Entertainment. Entertainment. Entertainment.

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Elephant can sense things on its front. Which means, should you have a need to escape from an elephant, always try moving behind it. It would walk an average of 60 km a day and would sleep in the standing position only. Should you encounter an elephant while driving through the forests road, NEVER disturb it in any fashion. Just wait on the road and allow the herd to pass. Remember, single elephants are much more dangerous to handle than a herd. Electric fences are set up in some areas to prevent elephants from infiltrating into the human habitat. However, all voltage levels should be limited to causing only temporary withdrawal response and shouldn't harm the animals in any fashion.

Tigers have a very excellent sense of living. They don't typically live in very deep jungles. They would need shrub forest to survive since their preys would be maximum only in shrub forest area. You could be walking on the jungle road and a tiger could be quite nearby - totally unperturbed by your presence. However, habitat loss is something that would make them lose their space and is the     threatening factor for them at present. Often, when instances of man-animal conflict get reported, the preceding factors responsible for this conflict to exists in the first place aren't probed or go untold. Tiger census is typically taken following the pug marks of the tiger. The path would be traced using elephant movements. A tiger typically survives alone. Female tigers resist any kind of procreation activity until their cubs are at least 5 months old. It has very clearly established territories and would never allow another tiger to enter into it. If there is a compromise on the territory, typically there would be a fight between the two tigers in question and one of them would die for sure. Should someone state that there was a sighting of several tigers together around the same area, it would be an obvious lie..! After quite a lot of efforts that failed in protecting the tiger, the Indian government decided to rope in the tribal community itself into the conservation effort. The area spanning Mudumalai in Tamil Nadu, Wayanad in Kerala and Bandipur/Nagerhole forest in Karnataka actually constitute a single zone for forest purposes and is a reserved region in addition to being a tiger sanctuary.

Hyenas were present in a cave near the Masinagudi area in very large numbers. They are typically nocturnal creatures that help maintain the health of the forests since they eat the dead animals. With diclofenac and other poisoning happening, a lot of hyenas and vulture died in the Nilgiris biosphere reserve.

Leeches are a nightmare to deal with when you walk for something into the forest area. Common salt   is used to battle the problem.

Wild dogs hunt in packs and has the highest success rate - around 95%. It is the only one which probably has the capability to hunt down a bison (the bison is pachydermic in nature..!!).

A sloth bear would have red eyes. Not all bears are herbivorous.

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That was definitely some wild talk..!!  Well, believe me, all of these were literally pulled out and laid to us neatly by Vinoth, our teammate, right from the top of his mind, as if someone were just asking what is his name..! He has a very deep interest in wildlife conservation and photography, in addition to IT.

When we decided to start touring the Nilgiris, we couldn't have had a better person that Vinoth with us. He joined us despite his ill health and showed us areas of the NBR (Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve) which none of us could've experienced otherwise..!

With Saravanan and Sundeep being present, some form of comedy is going to be guaranteed..! :-) And it did.

Aravind was negotiating a very very deep hairpin bend uphill towards Ooty from Mudumalai. There were a couple of cars which chose not to respect the "uphill vehicles first" rule. Quite peeved at repeated violations on this which gave Aravind a tough time managing to drive, Saravanan decided it was high time someone be taught a lesson or two. He yelled out to one of the cab drivers going downhill - "We are coming up slowly because three hairpin bends down, elephants are present.!"

As for Sundeep, his rather loud, clear and threatening voice to Aravind, "சும்மா இருங்க.. சிங்கம் புலி யானை கரடா" nu... "இங்க இந்த இருடுக்கே பயமா இருக்கு..!" made everyone laugh out loud... Obviously, he was asked if he thought female bears were கரடி and male ones கரடா in Tamil..!

To us Chennaiites accustomed to the "Cinema. Caaram. Coffee", "Food. Forest. Flesh" was definitely a different terrain, thanks to our dear Vinoth..!

***

"As she chirrups 'entertainment. entertainment. entertainment.' the world is at her feet" - so went a write-up in a prominent English daily.

One of my friends quipped in his SMS to me, "Do you realize that even VB (Vidya Balan) might not have seen the movie so many times?" - to my call to have a trip to the DP (Dirty Picture) movie once (oh yeah, it was once more and not once really..!)

Definitely, to her credit, VB has not diminished her acting prowess a wee bit. And being quite verbose with an umpteen one-liner punches, the movie isn't something one could watch without a decent grip of Hindi. "Entertainment. Entertainment. Entertainment." is just one example of a simplistic as well as a catchy and punchy one-liner.  Like NOKJ (No One Killed Jessica), the "reel-real" mixture has been taken care of pretty decently. "Oh la la Oh la la" definitely has a beat that would keep your feet tapping while "Ishq sufiyaana" would be for the ones who crave for a good melody beat. 

Never mind the generous pokes I get from my friends, I do feel that DP is definitely a paisa-wasool. After all, movie is all about "Entertainment. Entertainment. Entertainment".

***

(W)all is well that ends well..!!

Late into the night... hanging around in the office... time for dinner... "Operation coaxing" begins... 

"Hey, why don't we go to pizza corner and munch a piece of their veg kolhapuri?", I ask to two of my friends, who were looking and probably cursing the fact that the official day hadn't still ended for them. 

"Pizza corner?? That's quite far... my office day is still NOT over :-( We should go somewhere nearer" - that was the response from Aravind - our "cab guy", as we love to call him, who neatly flaunts his i10, with its well polished interiors and getting the crowning as our "official tour vehicle"

"Veliya saapida mudiyaade.." This was Saravanan - and oh yeah, he has very many a sobriquets that I would prefer sticking to his original name. 

"Pizza? No way - I need to get home... I would have some chamba rava upma getting ready for me.." - that was our Nagu (a) Nages.

It was definitely evident that "Operation Coaxing" was losing its sheen... but I cannot give up that easily too - and they would know it as well... After the confabulation amongst us coming to an end, we set out to decide on raiding the Dominos outlet nearby... 

We didn't have a need to switch on the air conditioner in the car. The weather was actually pretty cool outside. There were symptoms of a thunderstorm - but we always chose to ignore them if it is good old Chennai.

Next mission - place orders. Grab seats for four of us. Our orders were on predicted lines -some lip smacking garlic bread, some pizzas, a few cups of coke. What wasn't predictable however was our implementation of the S/S/V queuing model at this outlet too (If you are wondering what is it, it is - it is Stare / Stare / vacate). We were within the pizzeria looking for seats - nay, looking at others, as if requesting them to give us seats :-)

It was a full 20 minutes before the orders settled in. So what? We had everything under the sun to talk about - including the sun itself. Another five minutes - everything was almost gone. Time to quit eh? True - so, lets walk out...

The engrossing conversation and merry making amidst all the eating never let us realize that the brewing thunderstorm had broken out for the real in Chennai... Wow... we come out and decide to stand in the front of the shop - under a collapsible sunshade of sorts... (Dum dam dim dum dam.... ) Everyone got rattled and huddled together - each having feared the thunder but making me the obvious scapegoat and fixing an excuse on me - that I am the most scared of lightning and thunder, to move back into the secure premises of the shop.

Discussions continue - oh yeah, didn't I tell you that the next voting for the decision on the world economic crisis is supposed to be based on the discussion we had there? Never mind..! 

Rain stopped - or so we thought and stepped out. Dum Dim Dama dum... Aravind and I rush to the car... Saravanan and Nages started out in their motorbike despite the downpour that began once more. Ensconcing myself into the car seat and picking up the copy of The Hindu, which I had put out in the dashboard, I begin my conversation with Aravind.

"Ravi - romba mazha illa?", said Aravind.

"Amam da... naan intha news paper ah en shirt kulla pottuka poraen... innum rendu article padikala.."

"konjam over ah illa ungalukku?", said Aravind

"Irukalaam... but inikki thoonganumae... paper parkalena mudiyaadthu"

"Seri Ravi... parkalaam... you can get down here and walk quickly home?"

"Yes, I will do that... driving the vehicle in the heavy rain in all the interior roads is something I wouldn't prefer you doing as well..."

"Tata Ravi.."

"Tata.. thank you.."

Normally, I wouldn't mind myself getting drenched in the rain... matter of fact, I would LOVE it. But today was different... my only sole companion for the rest of the night - The Hindu shouldn't be getting drenched. I walk trying to challenge the speed of the lightning that struck the place before a few seconds. And lo behold - the drama unfolded - right in front of my house gate.

The gates  to my apartment were neatly locked up from the inside... With a heavy rain on the outside, a wall of steel about a 8 feet high staring in front of me and a switched off mobile from other dwellers in the unit - I had to make some quick choice... and I had to be real quick since some more time, my companion for the night would be wet and drenched, requiring to lie under the fan for drying - probably hours on end, before the printed letters become sharper and clearer like before.

So, what do I do now? Brave the rain with my companion neatly tucked into my shirt and challenge the roughly eight feet wall of steel to find my way to the portico of my apartment. That is, definitely, jumping into your own house like a thief, to make long things short :-)

Oh yeah, never mind... end of the day - (w)all is well that ends well, I thought to myself, quickly pulling out the newspaper from shirt and heading inside my house. Rest, as they say, is history..!

Ramble - II

Call it the bloggers block or online lock, whatever - one thing I knew that was happening was this -  I have literally kept my space on blogger rest in peace. Well, I wouldn't prefer taking the blame. I would rather talk about the fact that life was teaching me more lessons for a good part of the two years than before and hence it didn't allow me to be online for the most part.

***

"Brocheva vaare..." went the music on my phone, from the famous Shankarabaranam while exiting office along with my friends, in the lobby area. One of my friends promptly sprang up and said, "Hey Ravi, you know what? We have a similar song in Telugu". Even before he could come to terms with his excitement, the rest of the folks in the group stared at each other for a few minutes before bursting out aloud. Guess the initial verses from the song were good enough to make him even forget his own mother tongue - Telugu..!

***

More often that not, common sense seems to be the first casualty of formal education - or so did I understand when my friend and I were trying to fix the washing machine inlet for a little close until 2 AM in the morning on a fine friday night. While both of us might have been through the best of "engineering education" - theory pass, practical fail is what it all came to be..!! After a tough fight (no, I am not the one to give up so easily, even when I am wrong!), I realized that neither of us are getting anywhere closer to fixing the inlet proper and we were wasting quite a lot of water in the process. And what did we decide? My friend dropped out. Not the one to give up, I decide to hold the mouth of the pipe to the tap and finish off with washing my clothes before the crack of dawn. Exhausted, I slept for close until 10 AM into what should have been a nice saturday morning. Later during the day, deciding not to torture myself anymore with this exercise, I called up the plumber. And I was closely observing what he did, trying to find out what is that he is doing right that we were doing wrong. And lo behold, it was just a question of putting the washer in the right position..!! So much for observation..! Hope that I would fix it up the right way, should it break the next time around..! 

Later in the day, my friend asked me if I managed to fix the machine's inlet myself. I replied, "No, I called the plumber". With his ever optimistic smile, he proudly said, "Ravi, we should have probably videographed what we did and had it on youtube. We could have at least found a place in world's funniest videos"

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