Saturday, February 21, 2009
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Fun stay... far away
Year 2008 has been my year of extensive travel, specially the last three months of the year. Starting from the Mysore trip with a few of my friends followed by my visit to Sirsi, and then a college ‘Industrial trip’ to Hyderabad and ultimately my Bhopal trip.
I would have shared my experience about all my trips but I will share my experiences of the Bhopal one as it is the most recent one and the images are still fresh. Though I had been there for music purpose, I call it a trip because I dedicated just an hour or two for music and the rest for roaming and visiting places.
I had been informed that it would be a 30 hour journey on train. Thought my co passengers, magazines, music player, and my dad’s PJs would keep me entertained till I reach Bhopal. The first two options did not work out. The rest did entertain me for a while but come on!! Who would listen to the same music and my dad’s “was-that-a-joke?”genre of ‘jokes’ for 30 long hours!? I reached Bhopal with a sickening boredom. And sleep! And hunger! I was on train! Could not have the lunch and dinner I was given on train neither could I eat other “unhygienic” food as it could mess up my voice. :(
It was midnight when we reached Bhopal. It was 11.40 when I noticed a couple of good looking guys in my compartment ;) it was too late to strike a conversation, so chucked the idea.
Being tricked by the rickshaw drivers, we reached our hotel room in 15minutes from the station which otherwise could have been reached within 2minutes from the railway station. Deadly tired was I that I remember stepping into the room and the next thing I remember is the next morning.
We set out on our explore Bhopal mission after eating the yummy Paratha dahi at the hotel. Bhopal failed to impress me. The roads were filthy, there were no traffic signals, traffic rules were not followed, vehicles bumping to one another every second, (Bangalore is heaven! Trust me!)and the strangest thing I noticed is the Mehendification! EACH Bhopali irrespective of his age or appearance or whatever, compulsorily had his hair coloured! I could not find out the reason though! Another aspect of Bhopal which interested me was that I could see pure Hindi everywhere. Names of the shops were only in Hindi. Pure Hindi.“Videshi madira” shop was one of my favourites! ;)
The best part of the whole trip was the visit to Indira Gandhi Manav Sangrahalay guided by Salim Bhai. That was the place where I was supposed to sing. Situated on the Shamla hills, it was one of the cleanest and a very peaceful places in Bhopal. We found replicas of tribal huts made. I had a good time visiting each of those. A part of the site gave its visitors information on how the human race began and stuff. Salim bhai also took us to places around. We went to the upper lake, Jain temple for which we had to go on a rope way and then to the old market for shopping. Old market is a street where one can shop the girly stuffs. I did not shop much as I found nothing so appealing.
We got ready to visit the famous Sanchi Stupa the next day. We decided to travel by a local transport. Walked till the bus stop and saw a series of spangly decorated buses going to different destinations. We got into one of those funny looking buses which was to take us till sanchi. Honking without a nano second gap is as essential for Bhopal drivers as hair colouring is to the people there! It was a fun ride though. Music did not give me much company that day. I preferred to look out through the window. Saw nothing but barren land. Sanchi turned out to be an interesting place of visit. Climbed up the hill and reached the place where we found stupas built by Emperor Asoka. At Sanchi, we not only saw beautiful stupas but ate the yummiest guavas on earth!
3 days at Bhopal was a good experience though not the best of all my trips. Only thing which bothered me was food! I was bored to tears eating the same paratha dahi, roti sabji and stuffs, we planned to visit a good place where we could eat dosas and idlis. We were taken to Manohar sweets which was apparently a very well-known eat out in Bhopal. Desirous of south Indian food, both I and dad had a biiiiiig smile on our faces looking at the menu. We finally got to savour Dosa and Idli after 5 long days!
I was already home sick. Home food sick rather! The food served in train was horrible. I could no longer stand the sight of it. I had got a few Kachoris from the famous Manohar sweets on which I survived my whole journey and of course the Bhel, moomphali and Vada Pav always fascinated me ;)
Hmmm that was about my trip to Bhopal. Was happy to see Karnataka, happy to be back home :)
I would have shared my experience about all my trips but I will share my experiences of the Bhopal one as it is the most recent one and the images are still fresh. Though I had been there for music purpose, I call it a trip because I dedicated just an hour or two for music and the rest for roaming and visiting places.
I had been informed that it would be a 30 hour journey on train. Thought my co passengers, magazines, music player, and my dad’s PJs would keep me entertained till I reach Bhopal. The first two options did not work out. The rest did entertain me for a while but come on!! Who would listen to the same music and my dad’s “was-that-a-joke?”genre of ‘jokes’ for 30 long hours!? I reached Bhopal with a sickening boredom. And sleep! And hunger! I was on train! Could not have the lunch and dinner I was given on train neither could I eat other “unhygienic” food as it could mess up my voice. :(
It was midnight when we reached Bhopal. It was 11.40 when I noticed a couple of good looking guys in my compartment ;) it was too late to strike a conversation, so chucked the idea.
Being tricked by the rickshaw drivers, we reached our hotel room in 15minutes from the station which otherwise could have been reached within 2minutes from the railway station. Deadly tired was I that I remember stepping into the room and the next thing I remember is the next morning.
We set out on our explore Bhopal mission after eating the yummy Paratha dahi at the hotel. Bhopal failed to impress me. The roads were filthy, there were no traffic signals, traffic rules were not followed, vehicles bumping to one another every second, (Bangalore is heaven! Trust me!)and the strangest thing I noticed is the Mehendification! EACH Bhopali irrespective of his age or appearance or whatever, compulsorily had his hair coloured! I could not find out the reason though! Another aspect of Bhopal which interested me was that I could see pure Hindi everywhere. Names of the shops were only in Hindi. Pure Hindi.“Videshi madira” shop was one of my favourites! ;)
The best part of the whole trip was the visit to Indira Gandhi Manav Sangrahalay guided by Salim Bhai. That was the place where I was supposed to sing. Situated on the Shamla hills, it was one of the cleanest and a very peaceful places in Bhopal. We found replicas of tribal huts made. I had a good time visiting each of those. A part of the site gave its visitors information on how the human race began and stuff. Salim bhai also took us to places around. We went to the upper lake, Jain temple for which we had to go on a rope way and then to the old market for shopping. Old market is a street where one can shop the girly stuffs. I did not shop much as I found nothing so appealing.
We got ready to visit the famous Sanchi Stupa the next day. We decided to travel by a local transport. Walked till the bus stop and saw a series of spangly decorated buses going to different destinations. We got into one of those funny looking buses which was to take us till sanchi. Honking without a nano second gap is as essential for Bhopal drivers as hair colouring is to the people there! It was a fun ride though. Music did not give me much company that day. I preferred to look out through the window. Saw nothing but barren land. Sanchi turned out to be an interesting place of visit. Climbed up the hill and reached the place where we found stupas built by Emperor Asoka. At Sanchi, we not only saw beautiful stupas but ate the yummiest guavas on earth!
3 days at Bhopal was a good experience though not the best of all my trips. Only thing which bothered me was food! I was bored to tears eating the same paratha dahi, roti sabji and stuffs, we planned to visit a good place where we could eat dosas and idlis. We were taken to Manohar sweets which was apparently a very well-known eat out in Bhopal. Desirous of south Indian food, both I and dad had a biiiiiig smile on our faces looking at the menu. We finally got to savour Dosa and Idli after 5 long days!
I was already home sick. Home food sick rather! The food served in train was horrible. I could no longer stand the sight of it. I had got a few Kachoris from the famous Manohar sweets on which I survived my whole journey and of course the Bhel, moomphali and Vada Pav always fascinated me ;)
Hmmm that was about my trip to Bhopal. Was happy to see Karnataka, happy to be back home :)
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