Clouds in the valley...

Can you hear the cicada cry? It has perhaps, nothing to say - And yet the sounds remind of home, Lost somewhere far away   A wooden house atop a hill, And a silver stream below - Red earth, those whistling pines, Home in the mountains, long ago   Lost in the hills, but still a home Where every journey starts, Where summers were blue endless skies,   And winters, stronger hearts   And hills that made me fall in love With melancholy clouds of grey, Lessons that there can be hope Beyond a sunny day   The cicada stops, I wake to ask If I go back, will the hills be kind? But then, home was never far away, Home was lost, in years behind...

People here often ask me which part of India I am from. It follows with which cities I have been to, and naturally, the names they enquire of are the biggest metropolises, roughly dotting the four corners of my beloved diamond shaped country. Oh, you are from Calcutta? What about Delhi? Have you been to Mumbai? Isn't Bangalore the IT capital of the country? etcetera, etcetera, etcetera Usual questions, until the other day, a colleague asked me, ' So, you have been to Delhi, Mumbai and Calcutta! But how would you differentiate the three, maybe in one word?' Interesting and difficult question - the ultimate elevator pitch, with the challenge of unfairly encapsulating an entire city in just a handful of letters. But I tried my best, closing my eyes and replying with the first word that came floating in my emotions as I thought back of the days and months and years that I spent in each of these places. I responded, 'Culture for Calcutta, Money for Mumbai...

'When did you take these photos?' Newton asked abruptly while I was trying to distribute the soup his mother sent in two portions. Newton was my lanky next door neighbour - No, he was no wizkid in any form of science, but had earned his moniker from gravitating on the floor of my living room every time he came, ignoring my moderately expensive Ikea ottoman sofa. But science or no science, the boy was interested in my photography and often took the role of critic and fan alike. Today, he was browsing through my photographs taken from a boat cruise a few weeks back which I had happily ignored as I did not get the shot I was looking for. I tried explaining the Newton. 'So it was a whale watching cruise?' he enquired 'Yup...except that I did not get the snaps I desired' 'But some of these are quite good!' The boy was always genuine in his feedback, so I went back to the photos he was parsing. 'But these are not what I wanted!...

The other day I was looking at the articles on my website, and I found some in particular, that really touched me. As in really made me feel connected enough, to smile at the moments of joy and feel melancholic at words of yearning and despair.   When I looked at the other articles, they were good, but didn't seem quite as intense. It was then that I realized that the fault was not perhaps in the words - c'mon, I can't criticize my own works, after all - but rather in the content. Most articles were describing places or events, while a handful were more philosophical. At this point in time, I realized I could categorize most travel essays into three categories: Descriptive, Narrative and Contemplative (you see, years of consulting will make you classify even the most banal of objects around you into something apparently spectacular, either making some 5Ts or ending in 3 similar sounding words!)   Descriptive essays would be those where you end up talking about the plac...

If you are lucky, Life sometimes takes you back to the most vibrant of your down memory lanes. If you can withstand the overwhelmia and still breathe in peace to savor a fresh set of memories, you can't get luckier... Why do I write this, you might wonder? After seven years, Nishant has gone back to Paris! Paris - the place where the insanity for Bohemia all began. Sometimes it all feels like fast moving scenes in some old pastel colored movie set - an imposing cathedral here, an art noveau edifice there; small, artistic shops selling bits and pieces of nostalgia by the Seine; gargoyles frozen in time trying helplessly to show onlookers what it means to gaze at the cityscapes from that altitude atop the imposing Notre Dame; the smell of musty books in Shakepeare, walking about in the autumnal rains in the imposing gardens (and rushing in to an old seemingly decrepit house only to discover gigantic canvases of Monet). Then, the first snows of winter - falling,...

Isn't it one of the best times of the week - a Sunday morning? I do agree that a Saturday evening wins the race by a slight margin, but yes, a Sunday morning is still a close contender! As I drink a strongly concocted Tata tea in a vibrant red cup, and contrast it to the blue skies of a sunny Sunday, there is a peaceful smile on my lips, content in my eyes  and a flurry of thoughts in my mind. I start going back to the library of my life, and search for Sunday mornings in various times of my life, amidst myriad places that I have called home. My first flashback brings back memories from Shillong - the Scotland of the East, where I was lucky to have spent my kindergarten years, thereby allowing the hills to forever emblazon me as a 'mountain man.' Those were days when dawn and early bright mornings would attract the little child in me (rather than the pensive fading melancholy of dusky evenings that became such a salvation as years passed by). Those were days when I...

Not far from the more popular camping havens of Nelson Bay and Myall Lakes lie the postcard perfect beach town of Seal Rocks, in the mid coast of New South Wales, and 275 km north of Sydney. Having camped at Myall Lakes the night before, we couldn't help bring ourselves to this beautiful gem of a place. Named apparently after a family of seals that perhaps lived here, Seal Rocks today is devoid of these furry critters, leaving the beach to practically yourself. The long expanse of the Lighthouse Beach The Seal Rocks beach or the Boat Beach as the locals call it, is a crescent shaped beach in gold that easily steals your heart from miles afar, when you realize quite easily why this place was included in your to-do list in the first place. Sitting on a low hill with well trimmed grass carpets, overlooking this crescent shaped beauty, I had practically had one of my best Sunday morning coffees ever! But before I could actually get down on those sands and hug the turquoi...

Unstoppable Force was very happy. He was, well, unstoppable. He won in every match and was literally undisputed. There was none who could beat him. Life was going great, until one day he heard renewed murmurs of an age old legend – Immovable Object. People started saying that if there ever was a match, the legendary Immovable Object would definitely win! This started bothering Unstoppable Force. His impression as the undisputed champion was at stake and he needed to prove to the world that he was the greatest. So Unstoppable Force packed his bags and began his journey to seek out Immovable Object and show the world the true champion he was. But alas, is quest was difficult. He moved on for days and days but never found immovable Object. He roamed all around the world but in vain. Much to his chagrin, everywhere he went, Unstoppable Force heard rumours that people had seen Immovable Object but he could never trace him. Slowly, he lost the vigour and enthusiasm of his journey an...

The next destination for the day was Culburra Beach – a sleepy yet rejuvenating hamlet, south east of Nowra, and just north of the Jervis Bay National Park. It is a quintessential watery paradise – to its north lies the Crookhaven River, to its south is Lake Woollumboola while its east is wrapped by the magnificent Pacific dotted with myriad sun and sea laden sandy stretches happily justifying the name of the place (Curbulla is aboriginal for sand) We first headed to the  Culburra Beach Mote l located at the heart of the town. I met Gail who runs the place along with her husband Grant – Gail was a very cheery lady who happily talked to me about her hometown. In my opinion, this is one of the best parts of travelling – catching up with the local folks and hearing them talk with pride about their world, its unknown history and those hidden nooks and bejewelled corners that are well hidden from the Lonely Planets and the Tripadvisors of the world. Gail and Grant had bo...