends arrived a few minutes later. I forgot to tell one funny incident that happened just before my arrival to that pub. I was in the metro station. I went to a public toilet to pee. There was a tall man with long dirty blonde hair peeing in the next urinal. He was winking at me and peeping into mine. I felt embarrassed. I saw him, he winked. What the hell? I said to myself “I’m not that kinda party”. I quickly finished my work there and zipped. He again smiled at me and winked. I somehow escaped from him then. Back to the happenings to pub… Ioana introduced 2 of her friends named Christophe and Stephen. They had a few beers and I had one more beer. It was 500ml and dark. We were talking for about 2 hours and later we left to home. We weren’t that tired but it was late though. Ioana showed me some places on map to visit the next day. I was so interested to go to the place of UN.

I woke up and got refreshed along with Ioana. She dropped in the center of the city. I didn’t stay for a longer time in any of the places I visited that day. I wanted to rush up and see as many places I could. So I saw the monuments from outside. The Austrian parliament was attractive but not as big as German parliament. I visited some museums. Then I went to the UNO city which is in the far end of the city. It looked totally modern. No trace of traditional architecture was found in UNO city. It just looked something like Singapore or NYC. The buildings were very tall and shining. I wanted to get inside the UNO office, but one of the guards stopped me and said that only guided tour was possible there and I cannot go by myself. He was interested in talking to me. After having a few words, he suggested me some places to see in Vienna. He wanted to come to Stockholm to enjoy nightlife. Whoever enjoys nightlife, Stockholm would be a great destination for them. He asked me come at 2.00 pm for the next guided tour to UN. But I just had a few hours left to see lot more places so I took a few photos from outside and left the UNO city.

I started walking close to the Austrian parliament. There were lot more monuments on that road. I didn’t care to read the history of the each building. I just visited them and took pictures. I went some museums in the evening. When I wanted to go the one of the biggest museums in Vienna, I found that it was already late and it was 6pm. When I entered the museum, I was informed that it was closed for the day and they were waiting for the visitors gone inside to come out. After relaxing for some time, I took the bus to Ioana’s home. I cooked some chicken for her very quick. Just in 30 minutes. It always took me more than 1hr to cook chicken. We quickly had dinner and had some red wine. Ioana had some plan for the evening. It was Friday night. Who will be at home on Friday nights? She took me a place where her friends assembled for a drink. It was very nice experience for me too. We assembled near a monument where some famous orchestra and opera videos were screened. It was a film festival there and hence they screened opera, orchestra and some other traditional music as well. We went home at 12am. Among all other places visited till this time, I found Vienna was interesting and had lot more to do. I wish I could have spent a day more in Vienna. Finally, I had to pack my things for my last destination, Munich. The next day early morning, I had to start from the Vienna bus station at 6.40am. I packed my things very quick and tried sleeping for few hours, but I couldn’t get enough sleep. I woke up early. I quickly refreshed and left from Ioana’s place with a warm hug. I reached the Bus station in time. I had hard time talking to the bus driver regarding my journey to Munich. He didn’t speak a word in English. It was all body language which helped me. He acted as a dumb for few minutes when I talked to him :) Later I had no problem to get to Munich.

It was so exciting to the landscape when I travelled from Vienna to Munich. When I just passed Salzburg, the bus was stopped by the migration board to check our identity. We were entering into Germany. The migration officer came to me. I showed my passport. She asked me, “coming from schweden?” I smiled and it was funny to hear Sweden as Schweden. I know that in German, Sweden is called Schweden. He looked at the photo in my passport and looked at my face; he stared a few times repeatedly looking at the passport. He found the word “Tamil Nadu” in my passport and asked me if I’m from Sri Lanka. He was curious to know by any means I was a terrorist and I was the only “non white” there in the bus. I was disappointed that if I was going to end up in interrogation. He took my passport and the ID cards and passports of others as well. The bus driver came 5 minutes later with all passports and ID cards. I was happy to see one blue passport in that bunch. I got it back from him. The bus moved to Munich.

I'm eager to see Praha!

2008-07-29T16:18:00.010+03:00

When I said about my trip, everyone said Prague is gonna be the most amazing city out of all other cities that I had planned. With much anxiety I boarded the train. I met an Argentinean couple who had been travelling in Europe for more than a month and they had planned to finish the trip by September 2008. We talked about Argentina, Tierra del fugo, their travel experiences and the famous Argentinean wines. Later they were disappointed to know that they were on right seats on a wrong wagon. So they left to their actual places. I had some soup in the restaurant inside the train. In the table next to me, I heard 2 girls speaking with so much rhythm. All I heard was “jävla” I turned around and asked them “från sverige?” I tried my best to get into conversation in Swedish. As usual, at one point I had no clue what they asked me, so I had to speak to them in English. I quickly left to my place then after having my soup. I arrived at Prague around 5.20 pm. I informed Tomas about my arrival and right after that I went to exchange money. Euro is not accepted in Czech Republic. And the currency name is Czech koruna. I went to a money exchange shop, I gave him 50€. He gave me a bill out of bunch of pre printed bills and gave 1150 CZK. It was lesser than the exchange rate on the notice board. I took my mobile and started calculating the exchange amount. Next to me was an American who exchanged 100 USD. He got very less amount. He yelled at him and got his 100$ back. Then I checked my bill, the bill was for 5€. When I went to him to ask him all these mess, he took his 1150CZK and returned my 50€ back. I went to another exchange place; I thought it was a better place since there were many people on the queue waiting to exchange. He offered me 1100CZK for my 50€ Damn! It’s lesser than the previous deal. This guy didn’t give any bill instead he just showed the calculation on his computer. It looked like he took 75CZK as commission for 50€. I wouldn’t have asked a question, if he had given me the bill for what I exchanged. Agreeing with this shit deal, I followed the instructions of Tomas sms and reached the tram stop he mentioned.

It was drizzling. Tomas came and picked me up from tram stop. He looked like he just came from biking. And yes he was biking in the rain. We went home and he refreshed quickly. He wanted some Indian food that night. We quickly went to super market near his place and bought chicken. Tomas is sooooooooper quick guy, so I have to be as quick as him. We cooked quickly and ate very quickly but he enjoyed very much I believe, I can say that from his reactions and the complement he gave.

It wasn’t very late to go out after our dinner. So we decided to go out for beer, I was very eager to taste Czech beers; I have tasted some of them in Sweden without knowing that they are so special. It was around 9pm the other night, we went to a very decent pub in downtown. Tomas ordered 2 beers, they were pilser urquell. Tomas said it is the practice of Czech to wait till the foam in the top of the beer settles down and then take a sip. He said so when I was so eager to say cheers and have a quick sip. I learnt a new word in Czech “na zdraví” which literally means “for the health” But it’s the word for cheers. It’s a different practice that I saw in Czech that they say na zdraví and tap the glass on the table and take a sip. I was so surprised to see the price of beer in a pub like that. It costed just 31 CZK which is around 1.5€. We moved to another pub to taste some other beer. I was amazed with the taste of those beers as well. After having 1.5 liters in total each, we thought those were enough for a weekday. I wish I were in Prague every weekend, not just for those damn good beers, but for the price at which I get them :) I would say one of the best things I did in Prague was tasting those beers. It was not just that night alone we went for beer, every evening during my stay in Prague I didn’t miss to have those beers.

The next morning I have to get up early one reason was, as I said Tomas is quick guy and the other reason is he leaves to work at 7.30 am. A view of the Prague castle and the Charles Bridge from the river side along the busy road whispered in my ears “why don’t you have your bread and bananas sitting here and enjoy my beauty?” Do I need a better place to have my breakfast? I could enjoy the eternal beauty of Prague from there. It was not just the bridge and the castle, but the morning sunlight added more beauty to it. It was cloudy, some part of the sky were with dark clouds, the sun rays managed to peep into gorgeous Prague the other morning. My eyes captured the picture of this scene so did my camera. I wanted to sit there for some more time but I couldn’t resist going up the hill to visit Prague castle. I walked all the way along the Vltava River and reached Charles Bridge. After capturing some perfect reflections of the castle on the Vltava River, I started going up towards the castle. On the way to castle I could hear very soothing orchestra. When I reached the top of the castle, I couldn’t resist seeing the view of the city even though the orchestral music was tuning my ears to visit them. It was yet another precious moment in my trip. I had no interest in orchestra and traditional music before, it was not those guys who played the music in the street made me to admire orchestra, but I felt like the city of Prague spoke to me when they were playing orchestra. I spent 1hr listening to their pleasant music admiring the beauty of castle and the city. Their music was glamorous to attract me all the time. But it was hard for me to say myself “Its enough of orchestra” and I moved from there and visited other places. I went to the cathedral in the castle area. It was huge with beautiful architecture, marvelous traditional catholic interiors. I wasn’t so much impressed with the inner beauty of the any monument or church in Prague. They look the same as in Italy and Germany and perhaps other parts of Europe. There is nothing much to say about the monuments in Prague castle, it’s all the view of the city from the top of the hill that attracted me more than anything there. I spent the rest of the day visiting smaller churches in the city and going around the city in trams.

It was around 7.30 pm, I and Tomas met somewhere in the city and went for a beer. As I told you, I didn’t miss to have those fine brewed beers on any of the evenings :) Just having a couple of beers, we went home and cooked some Rajma curry. We had our dinner very late and didn’t have much time to go out. We talked for a while and slept. We have to wake up early the next morning. I didn’t see many of the places in Prague, yet I wanted to walk along the river admiring the beauty of castle and go up the hill and enjoy the orchestra. I did so. I spent another 1hr enjoying the orchestra. It was so relaxing to hear their music. And some old couples started to dance along with the music and the scene around was so exciting. Later I walked on the opposite direction to that of the previous day. I saw some government buildings with nice architecture and a few posh pubs. I took the tram and went downtown and started roaming in the streets. I went to a museum and some other monuments whose name I don’t remember. Tomas told me the previous night about a drink called Absinth which was famous in Czech a longtime ago and later it was banned because of its ill effects to the health. But now Absinth is available with less ill effects and with almost the same alcohol percentage. I was astonished to hear that Absinth has 70% alcohol by volume. I wanted to taste that. The tradition of tasting Absinth was to have a spoon with some sugar and pour some absinth in the spoon and light it up and take the burning shot. I was so curious to taste Absinth and take the burning shots. I went to a supermarket and bought 2 small bottles of Absinth.

Later in the evening I and Tomas met somewhere in the city and went to a pub, it was really great place with excellent interiors and lighting. There is one other traditional drink of Czech called “Becherovka”. I tried it with pleasure, As Usual the Czechs said that’s good for health since it’s made from lots of herbs. I heard the same thing from Hungarians when they talked about Unicum. But Becherovka is far better than unicum and jägermeister. Hungarians and Czech related the taste of their traditional drinks to jägermeister. After having 2 liters of beer and a Becherovka, I felt it was enough for the day as I had to pack my things up and get ready for Vienna the next afternoon. We went home very late. We had some food left so we didn’t cook anything. We then tried fire shots of Absinth. Tomas was so scared to take it for the first time. I went next. I was brave to take it very quick when flame was so high but atlast I ended up burning my lips. We filmed our first shot of Absinth. It was lots of fun to try burning Absinth shots. We didn’t try more as both of us had something to do the next morning. So the rest of Absinth is for Tomas and he would offer to his guests and couch surfers. It was very late that night, I had to pack my things up and get ready for Vienna. I slept very late and woke up as usual at 6 am as I have to go along with Tomas. The next morning we left early from the house and I went for sightseeing leaving my bags at his Dental Clinic. I went to a Military Museum and came back at 12pm to his clinic to take my bags and board the train to Vienna from praha holesovic. The weather was awesome when I was travelling in the train. I felt like Vienna gave me a warm welcome which I didn’t get from Prague or Hamburg or Berlin. It was absolutely messy weather when I travelled from Stockholm to Hamburg, from Hamburg to Berlin and from Berlin to Prague. See u in Vienna....

Way to berlin

2008-07-23T17:52:00.005+03:00

I reached the Hamburg central station, “Hauptbahnhof”. I was in time at the station waiting for the train. The train got delayed by 10 minutes to arrive at the Hamburg station. It was not over; the train went a mile from the station and stopped for another 10 minutes. Unfortunately I had to change train at a station called “Schwerin” and I had just 9 minutes to change the train if the train reaches on time. But it didn’t. I had to miss my actual train that had to go from Schwerin to Berlin. I went to information center of DB and got the tickets for the next train. I had to wait there for another 1hr and 40 min to catch the next train. I reached Berlin 2 hours delayed. Juli was at Berlin Hauptbhanhof to pick me up. I heard that Berlin is the city of alternative fashion. The first impression I got from Juli was she was deep into in alternative fashion as she had some piercings on her face and ears. We took the local trains to her home. We drank a coffee and got ready for the party that night. She took me a pub where other couch surfers assembled for beer. It was time to learn another german word “prost” which means cheers. I used to be very watchful on my spending in the pub, I don’t drink much there as the drinks are much expensive than to buy it from a shop. But after seeing the price of a mug full of beer, I went for 3 big beers. Yipeeee! I didn’t stop with it. It was time for tequila then. Al this costed just 10€. It was too late then, I decided to finish partying and go to sleep. I woke up around 9 in the morning. I thought to give a little surprise to Juli by cooking something for her. But I was surprised to see that her kitchen was with only cat food and not much of human eatables. I went to supermarket and bought some spagatti and tried cooking that with coconut oil as I found later that oil was missing in her kitchen as well. It tasted good when I ate it hot. But Juli missed to eat as she woke up very late since she partyed for a long time the previous night. I was disappointed as I made it to give a surprise to her.

It was 10 in the night. Juli felt bored to stay at home as it was Friday night, so she took me for another party. As usual I had thought not to get drunk or stay longer there as my trip will get spoiled and would not to be able to see Berlin the next morning. Juli partyed till 7 in the morning and returned home. I woke up at 10 am and started sightseeing. Hmmm, before I say what happened next, I must tell about this guy now. His name is Marcelo and he has capturing his life on cam 24hrs for past 1 year or more than that I believe. He captures his life in webcam and broadcasts in trueman tv. I met this guy the previous night when went for beer. He had his laptop on with 3G modem and captured all of us. So no matter what he does, everything is shown on this site. When I went early the next morning after partying, I went to this site, I was surprised. He was having fun time with a girl and it was broadcasted. He made the environment dark so no one can blame that he is not capturing everything, but his microphone was turned on hence I could hear him making love. I started wondering if there is anything called “personal” in his life? So he is one strange personality whom I met in my trip.

I started sightseeing then. I accidentally happened to meet Natalie whom I met the previous day on a guided tour. So I was happy to go around Berlin with her and without her I would have missed to see the German parliament. It‘s a amazing monument. It’s a blend of modern and the traditional European architecture. We had nice time talking to each other and felt very happy as I saw more places with her and I also got a company to go around. We saw the famous German wall which is called as “East side galleryIt was my pleasure meeting her and we exchanged our travel experiences. When the dusk surrounded, I departed to Juli’s home to have dinner with her. She woke late that evening since she partyed till 7 in the morning. I cooked some nice chicken curry for her. I hope she enjoyed it, I was little scared to add more spices or chili as she said she is totally against hot and spicy food. With very minimum spices and chili I managed to get the flavor of the curry. We had good time having dinner together. After sometime, I got a sms saying that “Hej karan, hur maar du och Namaste! Yes come! Contact me when u come to praha. Tomas kadlas, CS” so I was happy to see that someone was ready to host me in Prague. Unfortunately after having dinner, Juli had to leave her home as her mom was ill. But Juli came back home early the next morning and slept. I had to get up early as I had to get ready for Prague. I thought not to disturb her as she would have hard time last night. I whispered on her ears that “I’m leaving” She woke up and refreshed in a few minutes and offered me breakfast. She signed my couch surfing T-shirt as well. She then took me to the railway station. With a warm hug, I left to Berlin hauptbahnhof. I was too lethargic thinking that I still had time to catch the train to Prague. I always thought I had plenty of time to take the train. But when I saw the clock in hauptbahnhof, it was 11:17 and my train leaves at 11:17. I could see the train on the platform so I ran and boarded. Just a few seconds later, the doors were closed and train moved.

Hault in Hamburg

2008-07-23T17:00:00.003+03:00

It was late that evening when I arrived in Hamburg. I couldn’t reach my friend through my phone as calls were restricted. I found a nice couple who tried their best to help me. Unfortunaltely my friend could not reach me as well. Lately he we met after searching for each other in the station. I spent that evening sipping some “Becks” beer. This brand is very popular in Germany and I swear to God this beer doesn’t deserve to be that famous. Here comes a disaster, I logged in to couch surfing and I was terribly surprised to see my couch in Prague was cancelled. The hostess already said that one of her friends is gonna come in the middle of July but since she didn’t get any news about his arrival, she took it granted that he is not coming that early and decided to host me. Trusting her words, I stopped requesting for further couches in Prague. I was very disappointed and started requesting for couch in Prague. Satish, my friend told me that he can join me for sightseeing the next day after 1 in the afternoon. He had some class which he said to be very important as the professor would suggest some ideas to crack the exam. I woke up very late the next morning. It was 11.30 am. Satish was still sleeping, He was watching a movie all night alone and slept very late. He missed the class and came with me for sightseeing. I went everywhere and grabbed something and ate. Anyone from Scandinavia would do this as everything is cheap in Germany. And the cost of a beer of 700ml is 0.8€ whereas the same quantity of water costs more.

I was wondering what does the letter “β” means in German. I was guessing it could sound like “b” but to my surprise in the trains and buses when I heard the name of the stop, it was pronounced like “S” or “Z”. I learned my first German word in a shop. When we asked for sandwich, the lady in the shop asked how many we need. She asked something like “ein, zwie” or something like that. I understood from her body language that ein means one and zwie means two. We spent the entire day going around the city taking pictures. I was surprised seeing the cooking skills of my friend. I mean to say that I was surprised badly. I’m seeing the first Indian abroad who doesn’t have any spices in his kitchen. Thank god, I’m carrying all spices with me. For the breakfast, he made really good stuff. He took some fish and sprinkled some salt and pepper over it, kept a few slices of onions and tomatoes and microwaved it for 15 minutes. It looked funny when he made this dish but tasted well ;) when I told him that I brought all spices with me, he wanted to have some good Indian stuff for dinner. I cooked some nice chicken curry which really didn’t taste like how it should taste. He ate it like as if he was left in a desert for a few years without food. lol.. I am happy that he enjoyed it. I still searched for couch in Prague. Satish had to go to university the next morning and from where he had a short trip to AIRBUS. He was so keen that morning to wake up in time and get ready. Finally he went for the industrial visit trip. We had plans to go to some pub and have a beer in the famous “Reeperbhan” that night. I read about this place before I started my journey. But when I went there that Wednesday night, I was surprised to see all the streets there with full of sex shops. I have been roaming in quite a lot of places in Italy, Sweden and Denmark, but I have not seen some place as erotic as Reeperbahn in Hamburg. I know you all think about Amsterdam, I know that and I have not been there yet. Hope to see it a few months probably in my next trip. Forget the shops, I heard from some of my friends in Sweden who had been in Hamburg that it’s hard to go around Hamburg as a single on Friday nights. Anyone who looks like capable of paying a few € will definitely be surrounded by prostitutes. I saw this with my own eyes. It was not me who was surrounded by them. Those girls knew that I don’t have enough money for them so didn’t care to ask me. I heard about street prostitution in movies and news papers, but I haven’t seen a place which is legal to do that. Then we went to a street where the girls were sitting on a raised chair like in a hair dressing shop. Some were standing like dolls kept before some textile or clothes shop. And yes they were with the minimum clothes covering their privates. Satish was talking to them asking them to open the window. I don’t know what I was doing, but I just kept walking down the street without looking aside, satish was making fun of me as I kept on walking to reach the other side of the street. It was embarrassing for me when those girls called from the window. And I thought they were making fun of me so I didn’t bother to listen anything what they said. I reached the other side of the street, Satish reached a few minutes later. He started laughing his ass off when we met on the other side.

It was Wednesday night, so the trains and buses were not that frequent to reach home. So we left in just 30 minutes after seeing Reeperbahn. But I have to pack my things up!!! The next morning, I had to leave to Berlin. As usual, I woke up early and took shower and was ready to take the train. After thanking him for everything, I left his home and took bus to the hauptbahnhof.

stockholm and arrival to Hamburg

2008-07-10T21:04:00.005+03:00

It was then a very pleasant day in Stockholm. Annie had to work even on Sunday so I went alone to see the city. Everyone travelling to Sweden says “things are very expensive here” I too said the same when I was in Stockholm. Anything would cost significantly much higher than in Göteborg so I had to watch my pocket before I spent every kroner. I started sightseeing with one of the biggest shopping mall called “Galleria”. I walked down the streets close to central station. I didn’t wanna spend money on museums in Stockholm, as I believe they are not very popular anywhere else in the world. I loved to walk on the streets of Gamlastan which means the old town. A very tall church and some posh cafés are very popular in that locality. A beer of coffee along the shore in Gamlastan during sunset would be my favorite thing to do in Stockholm if my pocket is heavy J I felt little bored later to take pictures of me with one hand and smiling at the camera several times as I could not get myself in the center of the pic or I would have looked so terrible. I was little tired hence I took some bus and started sightseeing from the bus. I saw two identical copper towers at a very long distance. I thought to step out of the bus and walk towards the towers. After walking a mile, I found that the towers are on the other island so I changed my direction towards “the city hall”. Then I happened to meet one of my friends in Stockholm who helped me long back when I came to Sweden. We spent a couple of hours roaming in the city and took a boat ride to a theme park. I did some shopping as I promised Annie that I will cook some Indian dish for her. So it was close to 6 in the evening, I took the bus back to Annie’s home.

I was very hungry as I was roaming all day just eating bananas and burger. Some may say its enough my survival, but I need more J Annie was hungry too. I started cooking butter chicken masala. Annie was curious to see my cooking and she wanted to learn some Indian stuff that evening. I kept on adding ingredients to my dish, I thought she remembered everything I added to my dish, but later she gave up the dream of cooking some Indian dish :P It was time to serve and eat then. With a bottle of French wine and bread similar to “naan” we had our dinner. The next day she didn’t have work to do, so we had plenty of time to talk after dinner. It was close to 1 in the night. She slept and I did some packing as I have to start to Hamburg the next afternoon. I went to bed then with my laptop. I was on facebook. A few hours later I woke up and saw, my laptop was on with screensaver and my fingers were on the keyboard. I slept when I was online. Then I closed my computer and had a very good sleep that night.

It was 7 in the morning. I woke up and took shower. I packed the rest of the things and spent the last few hours in Stockholm with my computer as it was terrible weather. It rained so much and I couldn’t step out of the door. Annie wanted to buy some eatables, so we went to supermarket in the rain. I was not drenched by rain completely though. We came back home and it was time for to get started for the next destination. I took the bus to central station. My flight to Hamburg is from a airport called Skävsta which was said that it is in Stockholm. I paid jävla 150 SEK to reach the airport and it took around 1hr and 10 minutes by airport shuttle to reach there. The airport is not in Stockholm, It is very close to a place called Nyköping. I went to check in my bag and found that my bag weighs more than allowed limit. The girl in the counter asked if I can transfer some of the things to my hand bag. I did and checked in with out any problem. When I was about to board the flight, the same girl took my passport and kept staring at my face 5 or 6 times, I know I look much different now, she laughed and gave the passport and boarding card back. In the flight, I found that I missed one entire set of tickets and address of my friend in Hamburg. I don’t have any information about my friend in Hamburg. To get the address, I had to print the conversation with my friend which I had in gmail. I was little panic then. After I reached Lubeck airport, I went online on a public PC and took the address again. Meanwhile I had to miss the bus from Lubeck airport to Hamburg central station. To get the next shuttle I have to wait for 3 more hours by then I’d have gone crazy. So I asked some alternative way to reach Hamburg quick. I had to go long way and pay much more for my negligence. I paid the cost and reached Hamburg by 2 hours late.

Euro trip started..

2008-07-06T07:01:00.007+03:00

With Much anxiety and adrenaline, My Euro trip began.. I was welcomed by warm hug with a cute smile from Annie, my first host. It was already 10 in the night, I thought cooking wont be good idea that late so we were talking and tried surprising Annie with a gift, She was delighted. I was wondering if she would like my gift or not. I hope she liked it. She said, "but you'll become poor if do this everytime" , hahaha I'm not a jackass Annie :) I know how much it would cost for me to stay in a hostel for 2 nights, I spent much less than that ;) After talking so much, it was 12.30, when I tried to sleep, I still couldn't and its 6 in the morning right now, I took more caffeine last night.. Det är jätte stor kaffe.. I just checked a few places to visit in Stockholm on the web and Annie gave some directions to a few places.. When I checked the Stockholm tourist wiki page maintained by couch surfers, believe it or not there was a link called "2kronor hostel". I thought it costs just 2 SEK per night to stay in the hostel, though my thinking its beyond anyone's imagination :P , I was curious to know the prices, I checked the site thoroughly, det är jävla 400 kronor /natt.

to be contd...

My recent captures!

2008-06-30T02:30:00.006+03:00

From göteborgs operan - lipstick building is the highlight

From klippen, Göteborg

A capture of sunset in göteborg from göta alv on the way to Eriksberg - Hissingen

Wiered.........

2008-06-30T01:52:00.009+03:00

I wanna teach you something.

step #1 - seize ______
step #2 - Remove ______
step #3 -indulge.

You all ask me, "What the hell you mean?" Folks, I just mentioned how to drink a beer.And ofcourse, I don't have to teach you how to drink beer :) Check this foto which has an instruction manual to drink beer. Even kids know to drink beer I believe even if they have not tried drinking one. The beer name is TUBORG, a very famous Danish beer.

Is my pee radioactive? emits gamma rays or something? Is it not recyclable? Questions of that kind arises when i see pictures like this! Why is it socially hazardous? I found the same sticker in the adjacent closets as well :) I guess, it becomes hazardous since people drink the above special kind of beer in that pub :P

A symbol of good neighbourhood.

2008-06-14T12:42:00.005+03:00

Its very common that we greet each other when we see our neighbours but have u ever thought of doing something else apart from usual greetings and inviting them for your parties? This post is about one of my friends in Sweden and also the most valuable customer of mine. I went to her home recently to fix her printer. We had some time to look at the garden. She spends most of her time in gardening. After we had a look at the garden, She showed me a post box like thing exactly on the fence separating her house with her neighbour. I asked "why the post box is here?" she said its not a post box and asked me to open it. I opened it. There were 2 glasses. They were empty at that time. She said its a sign of good neighbourhood.

And the story behind these glasses is very short but its really an interesting way to have good relationship with people around you. She said once she was working in her garden and the neighbour was also working in his garden. He asked her if she wishes to have a drink with him. yes! they had a drink. This continued for some days. Later they kept a box on their fence with 2 glasses. They keep whiskey in it. If they wish to have a drink when they are working in their garden, they have some whiskey. I wish i could do that. But not whiskey but tequila, or a beer ;)

How important is data in your PC?

2008-05-26T07:17:00.002+03:00

I got a call from a guy asking me fix his computer. He said he got my number from one of my olds friends. Hence i thought not to charge for my work. He said his computer doesn't start and needs to be fixed soon as he has got his final presentation of of thesis in 3 days. I said I can fix the computer on thursday. We fixed the time and place to meet. But I don't know if he didn't trust me or get his computer fixed quicker. The next itself, he sought the help from Chalmers IT help desk, which is mainly for assisting user account related issues with in Chalmers network. They tried some troubleshooting but couldn't fix. They finally said it has to fixed using a recovery CD. He then asked if he is going to lose data. He said to me that he asked them repeatedly if he loses the data its a complete disaster for him. They said NO. He went home, took his recovery discs and followed the instructions. At one instant he was warned during the installation procedure that it will take away all the data. He was curious and asked some of his friends who doesn't know anything about computers. He said his friends told him that only in IBM computers there is a possibility to lose data but yours is ACER hence you may not lose it. It sounds so stupid! He proceeded and finally ended up with brand new "my documents" and "desktop"

It was Thursday morning, he called me and asked if there is any possibility to recover the data back. I was angry. Why he didn't believe my words? If he wanted to get it fixed little earlier he could have told me. When i met him in the afternoon, He asked me to install MS office which i did. He then said, how he knows my friend and whats gonna happen after this disaster. He came to study social works programme for one year. He is done with everything and only his 6 months of thesis work has to be presented the next day(friday) He said his permit to stay in Sweden is expiring very shortly and there is no means by which he can extend his permit. Hence he said "its all gone!" He is returning to his country shortly and come again to Sweden some other time to do it over. I don't know if he can get a permit to come later. Even after having so much of experience, I never ask someone to do OS repair or registry fix by them self using recovery discs. Cos its just matter of one strike in your keyboard which is gonna delete everything. I wonder why didn't the Chalmers IT help desk didn't realize this fact. Not every student is computer geek. I would definitely blame Chalmers IT help desk for this disaster.

A customer to remember!

2008-05-05T22:49:00.004+03:00

When i was working for DELL, I heard a very few old people crying sometimes for not getting their computer fixed. And they tell that they miss their sons and daughters emails and fotos. I felt those were the worst moments of my job, i thought i would rather quit that job for not being so helpful. I always thought at those moments, "take me to that place, I'll fix it in no time". It is not my fault or the customers fault for not getting their computer fixed, I would rather blame strict and badly framed policies for which each and technician has to abide otherwise the technician's job is not gonna last long!

In my new part time job as a computer technician, I met an elderly woman last Sunday. She stays a few miles away from my residence. I went to her house along with my lovable land lord. My landlord is the one who helped me in writing those advertisements in svenska. The customer was waiting in front of her house for our arrival. She introduced herself as Gunnevi. I was surprised to see her house. Believe it or not i can call it as a library. And she said that the books were arranged in alphabetical order. She took me to her computer then. I quickly understood the issue with her computer. It was problem with the power supply as there was a thunderstorm recently and since then modem and computer didn't work. We had to replace power supply in order to start the computer and find if there were any other issues. I spent close to 4 hours to fix the issue. She atlast said that she never keep money with her as it was dangerous to have money being an elderly person. We accepted to meet at a cafe on Monday. She asked the fee for my job. I told my fee. She said "oh!" (i felt sad for a second, i thought she felt thats too much for my job) "thats very cheap". She then offered me more than what i demanded which is also of the reason that made me to take time and write this blog :)

We talked about Indian cooking (obviously a good topic to speak with anyone) and Swedish dishes. When i was troubleshooting her computer she said many interesting things that happened in her life. On our way back to home on sunday after fixing the issue, my landlord said "she is an old woman with modern ideas!” Yes, Its true!. Gunnevi said that she admired the book "The memory keeper's daughter" and said her story behind that book. I never had fascinations to read book but i always poke my nose into everything what others know hence i saw the entire outline of the story in wikipedia and book critics blogs. I have planned to read that book once i have some time to read a novel. Finally I was very much satisfied to have fixed her computer and so did her. I remember when i left her home last Sunday, she said "Jag är jätte jätte jätte glad", and I got appreciation for my job which I always expect more than my fee :)

Appreciation - my boost!

2008-05-05T22:21:00.004+03:00

I have had the most terrible and worst customer experience which were mostly of not my fault but because of the previous technicians and the some ridiculous policies of DELL. I felt very sorry for such customers who had terrible experience with DELL for whom I could not have done anymore better. I have had so many comments like "you are my hero", "you saved my life", "my son/daughter/mamma/pappa/ is in this computer", "thanks for saving those fotos" etc.. Everyday i thought i should get atleast one or two extraordinary comments apart from "thanks" because those comments gave me job satisfaction to an extent as it was a real tough job to work all night 365 days a year. When i left the job, only thing that i felt I was missing was those appreciations.

I participated in DELL community forums and post the fixes for issues given there. Even if something is not known to me, I search Microsoft knowledge base or the relevant articles and try to get a fix for the issue. I maintain DELL tech support community in the most popular social networking site in India. I just get appreciation for my ideas and fixes. I have shared my ideas and fixes just as a hobby. But later I thought to do it for a small fee to support my living.

I charged just 50-60% of nominal fee. I had this idea long back to do, but for various reasons i dropped the plan. Recently i made up my mind to go to customers place and troubleshoot computers. As i have good experience troubleshooting over the phone when i was as a tech support agent for DELL. Some customers were so generous enough to more money than i expect cos they always calculate the nominal fee and pay a little less than that. But my expectation little lesser than that so I was satisfied with most of the customers but I was not satisfied with only a very few customers as they didn't think that I'm charging much much lower than nominal fee and the amount of time i spent for their computers. But I found the real job satisfaction in it. Apart from getting money I always made some good contacts with the customers. I make sure that they recommend me to help their friends and relatives with their computers :)

A lesson i learnt!

2008-04-17T15:00:00.005+03:00

After having a Mexican dinner and a beer at my university, I went home. My room mate and my friend Marco called me for a beer at a student cafe. We went there and each one grabbed a beer. I saw a girl with red hair. I couldn't remember her name either or where i met her. But she remembered where she met me before. We met actually in a party organized by couch surfers in Göteborg. Again we introduced ourself. But this time i believe I'll not forget her name or face and where i met her cos I felt very embarrassing for a moment in front her. I asked her if that was that first time she was coming to that cafe, she said no. But it was the first time for me to that cafe. She asked so where i usually go in the weekends? Most of the weekends i stay at home, doing something but if i feel bored i might go to sticky fingers, excet, valand or park lane if my pocket is heavy i said with some laughter... She asked which one i like the most, i said park lane and sticky fingers. But she didn't like sticky fingers. Then i said that i have been to one more pub which is called "Gretas". Its a gay pub in Göteborg. It was one new years eve when i went there. Since i was little high with alcohol that eve, i met some guys in tram and they took me to gay pub and i realized that it was in a gay pub after getting in when some guys approached me.

I said I didn't like that place since most of them were homosexuals. I guess she got offended at this moment. She then started talking something and she said that her friends told her gretas is a good pub and she wants to try that once. I said if she wanted to see what was so special about that place, she could try that place once, but its only for homosexuals i said. She politely said that she is... I just felt like turning back and go somewhere as i was not comfortable cos just a few moments ago i said i don't encourage homosexuality and cracked a silly joke on them. I apologized to her, I should not have spoken about this topic unless i had known her better. She didn't leave me. She wanted me to justify why my opinion about homosexuals is bad. I said i don't hate them for what they are, but i don't encourage what they practice. In reality, if one of my friends turned out to be one of those, still he will be good friend of mine. No doubt about that.. I said i never came across any of my friends who fall in this category. The conversation continued for another 20 mins regarding LGBT rights in India. I said recently i saw in one of the top news channels in India about their rights. And I said people in India are getting aware of LGBT these days. I said for everyone in India to accept this, it may take even 10 years. Finally I said i just wanna talk something else, cos by someway she tackled me and asked reason for why I cant accept homosexuality in normal society.

So the lesson that I learned was not to talk about LGBT unless the other person is well known to you. Even though i don't hate them, i sounded like i hate them when i expressed my opinion! So folks who ever reads this will have an idea how to talk to a person about LGBT and how to avoid this topic with a stranger. It is better to avoid this topic with a person who is not well known to you.

One other tour to Italy

2008-04-15T16:37:00.006+03:00

Its again a big story.. This tour just happened for me. I thought to go for Italy again in easter holidays. I planned in a short time and spent beautiful 5 days in Italy. To my surprise Italy as not that hot as i thought when i started from Göteborg. Milan was also cold indeed. Yea, it was in the month of march, so its the end of winter and probably the starting phase of spring. I'm little lazy to explain the whole story here cos its may take more than 5000 words to describe my experience. Just to mention a few places and monuments, I visited The Duomo cathedral in Milano, Brunate, a mountain peak in Como, near Miano. Its not brunette :)

From venezia

We didn't have any leisure time to chill out as out schedule was so tight to travel as much as possible. So we visited Venezia and Firenze. Its always a pleasure to walk around the old streets of Venice. I felt like i was in some 17th or early 18th century when i saw those old buildings everywhere in the streets of the Venice. I really wonder how same old buildings could be seen everywhere even in this era! And the most amazing thing to do in Venice is go for a ride in "gondolas". But it is not cheap or reasonable price to pay for it would say. Its fucking 100 euros to go for 1 hr ride. If I'm newly married, probably i would go for it. Otherwise a big NO! But there is another way to experience traveling in water in Venice. It is by ferries which operates in the "Grand canal ". Its not expensive but a reasonable price to pay. Though we cannot go in the narrow streets in this ferry we can enjoy seeing most of the important landmarks. Photographers must enjoy this ride during sunset to capture the beauty of Venice.

From Firenze

Florence or Firenze is another beautiful city in Italy which has numerous historical monuments and worthful places to see. Fortunately we were traveling in tourist week, so we had concessions to enter into monuments for lower price and in most of the places for FREE! :) Most amazing features in Florence to see are Piazza del Duomo, Palazzo Piti and the famous statue of "david di michelangelo". There are lot more museums to see in Florence. And yes, through out Italy it is museums everywhere :) And you might not have time to see every museum. One has to be very selective in choosing the museum. Art lovers!, there is no restrictions for you to visit these places, its full of ancient magnificent art works in all the museums. I visited the museum in Pitti Palace and was wondering about art work on the tiny buttons on the clothes of the king and the queen. Now i Know the reason why Italians excel in what ever they design. Its not their technology but their history.

From Firenze

Uyirai tholaithen - kadhal vendum

2008-03-19T17:22:00.006+02:00

A song that i searched for quite found it just now. Its from a malaysian tamil tele movie called "kadhal vendum". The track name is "uyirai tholaithen". I first saw this song in youtube and amazed to hear such a pleasant song. Hats off to the the lyricist... folks! I know many would have been exhausted searching for this song in top tamil mp3 sites and forums.. but i found in a site which i have never seen before. Click here to download as mp3..

Learn some technical stuff!

2008-03-07T13:00:00.005+02:00

Hi electrical engineers, have you ever thought of comparing real power(KW) and reactive power(KVAR) to some other visible stuff??? When i was searching some formulae for complex power in the web, i found some interesting analogy made with beer in a mug. Its pretty interesting and anyone can understand the concept of complex power. Check it out...

And here is another link which describes the beer analogy with real and reactive power. click here to see

Turista till spanien! Bara en dröm :(

2007-12-21T13:24:00.001+02:00

I had planned to visit my friend in spain and spend a week there during christmas holidays. I dont know if i can make it. My professor has asked me to take an exam during 3rd week of january. And my friend John who is in spain visits göteborg after christmas. I'm very confused and not sure if i can make a trip to spain before my friend leaves from madrid. WHERE THE HELL TIME IS FLYING? Oh God! please insert just 7 days in the calendar! Let me go to España.

Troubleshooting made easy!

2007-11-12T19:37:00.000+02:00

I was wondering f there is any software like dell connect which i used when i was working for DELL because my computer at home goes wrong at least once a month and its hard for me trouble shoot over the phone or Google talk. I was very surprised and happy to use DELL connect for the very time because it saved time and above all, i need not explain any technical things to customers. When i say terms like "icon", "desktop", "harddrive", "WI-FI" etc some customers dont have a clue about what i'm talking. So all my work got reduced when DELL launched DELL connect. I searched for some similar programs in the web to use for my personal computer but many of those screen sharing applications or the VNC programs lacked speed even though connection was healthy and they were not user friendly as well. I came across a software called cross loop. This is similar to the one which i used in DELL. First i asked my friends to install this software and didn't tell what this application is all about. Then i played with their computer from my end. They got scared as i started searching their private folders. hahaha... The set up file is around 2.3 MB but it works really well and 100% security is assured as the connection access code is encrypted by 128 bits and is randomly generated every time. Try this out folks!! You will enjoy troubleshooting your mom's computer sitting from your desk. :)

Tour De ITALIA

2007-11-12T17:34:00.000+02:00

Its been 1 year since i came to Sweden but i haven't traveled anywhere except to Denmark. Felt like i was just eating, sleeping and spending rest of the time in front of my laptop. I and dina(my room mate), planned 2 months back to go to Italy, but our residence permits to stay in Sweden was getting over. Se we had to wait for one month to receive the extended residence permit. The day we received our permits, we checked flights to Rome, to our surprise, it was very cheap, we booked tickets to fly on 24th October 2007.

It was late autumn and it was getting colder everyday in Göteborg. But we know usually in Roma, temperature is pretty high compared to Sweden.When we reached Roma, the first thing with which i was surprised was Indian kind of houses, that is flat roofed and painted like a typical Indian house. I felt like i have come to India for vacation. I could see palm trees, which i have never seen in Sweden. We reached the hostel at around 10 am on 25th as we stayed at Frankfurt on 24th night . we got refreshed and started visiting places around the hostel.

ROMA - THE ETERNAL CITY:

I was amazed to see the classical roman architecture. I would love to see those mighty statues and marvelous piece of architecture again. I really don't remember the number of monuments we saw. In fact, the entire city of Roma is a tourist place. I don't know why Colosseum is not a world wonder. I was surprised to see the huge walls of Colosseum. Plan 2 and 3 of the Colosseum are damaged seriously. The tourism department is now working on reconstruction of the walls and make it circular again. But i feel, Any historical monument should not be reconstructed or modified in a greater amount. If reconstructed entirely, then its no more a monument but another modern building!

I saw some fat filthy guys dressed up like an ancient gladiator. Those guys minted money more than software engineers in India. Just to take a snap with them they charged €5. People were waiting in a queue to have a snap with them. Another important monument in Roma is pantheon. Pantheon proves Italy is the best for architecture and art. I have no words to say art on the mighty ceilings of the pantheon church. I still wonder, how one could have done all those art work lying down for days or months!! who knows how long it took to complete the art work??

Another important place in Roma is fontana de Trevi. Its a mighty fountain constructed with marbles. There is a fortune behind dropping a coin at the fountain. One who had dropped a coin in the fountain would visit Roma once again. You wont believe me, The fountain water was crystal clear, and i could see the bottom of the fountain. It was full of coins. Even though there isn't any entry fee for this monument, people throw € just like that.

Romantic Rome - I saw number of couples in the city getting married in public places and churches in Roma. They are not from Roma but their wish is to get married in this romantic city. I saw wedlock happening around Colosseum and in some small churches. To see the entire city of Rome, the best place to visit is Piazza dei Popolo. I went there in the dusk. It was beautiful to see the eternal city in the perishing sunlight. Next to me is a charming couple. They both were enjoying the beauty of Roma kissing each other. I have never seen any other better place to show love. I would like to take my better half to this place and show what love and Rome is. When this couple were enjoying the beauty of Roma, there came a disaster, A Bangladeshi who was selling rose. He interrupted their love convincing them buy roses. I agree that rose is flower symbolizing love but it was not the right time for him to ask them to buy. So the view of the city of Roma is the specialty of this place. I found that Roma is not only the eternal city but also the romantic city.

Basillica S.pietro- The place which every Christian would love to see at least once in their life time is Vatican. Its such small place to be called an independent territory. The art work inside the church is marvelous. The church has got a huge copper dome in the center which is visible from many places from Roma. Just like in pantheon, the walls and ceilings are absolutely filled with art work. People stand in long queues to get inside the church, i have never seen such a long queue in Europe. One other important place to see in Vatican is musei vaticani( Vatican museum). Unfortunately i could not enter Vatican museum as it was Saturday and entry after 1 pm is not allowed. We went there around 2 pm. Hard luck!

Monumento a vittorio Emanuele II-Mightyyyy and beautiful!! No better word to describe this monument. Its located very close to Colosseum. Those huge copper statues in the top of the monument is visible from many places in Roma. This is one my favorite places in Roma. Its mighty, massive and beautiful!

I have just said a very very very few places which we have seen in Roma. Go to Roma and explore the rest yourself. Roma is the eternal city even if its ruined by time and nature.

JOURNEY TOWARDS WORLD WONDER:

On 28th we got ready to visit the former world wonder - the leaning tower of Pisa. Pisa is a small town and there is nothing much to see except the leaning tower. One can spend hardly 4 to 5 hrs in the tower and the Baptistery church. The most disappointing news was the fee to enter the tower. It was €15! I spent only €16 to come to Pisa from Roma!!! lol!! After spending around 6 hours in this place we took the train back to Roma. The trip to Italy almost reached the end.

The next morning we boarded flight to Frankfurt. The useful thing i did in Frankfurt was getting duty free tequila.. hahaha.. We then took the flight to Göteborg in the afternoon.

Its truly an unforgettable trip! Would love to see Roma once again!

Good or Bad or Ugly?

2007-10-03T14:30:00.001+03:00

Its a conversation between me and a espano-swedish girl.

Her: "Have you kissed in public places? Do you like to kiss?"

Me: "No. I haven't kissed anyone. In India, Its not very common to see people kissing in public places."

Her: "Are you a virgin?" (A very tough question to answer for a boy living in western world but brought up in a conservative society like in India, cos' Its kind of prestige issue to say "No" to westerners and it will be really a big issue if I say "Yes" )

Me: "Yes."

she comes with an amazing question then, funny

Her: "How do you make babies then?" (i can see the curiousity in her eyes)

Me: "Everything we do it inside 4 walls. To make love, bus stop or tram is not the right place, i feel" (With some laughter...)

She wonders, as if she has seen the most wiered person on earth. Then says to herself that "i can understand, you may not have had sex, but you haven't even kissed a girl? That sounds ....." (she didn't say anything after that) She then shooted questions at me "Do you wanna have a girl friend"," are you waiting for the right girl?" I have answered "No". I dont know what she feels about me? I really dont know how "being not kissed" sounds!!! good? or bad?? or ugly???

This little piece of conversation is funny for me, interesting for her, wiered in india, might be meaningful in Europe. But i'm happy if she doesn't have any thoughts on me as in the picture below ;)

comments please...

devotional hip hop rocks!!

2007-09-15T02:29:00.000+03:00

folks, if u happened to visit this page. just stay here for 5 mins. You can feel the influence of rap / hip hop in devotion. I'm not that spiritual and i'm not pratising perfect hinduism. But if i had heared this song before, i would have been "bakthimaan"..lol. But its too late for anyone to make me spiritual :P hope you enjoy this song.. I love this song. It rocks!

Svergie mosquitoes: Get me a HIT

2007-08-23T03:11:00.000+03:00

I was preparing for my exam and suddenly, i heard
hissing sound of mosquitoes, i didn't experience
mosquito bites since i came here, because the
temperature doesn't suit for the mosquitoes here.. My
friends here in sweden who stayed for a longer time
told me that we can see mosquitoes in summer.. Yea its
end of the summer now... I was astonished to see that
mosquito.. It was so big... I then managed to take a
snap of it keeping beside a ruler to show how big it
is!! I have never seen such a big mosquito in
chennai.. lol..Not only brinjals, oranges and some
other vegetables are big here but also mosquitoes..

cookies!!! cookies!!! cookies!!!

2007-08-15T18:32:00.000+03:00

I just finished eating some cookies made from turkey. We get some economic products from turkey through out Europe. When i went to Willys, a famous departmetnal shop in sweden, i
found some good cookies fo very cheap price. They offered 3 packs of turkish cookies for just 10 swedish kronors. The same brand cookies were kept in another shelf on the same shop, but the price was 5 swedish kronors each. Both the cookies are going to expire at the same time and they are manufactured at the same time as well. Then why some cookies are being sold with slashed price??? You know why???

Its because in those cookies, the cream is applied on the wrong side. The cream is applied on the design side!! That too not on all the cookies, it was applied on teh wrong surface on only some cookies!! Is this a reason to sell those cookies for such a low price??? This is what swedes are expecting here, Even if if their food doesn't taste good, they alwys look good!!! never judge a dish by seeing it!!! :)

A song that i was searching for years!!

2007-07-24T11:46:00.003+03:00

It goes this way...

Be what you wanna be,
Takin things the way they come,
Nothin is as nice as findin paradise and
Sippin' on Bacardi Rum (summer sun).......

It’s beautiful song for very famous liquor- The Bacardi rum. With reggae music and soothing voice, it’s so nice to hear at anytime. I have been searching this song for quite long time. May be for 2 years I guess. I was searching for this song in youtube as well. I could see that song but it’s just the commercial of Bacardi. So it was for about less than a minute. I couldn't even find the song in YouTube nowadays. Finally after searching so many websites, i found this amazing song and I’ve uploaded in megaupload server.
The original track was sung by groove connection and the song name is
"sittin' in the summer sun"

And here is the link for this song!!

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QSJB3D2C

TRAVELLED ACROSS OCEANS TO WATCH SIVAJI!!

2007-06-19T20:10:00.002+03:00

It was saturday evening, 16th of june 2007. I and my room mates planned to go denmark to watch sivaji. We planned perfectly well and at the end of the journey everything was ok. We booked ticket from gothenburg to copenhagen on 17th early morning 2.00 am. So we had only a few hours left to depart to denmark. i just took a small bag in which i had deo (as i'm not going to bath for another 24 hrs or may be even longer if i miss the train.. hahahaha..) a packet of cookies and some bread( but finally no one ate this bread... we grabbed what ever we found in front of us when we were hungry...) I, john, venki, parag and kishore were waiting in the stop nearby our apartment at 1.30 am for the local city bus which takes to the central station. It was john who made the thrill in the very beginning. He forgot his camera!! We had just 4 mins to catch the bus, john suddenly started running back to the apartment to get the camera, he arrived at the bus stop exactly on time. Infact he started running from the apartment after seing the bus approaching the stop.

A view from the boat ride - kopenhavn

It was 2.00 am exactly we boarded "safflebussen" that goes to copenhagen from my city(göteborg). All were so eager to see the world famous underwater bridge that connects sweden and denmark. Anyone who wishes to come to denmark or sweden or entire scandinavia should not miss to travel in this awesome piece of architecture. The bridge is designed in such a way that, it wont interupt sea transport that occurs in the narrow sea area between these 2 nations and also the air planes which land in the "kastrop" airport (copenhagen international airport). The bridge is built between the city of malmo(sweden) and copenhagen(denmark. From malmo, its a over bridge that is bulit with a breathtaking altitude. I felt like flying in a plane above the sea. The over bridge is about 8 kms. Then comes the man made island. Which is very slim and lengthy piece of land. It may be around 2 to 3 kms. From this man made island the challenging architecture exists. A big tunnel, that runs underneath the sea connects copenhagen. oooooooooooooh..... We finally reached copenhagen railway station at 6.00 am in the morning. We then roamed here and there in the streets and clicked some fotos in front of famous tourist attractions. Unfortuantely it was sunday and it was early morning. Streets were blank, only drunkards were roaming in the streets with world famous "carlsberg" beer- "probably the best beer in the world"

from öresund bridge - between sweden and denmark

We found that tourist information center do not operate on sundays. It was time for city cannal boat ride. Amazing ride it was!! In one hour, they showed all the imporatant tourist places of this city from the boat. Famous fairy tale "little mermaid" is in copenhagen and we didn't miss that. Its really a small statue but i dont know why it became so popular and the most famous tourist attaraction of copenhagen. May be the historical story has got some sense to make it popular. We planned to take the train to horsens(another city in denmark) to watch the movie. The train was scheduled at 12 noon. but the boat ride got over only at 11.50. In 10 mins it is not possible to reach the central station, buy the ticket and catch the train. however we didn't lose hope. I, kishore and venki ran to railway station. In half the way, we all heard church bells ringing for 12.00 pm. We the collected the infromation for next train. Thank God we got another train at 12.30 pm which goes to that place.

Two and Half hours of tain journey to hornes was also beautiful. Got some rest after running for the train at copenhagen. We arrived at the horsens train station at 3.20 pm. Many Srilankan tamils live in denmark. actually one of the srilankans took the contarct to show sivaji in horsens. When we rang up to him and asked the way to theatre. He came with the car and picked us as if we were his realtives or friends. People, Hats off to your hospitality!!!! We thought the movie wont last longer than 3 hrs. But the movie was really lengthy, the show started 20 mins late and the film reel got struck twice.. Bull shit!!! we missed the return train to copenhagen But in denamrk there is a facilty with their trains, We can return with in 24hrs in any intercity train with the same ticket. The theatre was houseful, We watched the first half of the movie sitting on the floor. No seats were available. In the second half wefound some chairs to sit and watch the movie. About the movie--- I feel the first half is not up to the expectations, but the second half is really wonderful..

A beautiful church, very tall indeed..

After the movie was over, The gentleman who dropped us from the station to theater picked us again and dropped in station and gave 200 danish krnoners back to us. The movie ticket was 300 danish kronors for 3 people He said " you have come from sweden to watch this movie and i could not invite you to my house as u have already booked the tickets to return. Its my great pleasure to have you 3 to come to denmark exclusively to watch this movie". We 3 felt like tonnes of ice floating over our head. We then boared the next train. But you know what? This train reaches copenhagen at 11.20 pm, but our bus from copenhagen to göteborg will depart at 11.00 pm sharp. We sent message to other 2 guys who are waiting in copenhagen and didn't come to watch the movie to return to göteborg and need not wait for for us since we missed the train and said that we'll reach copenhagen by 11.20 pm. We 3 were disappointed as we have missed bus to our city. When we 3 about to get down from the train at copenhagen, i recieved an sms " the bus is departing 15 mins late, if u can catch the bus then try" we again ran to the bus stop from copenhagen railway station. The bus was about to start. We caught the bus just by a viscor. There ended my journey to copenhagen. So we are back to göteborg.

Its me in the canal ride @ kopenhavn

One of unforgettable and memorable moment in my life - "travelled across oceans to a different nation watch a movie"

check out my favorite fotos here

2007-04-11T14:22:00.000+03:00

Its not just a fotograph.. i'm so impressed with my camera after i saw this!!!

check for some more fotos here!!!!

A chruch behind our apartment. looks so beautiful in this spring season...

how about this??? beautiful dusk, birds flying all over the sky, excellent weather, it was around 7.30 pm, start of spring here, my eyes captured a shot of this scenic beauty and my camera as well!!

its autum

2007-04-07T01:42:00.000+03:00

HEY HOW ABOUT THIS???

'autum'- photographers' favorite season.. my favorite season too!!!!! wat colors u dont have? those beautiful maple trees with yellow and yellowish green leaves catches anyone's attention.. this foto was clicked in front of my university. one of my favorite pictures!!