Mundane Musings

It did feel a bit odd to be planning a family trip to Yercaud in November, bang in the midst of torrential rains. But one of the brothers was landing only then and the rest of my family thought of swinging it and face the consequences. The consequences, I am happy to report, were of the joyous kind; it is Yercaud we are talking about after all. The very Yercaud which had pulled my heart and locked it somewhere in its lush, green wild mountains when I had first visited it about 7 -8 years ago. I didn’t realise how much I would miss the sound of silence, which when punctuated by the chirping or tweeting of birds only seemed to augment the immense, humbling, wholeness of that silence. I fell in love with this small town nestled in the Shevaroyan hill range with its tiny roads that surprisingly could accommodate a good car and which had myriad trekking trails. This time I felt like I was coming home. Any doubts I had of it having changed in the interim were firmed up as we made ou...

So true When Sharan warned us that we had a ten minute walk from the road to reach his guest house in Hadathorai, Kotagiri, I was quite sure that he was exaggerating. The pictures he had posted did not evoke much confidence in me. They were predominantly of his wild garden and of the beautiful mountains around, but hardly of any of the bedrooms or bathrooms in the homestay. A ten minute walk to his guest house? Who was he kidding? Either this place was going to be a hole in the wall, I thought or it was going to be one hell of an experience. At the back of my mind though, I had some confidence in S’s choice of this place. He had a knack of picking up homestays and guest houses that were quaint/comfortable/superb and available for a song. This, he had picked up from Airbnb A magic of colours - Kotagiri So when we drove from Chennai, via Avinashi and picked up 50-something Sukumar, the guy taking care of the place, from the Kotagiri bus stand, I got th...

A slice of Paris Two things struck me about Paris when I walked with slight trepidation and excitement, out of the huge, bright Charles De Gaulle airport in May. 1. Parisians seemed to be in a hurry. Not one local could be caught strolling or God forbid, lounging. Even the tourists seemed obligated to hurry a bit. One such tourist being me, of course. No sooner did I sigh and place my heavy backpack onto the escalator that I heard a soft "Pardon" behind me. I turned to see a polite yet impatient local, looking beyond me at the remaining part of the escalator, as if assessing her chances of jumping over me and continuing without a break. This reminded me very much of our bike riders in Chennai's streets. They think it anathema to apply breaks while zipping through traffic, even if it means cutting into other's path or knocking side mirrors of other vehicles. So I quickly   moved to the right and watched the purposeful stride of the woman who did no...