The most splendid vacation

I am finally back from the Mumbai-Goa trip. It has been ten splendid days, the best vacation so far. We, which includes Uncle V, SS and me, got to Mumbai by train, although after this trip I am not planning to undertake any long distance train journey.Both the times the train was nothing short of a nightmare.  First time we had to share the compartment with a tobacco chewing man and his family, the moment he entered all we could smell for the next twelve hours was the pathetic red tobacco. I climbed on the upper berth at around 8 PM and climbed down only once he left the next morning somewhere around 8 AM. And while on our way back we spotted a mouse in our bogey, I am petrified of mice, nothing scares me more.

Anyways the fun part was when we got to Mumbai, the first evening we were there we visited the Juhu Beach, the walk on the beach was great, the sound of the waves mesmerizing but unfortunately the beach is filthy, at night time one can’t even think of going near the water, not because the tides are high but because of the garbage. Its like a trash can compared to the beaches in Goa.

The next day was consumed by crazy shopping in Lokhandwala and Bandra, the best thing about Mumbai is the public transport. The taxis and three-wheelers are easily available and aren’t expensive at all. I didn’t realize shopping could be so hard especially when you are buying gifts. We managed to buy gifts for everyone in six hours somehow.

Rest it wasan usual trip we spent a day at Colaba,sightseeing, the day we were there, the Mumbai Secretariat caught fire, check out these pictures I got from my camera.

We also visited the National Gallery of Modern Art, the gallery has been preserving modern art since 1850. It had this calender art where they depicted each bollywood year, it was really hilarious, just check this picture I smuggled, smuggled because photography was restricted and I could not click more pictures after this.

I am not much of a foodie, but I relished the sea food, the popular Leopold cafe at Colaba had the greatest fish fry I have ever had. Another must visit cafe is Hard Rock Cafe, do I have even have to elaborate about that?

Jumbo Combo @ HRC Mumbai

On the third night of our vacation we left for Goa, on bus. The bus ride to some extend was exceptional, all night I felt I was on some roller coaster. Uncle V had a bad experience on this bus. We hit Goa mid-morning and checked in the resort in South Goa near the Varca beach which is a beautiful beach. The resort had a nice swimming pool. SS and I wanted to swim but we didn’t have costumes. We hired a two-wheeler and drove to the nearest market, it started raining while we were driving. Its hard to explain the beauty of Goa during rains, its so green, lush and mesmerizing.

After the swim we settled for another sea food lunch at a near by shack, I had a fish with cheese, mashed potatoes and mushrooms. Another great dish, it was perfectly creamy. After lunch we went to the Varca beach for the sunset where we caught fishermen fishing. They caught a baby shark.Here are the pictures from Varca Beach.

Sunset at Varca

Most of the next morning was spent sleeping and getting over the previous night, it was something that will stay in Goa. Late morning we went to Colva Beach during the high tide. That was the best beach experience, swimming in beach, being swept by the high waves, it was just amazing.

Apart from the beaches we visited churches, the big foot museum and the archeological museum in old Goa. The Big foot museum was the most interesting place, it had an old historical Goa village setup, which was very well done. The archeological museum had sculptures from 13th century to 18th century and the paintings of all the Vice-Roys of Goa till 1961. It was in 1961 the Portuguese left Goa and Goa didn’t have Vice-Roys after that. The smallest state of India has incredible history attached to it.

After three days in Goa we got back to Mumbai for our last day of vacations. We spent that day on the last minute shopping and hogging on food. I swear I have never had so much food.

I still have the holiday hangover and its hard to get over it. I so miss swimming all day long and being lazy.The time just flew by and now I am back to work.  Here are a few more pictures:

The Haji Ali in Mumbai

 

 

 

Birthday off the Highway

Immediately after the exams got over this time, it was my friend SM’s birthday, her nineteenth, her last teen year. We could not let this birthday, just be any other birthday, the party had to be glorious for dual reasons. First We all managed to complete two years of college, the time seems to have whooshed by and the birthday.

SM had been throwing subtle hints she wanted a surprise party and this made the task hard for us. What surprise this time? Her last birthday party was a surprise one as well. We were clueless and had very less time to plan a surprise because of exams. That is when CK came up with the igneous idea of going to Kikar lodge, seventy kilometers drive from here. It was a perfect idea, a getaway and birthday surprise planned together.

One of the many sign boards

We decided to leave early morning, at around 8:00 AM, few of us had a class, including the birthday girl, everyone bunked it. SM was blind-folded to add more mystery to the surprise and make it look more dramatic. I didn’t have my jalopy this time but didn’t miss it at all. We had two of my other favorite vehicles, Uncle V’s car and SWAT’s two wheeler. I accompanied SWAT on the two wheeler for the first bit of journey. Majorly because I wanted to drive and she let me drive. She is the only who lets me drive, nobody else trusts me with the two-wheeler. Well, I just drove for the first fifteen minutes of the two and half hour journey, rest of it I was crooning third-grade songs and enjoying the ride on the pillion.

We made it to Ropar in one hour or a little more than that. Most of it was a good drive, the highway is really nice and we have driven there before. We took a stop near a canal and took some pictures. The adventure began after that when we had to get off the main highway and drive on the roads where the width keeps on reducing like you wished your waistline should. There were twists and turns, the driving got dicey. Suddenly the mobile signals went off, we were in the unexplored rural Panjab, with no sight of Kikar lodge.

Scared we had lost our way, we stopped by at a Dhaba to ask if we were on the right track, elation engulfed when came to know we were but were still a twenty kilometers away. That is when I started driving again, I forgot putting on my glasses and could not see the potholes, and drove into every single pothole making the bumpy ride even more so. SWAT who was the pillion was cursing me, not her fault, poor her.

Before we realized the size of the road reduced and it was no longer a road just a track where one can barely drive, there were signs leading to that place all over but the road never seemed end. Swat and I even lost our way, we missed a sign board.It was frustrating but finally after a four kilometer drive on those roads we entered the massive gates of the lodge.

The place was beautiful, rejuvenating, lush greens trees surrounded us, their pools were bright blue and I wanted to jump into them. It was really peaceful to not have mobile signals, away from the city. Kikar lodge also provides some adventure sports, check their site for details, we could not indulge into those because of lack of time and resources.

The lunch was pretty decent, after the lunch CK and I jumped into the pool, despite knowing we could not because we were not entitled to and we didn’t leave until one of the guys came to tell us we weren’t allowed. After that we just sat by the pool and talked for sometime, by 2:30 PM we left the lodge. The place is paradisiacal for a getaway, it would be great to spend a weekend there. SM loved every bit of this surprise. Here is a hint guys, give me a similar surprise on my birthday, just don’t blindfold me The drive back was easier, nothing much happened then. I realized give me a car, good company, a swimming pool, a few good books and I could live my entire life with just these things.

When we were leaving this is the scene that bade us farewell

More pictures

The Dakku Getup for the ride on two-wheeler

 

 

 

 

 

An over the top drive

* I wrote this piece in October and editing and publishing it again for this contest,  also visit this site http://www.mahindraxuv500.com/*

I have the most insane friends, their dictionary does not include the word “Normal” . They are absolutely CRAZY! After reading this post you will agree with me. My all girl gang has this  pact of  going on a small road trip after every month’s exams, to de-stress ourselves. This was mutually decided after our first trip to RDB fort. The pact is sometimes violated and this trip happened after a lot of speculations, cancellations and everyone was infuriated, I nearly thought it was never going to happen.

It was decided after the September exams that we would go to floating restaurant which is around fifty kilometres from Chandigarh. The plan was cancelled due to some  unavoidable circumstances, with each passing day the college got unbearable. The lectures were a harassment, the professors even more so, we had endless assignments, submission deadlines, presentations and tutorial sheets to complete. That is when Swat and Uncle V talked again about  plan and told me . I was just looking for this break from college, I asked everyone else and they surprisingly agreed . So it was decided that the people who have two-wheelers ( I don’t get the car on weekdays ) would get them and we’d fly out of the cage. It was the six of us and three two-wheelers, the perfect equation.

Next morning we got together outside the college gate and Uncle V and I discovered that Swat had included few of her friends and AV ( who had her own little adventure while coming out of the college, she was caught by the guard but managed to escape) in the plan and from six we were now eleven people . Now we had eleven people and not enough two-wheelers to accommodate . We thought of getting buses, I hate buses even the one hour bus journey to college whacks me out. They are just too uncomfortable especially the Punjab transport buses and CTU, since college started I have been trying to get used to them.

So anyways we had no other option, unlike the previous times we knew the way to the restaurant. That unfortunately meant less  adventure. The first bus we approached did not go to Sirhind, neither did the second one, the third one went exactly where we had to go but it was fully occupied and there were no seats available . I just moved on thinking maybe we will find a better bus, its always good to have options and I did not want to travel in an overloaded bus standing next to  someone who kept pushing me and trampling on my foot.  When I looked back I to my horrid shock saw SS and AV asking the conductor if they could travel on  the bus top, yes the  freaks came up with idea and thought of executing it . I just ignored them, thinking no one will ever let them get over the bus  but when the conductor approved of the idea, I was completely taken back. This is how I am getting killed, falling from the top of a rashly driven Panjab Roadways bus, I thought.

We used to joke about travelling on a train top or a  bus top but our life is not some bollywood movie where we can do that and sing and dance our way . I had a battle inside me, whether to go up or not, by the time I could think of anything everyone was up there except Uncle V and me. I then dismissed all thoughts, the battle inside my head abandoned mid-way and climbed up, going up each step like a petrified animal going into a lion’s den.

I never imagined I would end up on a bus top. The top was dirty and I honestly was doubtful of sitting there even after I had climbed up, but now there was no looking back or should I call it climbing down. I finally sat down making myself comfortable. The wind up there felt very nice and the view was amazing too. We could see things and savour the scenery in a more beautiful way which could not be done had we been travelling sitting inside the bus. The skies seemed closer, bluer. Have a look at the picture from the top :

We chatted like we had never talked before and then started singing as well and drew a lot of weird looks towards us  but who cared . It was glorious . The gang doesn’t  just say things we believe in doing things . The travelling on the top did not prove very good for our poor hair. The best way to worsen a bad hair day is to travel on a bus top, your hair will be at their best worst . After an hour long singing and screaming and evading trees that had the potential to hit our heads, we finally reached the floating restaurant. Getting down was major task for a few people who were scared out of wits, specially Swat who after climbing down to disguise her fear said ” Oh, it wasn’t that big  a deal, was it.”  The place looked mesmerizing, we took half an hour to de-tangle our hair, after all  we are girls no matter how we travel,  another half hour to make our faces look good.

Finally when everyone was done, we headed for breakfast, which wasn’t really impressive. I felt the place was shaking because it was on top of the water, but everyone else denied that. Apparently they are not vibration sensitive .Probably they were just doing it to contradict me.

After the breakfast we went and sat on the bank of the river and a nice time . It indeed was a peaceful place something like Jainti Dam, we talked some more, discussed things and clicked a few pictures and came back .Its sometimes good to be crazy, this trip will go down in the history of my college life and will always remain the most apprized memory.

Here are few more pictures to make you envious.

             

The Canal, you see the restraunt in the picture.

Beautiful skies

Swat and I walking

Canal again

Somewhere on the way. We had to really save our heads from that thing.

An over the top drive

I hope no one from my family ever reads this especially my mom and dad , they would probably disown me if they read this (disown here is an understatement ).

I have the most insane friends whose dictionary does not include the word “Normal” . They are just CRAZY! They  can go upto any level of madness . The post is a prove of this fact. Well me and my gang of girls have this pact that we go for a small road trip after every month’s exams and around diwali . This was mutually decided last year when we went to what we thought wasRDB fort. The pact was sometimes broken and this time it had been too long since we went somewhere and we just had to take a break.

It was decided after the last month’s exam that we would go to floating restaurant which is around 50 kilometers from Chandigarh. But the plan was cancelled due to some  unavoidable circumstances . But this week we got so bugged by college , the lectures were a harrassment the professors even more so and we had endless assignments , submissions and what nots. This was when Swat and Uncle V talked again about the previous month’s plan and told me .I was just looking for this break from college , I asked everyone else and they surprisingly agreed . So it was decided that the people who have activas ( I don’t get the car on weekdays ) would get them and we’d fly outta the cage. It was the six of us and three activas .

Next morning we assembled outside the college and Uncle V and I discovered that Swat had included few of her friends and AV ( who had her own little adventure while coming out of the college , she was caught by the guard but ran away) in the plan and from six we were now eleven people . Now we had eleven people and not enough two-wheelers to accommodate . We thought of getting buses , I hate buses even the one hour bus journey to college whacks me out. They are just too uncomfortable especially the Punjab transport buses and CTU and since college started I have been trying to get used to them.

So anyways we had no other option , unlike the previous times we knew the way to the restaurant . So that meant less of adventure. The first bus we approached did not go to Sirhind , neither did the second one , the third one went exactly where we had to go but it was fully occupied and there were no seats available . So I just moved on thinking maybe we will find a better bus , its always good to have options . After a few seconds I saw SS and AV asking the conductor if they could travel on  the bus top , yes they  freaking thought of it . And when the conductor seemed okay with the idea all of them started climbing . I was like FML , we just joke when we say how cool it would be to travel on a train top or a  bus top but our life is not some bollywood movie where we can do that and sing and dance our way . I had a battle inside me , whether to go up or not by the time I could think of anything everyone was up there except me and Uncle V so I just stopped thinking and climbed .

Phew! I never imagined I would end up doing that . The top was dirty and I honestly was doubtful of sitting there even I had climbed up. But  I believe if you take a decision there should be no looking back , so I finally sat down making myself comfortable. The wind up there felt very nice and the view was amazing too . Have a look at the picture from the top :

We talked like crazy and then started singing as well and drew a lot of weird looks towards us  but who cared . It was glorious . We just don’t say things we do things . But the travelling on the top did not prove very good for our poor hair. The best way to worsen a bad hair day is to travel on a bus top , your hair will be at their best worst .

After an hour long singing and screaming and evading trees that had the potential to hit our heads we reached the floating restaurant. Getting down was major task for a few people who were scared out of wits, specially Swat who after climbing down to disguise her fear said ” Oh , it wasn’t that big  a deal , was it . ” The place was beautiful , we took half an hour to detangle our hair , yeah we are girls , another half hour to make our faces look good . Yes we are girls after all .

Finally when everyone was done , we headed for breakfast , which wasn’t that impressive . I felt the place was shaking because it was on top of the water , but everyone else denied that. Apparently they are not vibration sensitive . Uncle V – It was shaking , don’t you deny it just for the sake of contradicting me . After the breakfast we went and sat on the bank of the river and a nice time . It indeed was a peaceful place something like Jainti Dam ,talked discussed things and clicked a few pictures and came back . Here are few more pictures to make you envious .

When things get happening .

I couldn’t wait  to get my computer and type this post. Do you have any of those crazy cravings in life that you badly want to do? I mean something very insignificant and small but there’s an itch to do that . I am assuming that many of us have courtesy a few facebook pages. I have a lot of those small goals I want to achieve apart my bigger not so insignificant goals. Thanks to Panjab government I got to accomplish a lot of stuff today.

Before I get on that there is another thing I am dying to spill out here. We have our freshers this weekend and for the first time I am doing theatre , not acting obviously , my plate was so full that I thought of opting out of it. Errr Okay …. the truth is  the director that is uncle V dint take me. This is like the “ghar ka play” Vanya is the director , me the script writer and AYG , AV , Swats , SS and SM cast in major roles. There are a few juniors as well but for smaller stuff .

The story of the play is a spoof of “Auditioning of a ghost ” , you can find it on Google. I will post the script in next post to get a feedback from you all. So this weekend the  eight idiosyncratic girls ( we are group of eight people who hang out in college , incase I haven’t mentioned that before) will present their first ever play on stage. Hope it goes well.

As if the play and dancing part ( Swats is also choreographing a dance ) were not enough for a day that we were stuck up in a never ending jam owing to the protesters on the highway.The bus drivers told us the buses would not go beyond that point .We were still a good 15-20 kilometers away from our destination. It was pure co-incidence today that I was with a few AIESECers in the bus . We had to get to this meeting urgently.So we like everybody got down from the bus and start walking the highway. Now this is where came my first small insignificant goal number one  . Walking on a highway . I always wanted to walk on a highway for a considerable distance. Do I sound insane? I don’t care anyway. We walked in  the middle of the highway with no worry of being hit by a speeding car

Just check out the pictures .

This is where the protesters were , check point one , a toll tax barrier just approximately 10 kilometers from Chandigarh.

We somehow managed to make our way out of this massive crowd , it was a ocean of human beings .  The second goal might sound even more weird , do not judge me on that . It was walking on a long over bridge . I told you Do Not Judge me. Walking on the bridge was absolutely epic , we made a hilarious video , where we were laughed at by strangers just because we were having fun . People! Can’t never stop talking . And you should check out the picture below. The sunset looks amazing .

The Sunset

After a stretch of over 4-5 kilometers we thought of getting a lift .It kind of seemed impossible. There were hardly any vehicles and those that passed did not stop for us. And just when we had given up all hope and almost touched chandiland , a open tempo came and agreed us take us  . That’s where the goal numbers 3 and 4 came . Getting a lift on the highway and travelling in a open tempo standing with my friends. It is so amazing with the wind . I think I should ask my mom to get me an open jeep. Unfortunately I don’t have pictures of the tempo.

We reached fortunately enough on time (not exactly on time ) to attend the meeting I was so looking forward to  after the little glorious adventure of ours. Accomplishing those few goals makes me feel happy , I have lot of such small things I want to do , living on the riverside in a tent is one more thing on the list . I don’t even know if qualify to be called goals. An already crazy day was made even more crazier , that is when the things got happening. It’s really weird that everything happens all at once . I was cribbing three days back that everything is getting boring and now it all started happening together. Strange but i still love it .

Now  I look forward to hear from you , what is that small thing in life you want to do , just to make yourself happy.

Cheers!

Summer 2011 – The Jalopy and The Trips to nowhere.

Summer 2011 – My first summer in college and the first in which I had no hoildays , I cribbed and sulked . How could we have one whole month of training immediately after our first year finals? Life could not get worse. But now that it is almost over I can this was my best summer ever. Apart from the training , which was not bad at all , I had the time of my life.Will write about the training bit in the next post.

I  got my driving  license two months back. It was a glorious moment after closely missing it the first time because I could not drive up a slope anyways  I have  it now. The feeling was great .And with my driving license I also got this jalopy , which broke down twice in a month and once the tyre burst.But still I fell in love with it , it took me places.Without it my life would have been incomplete.

My love

 And here are some facts about this beauty:

• It only plays a Bryan Adams Cassete , yeah I have cassete player in my car ,cool isnt it?
• And when you try tuning in the radio , it gets silent and when you have given up all all hopes and start hitting all the buttons on the player or probably forget about it , its suddenly starts playing the Bryan Adam tracks.
• Its a 2000 model 
• There are times when the gear gets stuck and refuses to change gears.
• It gets wobbly if you drive at the speed of 70
• It has an A/C which does not cool , so better roll down the windows. 
• It makes all sorts of embarassing noises sometimes like a tractor.

Two months driving this and I never want to part with it .Everyone curses it and the the some probably curse the driver too but still they love it.By they I mean my friends , we have been on countless drives , drives people wont exactly call sane.

Whenever someone is in a bad mood this little thing comes as a ray of hope , lifting up the mood , Uncle V and Swat , my partners for these litlle geris(drives in panjabi) ,will agree with me the most.Although I bet AYG and CA swear that they wont go anywhere when I am driving that car.

Initially it was just the quieter side of sukhna  lake we ventured to , but later on the car pushed us further , to the ouskirts and smaller places , places away from the city. Every single of these little trips has something crazy about it , never intentional. Just happens , it’s like we get high without drinking, high on life.

Last time when Swat and I went , still dont know where , the car tyre burst and that was one scary thing. We dont know how to replace it and for good 15 minutes I refused to halt the car thinking it wont start again (err I did not know it was just a flat tyre , thought its much more than that) Awesome aint I? Nobody could be more dumb than that.But when I finally stopped , I was relieved that it was just a flat tyre and nothing else. Fortunately this dude helped us .

Two months with this car and a year with these eccentric people I know my next three years in college are going to be more than  awesome.Few glimpses of trips to nowhere:

Another escapade from the college

After a gap of three long  months and the first trip , the backpacker club got into action again , this time to a place more known and closer by – The Jainti Dam and it was on our own vehicles , no gruesome and abominable buses with  fat lying tobacco chewing  conductors.

It was just the four of us , our activas  and backpacks. The plan brewed with the idea of driving to the morni hills( that’s probably  our next destination) fifteen days back in a drab chemistry class. And yesterday when a few backpackers chickened out of driving in the hilly areas ( morni ) , I thought of going to the dam, the entire plan was chalked out .

Planning such things after an exam is great fun and perhaps a custom now. We do it all the time and the plans turn into reality only a 50% of times.The plotting was elaborate , guess more than what was required. Since six (earlier ) of us were going, we were teamed into three departments , one for food , second beverages and I can’t recall what the third was. Yeah that’s how engineers work , diligent and efficient. We are definitely going to do the big MNC world some good.

When everything was decided , two of the people chose to go out on dates over going out with friends, can anything be more lame and boring?? This infuriated uncle V( the self proclaimed team leader) and then me ( the self proclaimed inventor of all the cool ideas, this was my idea , and they seemed to be ruining it).But then we decided to leave them behind and  have the real fun while they bored themselves to death with the guys.

In the morning after making sure that all the departments were taken care of we left . The backpackers were out again. We got on to the highway in ten minutes. Again the same old thing happened , he had no clue where to go and  where to turn from. That is when google came to our rescue , thankfully it had the directions of the dam. Seriously if you can’t find something , just google it.We got on the right path.

  The roads kept on getting narrower and the ride bumpier. We bypassed countless villages , farms ( nice ones with yellow flowers) and tiny huts and villagers who eagerly gave us the directions( google did not have the complete details and airtel did not have good  network there).

That’s one of the  broad roads among all the narrow roads. Don’t we look like scary monsters?

After a half hour’s drive we were at the dam.The most calm and peaceful place. It seemed so beautiful , being there, away from the usual hustle bustle was nice.Then we thought of going down the slope and sitting by the water body.Going down the slope was the most hilarious thing. S would tumble after every second and scream for help.

Finally when we made our way down and were admiring the beauty , the irritating caretaker started yelling at us and telling us that going so near the water was prohibited and blah , blah. Jerk had seen us “trekking” ( S calls going down a 10 meter slope trekking) and had not stopped us then.Anyways after much complaining and swearing we climbed ( trekked) up. 

We then found a spot to sit and cursed whoever that man was till we were satisfied. All the driving and “trekking” had turned us into hungry gluttons and the the food packets , breezer bottles were opened and we got high on life. Uncle V wanted us to talk, not the usual useless chatter wanted the three of us to reveal things( I am not mentioning the things here). She is good at making people do that.It’s strange I am with these people all day long and even then there was so much I did not know.

The three of em’

And me

At around two o’clock we decide to leave and on the way stopped to click some pictures of the fields with the yellow flowers.That’s were we had the stole ( that makes us look like monsters)tying drama around my face. I could not do it but had to coz otherwise the hair go frizzy and entangle badly.Gosh those three made me feel like a clown.

When S decided to shoot me .

Somehow I managed to wrap around that wretched stole  to save the hair but still they did go bad . The drive back was quite uneventful except for S saying out loud to a hot guy with an anorexic girlfriend, that he needed to improve his choice. Unfortunately we did not stop see his reaction.

A few more pictures :

This one’s my favorite

Physics live! Direct from the lecture hall

I am using my laptop illegally in the physics class and so was tempted to write.Here is a  live commentary. Right now we are being scolded by our teacher lets call him man of principles (MOP ) More than physics we are taught to have principles in our life( which is good but why in physics class).

Apparently its our last class and he is mad at us for sitting at the back benches.Now he is telling that we are never going to get a teacher like him ever again , rest of the teachers are just here to read out of books. GAWD.   It’s story time , a colleague of his being a maths teacher asked him to explain integral to him .Mr MOP get a life.

Finally we are doing physics .Okay MOP is writing the Schrodinger wave equation like we can not read it from our books.Why is he inaudible when he is teaching and loud enough when expressing his feelings to us? Won’t it be cooler if we are allowed to use laptops in class , atleast now I’m listening carefully  to take down the notes(trying to multitask). We would save so much paper with the use of laptop.The class is getting boring yet again .Now my use of laptop is grabbing a lot of attention and before I attract MOP towards myself I’ll stop writing.

A trip to the road not taken.

What do you do when you lose your way in a completely alien land? And you have no idea where you are heading not even the exact name of the place. I mean it’s like you know where you are going but are clueless of the about what path to follow. I won’t complicate this further.

The story is something like this : eight nearly broke girls, correction eight backpacker girls decide not to attend the college and instead visit the famous RDB fort (where Rang De Basanti was shot) situated in the interiors of Punjab. The fort was an hour’s drive from the college and because we did not have vehicles of our own it would be an extra half hour. So in the classroom in five minutes the entire plan was made in this manner, 9 am departure ; 11 am arrival at the fort and again at 2 pm departure from the fort to be back by 4 pm and go back home in the college bus.

We got out of the college and then began our adventures. We caught a three-wheeler to the nearest town where we thought we’d get a bus to the fort. The tiny little town welcomed us with a two dozen buses each to a different place. After a inquiring from various bus conductors we found “our” bus. We quickly grabbed our seats (I think finding a good seat in these buses is a rarity) with a contended, electrifying smile on our faces. The birds had flown from the cage.  We sat with complete strangers, none of us had ever travelled in a bus before ( leaving apart the college and school buses ).It was altogether a new adventure.

A vendor at one the bus stops.

We had just settled when the conductor came to us with the tickets. But wait a sec! Tickets to where , the RDB fort where the Aamir Khan movie was shot . Hell no! no such place existed according to the conductor and after informing  this he went to give tickets to the other passengers , who by now were curiously looking at the eight girls who were new to the alien world of which they were a part. It was panic time, we were on a bus to Ludhiana and on our way to a place nobody had heard about. That is when the tube light (our friend Su) lit up and told us her cousin had been there. The cousin was called, he told us we were on the right way and the fort was actually situated in Doraha near a gurudwara.

Finally the conductor gave us the tickets and we were in our elated mode once again. Now aunty 1 gets on the bus , a senior citizen and because there is no other  seat I offer her mine . She is pleased and enquirers where we are going , we tell her. To our utter shock she enlightens us that “our” bus  is never going to take us to Doraha and we need to take another bus.

The bus stops in some town , we got down after thanking our aunty no. 1 and cursing the creepy  conductor for cheating and misguiding us. Fortunately we immediately got a bus to Doraha.  To satisfy ourselves we first ask the conductor, then a passenger, then the driver  and then the conductor again .

The second bus

So we were all set to go in our second bus. The smiles were back . All was well until Su got in a conversation with a helpful aunty no. 2 . She too is curious about where we are going  and Su explains  . Then to our  horror ( once agian)  she told us that the RDB fort was on a different road. We were supposed to go by the GT road.Although there was similar fort in Doraha but not AAmeer Khaaan walla .Everyone started panicking yet again then V told everyone that we were on our way to discover a new place ,nobody had been there before . We were on the road not taken.

After being relaxed by V’s wise words we all resumed our usual talks.Tuned into my Ipod I was happily looking out from the window , the bus was now on roads that was barely 30 inches wide  . It seemed like we were going through the fields itself. Suddenly instead of Chris Martin I hear this:

                                          Tu mainu Chad de Ya Daaru Chad de

                                                          Rabba teri khair ne 

OMG! It was the music blaring out from the bus woofers , I had  noticed those on entering and laughed mentally ( the mental  evil laugh) and doubted their working .It was playing the very music I detested and giving competition to my Ipod   apparently  my Ipod failed them. All my friends exchanged the what are we doing here looks. GAWD ! I had never heard such baritones ever.To top it all Teju started singing those songs.
 

URGHHH!!! god alone knew what part of world we were in the rickety bus , going at speed of 70 km/hr on the 20 inch wide road ( the width had reduced like we wish our waists would do at the same pace  ) . Suddenly we were on the GT road and the bus halted . The conductor told us we have to cross the road and we’ll reach a gurudwara and just beyond that is the fort. He even told that the same bus will take us to college at 2 so we should be back at 2pm same place and he’ll pick us up.After quickly thanking him we entered the township. After a small break at the gurudwara we where on our way to the Fort.We finally made it.
Enough of Babbling from my side now the pictures will do the talking:

HIP HIP HORRAY

The road  from Gurudwara to the fort

The entrance . Magnificent !!

This is supposed to be the Mosque

At the fort

Me

 After having a hearty lunch we went back to the highway. On the way back while we were walking some horrendous  buffaloes tried to chase us away , that was  scary , we ran for our lives. We reached college in time to boast about our day’s adventures to the classmates who had stayed back and studied in the ever boring classrooms.
Cheers to the Backpacker girls Club. 

PS: Sorry this post is too long but couldn’t help it . My friend V ( who religiously reads my every post ) wanted minute to minute description.This one goes to those 7 people who made my day.