How about an Adventurous Arranged marriage?

Heads Up: Logical mind is not entertained. Emotional minds are most welcome

Every problem starts with FB and WhatsApp

Lately, I have been seeing Facebook posts and WhatsApp messages of my friends getting their marriage fixed. And also notifications for various government posts with only persons born above 1991 being eligible. I don’t know what to think other than the fact that I am getting aged. Having said that, marriage is the next thing coming to mind. What about that? Love marriage seems out of option. So, this option less question leads to another question. What about the Arranged marriage?

Explain arranged marriage with it's types (2 marks)

             No concrete ideas. But, got a little idea on how these will happen thanks to my friends. So, started thinking on how a Dream Arranged marriage would be. One which gets fixed now and get married after a year. Or one that gets fixed now and getting married within 3-4 months. Hmm..how about within a month? I know it’s fast and there are only disadvantages in that. No time to plan. No time to get along with the girl and many no’s like that. But, there lies a silver lining in that. Let’s come back to that later.
           
 Disadvantages of prolonged Arranged marriage (at least 7 points)

             Firstly, if you get married after 1 year of getting fixed, you have the following disadvantages

           1)      Over/excess/unlimited/non-stop talking to him/her which further have the disadvantage of getting the marriage cancelled (as a single guy/girl, we never want that to happen)

           2)      Secondly, you will lose the feel of arranged marriage because gradually it will become an  arranged cum Love marriage

           3)      Your friends will have the embarrassment/irritation of seeing you blush. Yeah, exactly. That same 'enna venumnaalum pannu..aanaa thayavu senju vekkam mattum padaatha' moment (I think this applies only for Boys)

           4)      1 year means obvious fights. So, obviously you too have to hear love failure songs like a real lover (then it’s a “kadasila ennayum Love failure songs kekka vechutaanglee Sivaji” moment)

           5)      And most importantly, one year of Bachelor life wasted, which means you can’t post single or love failure (one sided) statuses or memes in FB
     6)   In the long run, you tend to forget that you are engaged and going to get married similar to how I forgot the last point due to prolonged thinking
     7)   ????

The Hare and the Tortoise (it's not always about winning)

              Having said that, what is the silver lining in that fast paced marriage? It sounds like an adventure. It’s like a roller coaster. Like the first day in school or college. You don’t know what’s there for you. That excitement. That nervousness. That non-stop heart beats. If you have spoken everything during in that 1 year I wonder what they will be speaking after their marriage. And it’s more like Love marriage again. Before marriage, everything would be optimistic and mostly virtual and hence everything goes cool. But, after marriage comes the gap and the fights when you are facing the real scenario when your mind says ‘Ego Matters.
      
THE Adventure
              
              I am not saying that fast pace will work out and the other one won’t. I just think that fast paced might get entertaining. Hmm..for example, let’s take first night. You may have thought to speak about many things. About his/her family and their characters. How the border in her sari looked so nice? What chocolate she likes? How that light streak of Santhanam in his forehead was cute? Why his/her friends were giggling on the reception stage? Did he/she understand a single word of what the Iyer said during the marriage Pooja? Where to go for honeymoon? But words won’t come out. It would get many days to get settled. Every situation becomes a lesson. You get to know her/his likes or dislikes gradually with many ‘I thought so’ moments and cute little smiles Compare this with the virtual scenario of knowing these same things by talking in phone and the worst part – WhatsApp message
     
The Best Parts

              You will be cautious with your every move thinking on what he/she might think. Tasting her first cooking without knowing how it would be. Going out with him in bike nervous about the speed bumps. That innocent touch when both try to take out popcorn from the same cup during the first movie which leads the sweet and endless ‘you take..no no you take..no you take first’ moments. And then continuing that just to touch him/her. And the best part, the first blushing from him/her. That will be a killer one for sure. It’s an indescribable experience. (Blushing over phone and the eyes-closed-blushing-smiley in WhatsApp is no match to this when compared). Those initial days are the ones which you might cherish forever.
     
The Hare and the Tortoise - Again (now also it's not about winning or at least participating. It's about the dreams the Hare had while it was asleep)

        And after reading all this, some might think ‘This guy got married fast paced and so he is saying like that’. It’s not about getting a girl or a boy and it’s not what I experienced. It’s just a collective of imaginative thoughts of how a fast pace marriage might feel. Those thoughts sounded like an adventure. A real adventure, not a virtual one. So, I am sharing it here. Who doesn’t like to experience an adventure? Or at least dream about it?

Pin Hole aka Heart Hole Photography - DIY

Heart hole Photography

Felt very bored on this Sunday evening. That’s when I saw this article on Photography.

7-Essential-Photography-Hacks-And-Tips

Pinhole Photography:

In that, I liked the concept of Pinhole Photography very much. It’s basically, creating a pin hole in your lens cap or pasting a pin holed cardboard or paper in front of the lens so that you get your image inside a hole in your frame.

Heart Hole Photography:

I thought of giving it a try. But, with a little twist. Heart in the place of pinhole <3. I can’t afford to lose my lens cap for the sake of this. So, I decided to try using paper.

Things needed:

1)  Paper

2)  Rubber band

3)  Bright color sketch

4)  Knife or scissors

STEPS:

I will try to jot down on how it went in steps.

STEP 1: Take a white paper, place it over the lens and press the paper on the edge of lens so that you get a trace of round shape in your paper.

STEP 2: Take the paper down. Draw a Love symbol on the centre of that traced circle. And color it. I chose green since at least in the paper I can get a green signal.

STEP 3: Color the whole traced circle to green or whatever color you like leaving the inside space of Love symbol undisturbed.

STEP 4: Now, get a knife or scissors (I used pin hook) and cut out the heart part from the paper.

STEP 5: Now, place this over the lens again and do adjustment to position the heart in whatever place you want in the frame.

STEP 6: Take the rubber bands and put them over the paper (see below for clear picture)

So, everything is ready and good to rock :)

This is how taking photos using this technique looked like:

Some of images which I took using this so-called-heart-hole-photography-technique ;)

NOTE: I did this very roughly without any professional intention. But, if you want a professional touch, try using a cardboard with cello tape. And instead of rough edges in Love symbol (like mine), try cutting with sharp edges for a perfect touch. And last but not least, unleash your creativity for best effects :) <3

Why we need to read in Tamil?

                First of all, I would like to say that this is not a post to advice or criticize. It's just how I felt when I started reading Tamil books and understood how great they are.

Current Situation:

                Speaking of reading, whether it is Tamil or English, it has become a rare one as getting audience for artistic Tamil movies. When you say that you read books, you are viewed as someone different in your social circle. First question which comes is "English or Tamil". If it’s Tamil, then I have 90% probability of losing that 'Someone different ' value. I even had a bitter experience of a friend of mine asking me like 'Do we have notable literature in Tamil?' I don't know how to say that we have notable and acclaimed literature for past 1000 years and even above.

In the past:

                In the past, it wasn't like that. We had businessmen, small kings and big kings patronizing poets. Even though, some of that patronizing might be for self-proudness, it was elemental in making the poet continue to create. And hence, we had mind blowing literature.
 
What about honor?

                I am not saying we don't have now. We have awesome literary works by some notable persons. Maybe they are updated for the modern audience. But, are we reading them or at least honoring them?

                The only honor literary persons get these days are name in papers and TVs when they won Sahitya Academy award or our Tamilnadu Govt. Award (which is shown by Tamil media alone). We can't blame the Northern media though. When was the last time you saw a name of a literary person from other state on a Tamil media?

                Let's leave other languages. Coming to Tamil, did we ever had any discussion on any book which won Sahitya Academy award? No. Or anything about our Tamil Literature? No. We only have these dramatic shows trying to showcase it as equals to Arnab Goswami's **** shows (you can fill whatever bad word you want)

Reading Habit:

                And coming to the habit of reading, are we really reading? The irony is that most of us think reading Ananda Vikatan and Kumudham is a great literary reading (I agree with Ananda Vikatan a little bit since it has some good literary content). It's not the actual reading though. There are hundreds and hundreds of mind blowing works in Tamil. They have every range of emotions - love and sex, joy and sorrow, revenge and forgiveness and whatever-you-know to whatever-you-don’t-know.

Why in Tamil?

                It's not that I am opposing reading of English books. They are fine. But, you get that cultural touch only in Tamil. Imagine reading about a war in England and a scene which depicts a fight with a neighbor in Chennai. You will get involved more with the second. And it's great that you know about your culture before moving on to other culture. It's because, then only we can compare them with ours which will give us a better understanding.

                And always there is a talk that many areas of writing are unexplored in Tamil literature. That's not right and we are exploring many contemporary areas of literature too, by our modern day writers.

That feel of reading in Tamil:

                And the habit of reading in Tamil, it is an unexplainable experience. You have to read it to experience it. Not only can the movies make you feel or cry. Literature can too. They are an important tool for a change in society as Jeyakanthan says. Change in the sense it's not like an uprising. It is a gradual change which will affect your life forever. Like the short story 'Agniprevesam', it is a famous short story of Jeyakanthan and created more controversies when it came out in the 1960s. It totally changed the way of how middle class people considered 'Chastity'. And his continuation novel for that short story titled 'Sila Nerangalil Sila Manithargal' is a master piece which won him the Sahitya academy award. And many other writers like Asokamitran, Janakiraman and Jeyamohan explore the mind, the extent of its thinking and ways it can think which we also do, but afraid to say it loud in the public. They deal with those kind of thinking and give us a kind of solution on how to deal with them.

A little alert:

                And if you are coming to Tamil Literary World, please don't get yourself into any group of fan following of any author. It's because we have many unhealthy discussions by fans of different Tamil writers online. So, please avoid them and try enjoying their works.

Some suggestions:

                If you have decided to read Tamil Literature, here are some books I can suggest as a heads up:

1) Sila Nerangalil Sila Manithargal - Novel by Jeyakanthan
2) 18 aavathu atchu kodu - Novel by Asokamitran
3) Aram - short story collection by Jeyamohan
4) Muthirai kathaigal - a bulk collection of short stories of Jeyakanthan
5) Short stories of Prabanjan, Kalki and Janakiraman

                And many more. These are like drops. A vast ocean is before you. Try to sail in it and don't get feared of drowning. It will teach you how to swim.

A little favor:

                And if you are going to read a book, please buy them as paperback and read it. Nothing can match that experience. No eBooks or borrowed ones (unless you can’t find that book). Please buy them on your own. It's because at the end of day, writers are also trying to make their ends meet, by enriching the culture and humanity left with us. :)

Note: And I wrote this in English since many of you wouldn't have read this if it was in Tamil. That's what I thought. Pardon me if I thought wrong.


If you want to see how our Tamil literary world has evolved and how mind-changing reading can be, have taste of it here: அக்கினிப் பிரவேசம் - ஜெயகாந்தன்

Solo Backpacking to Villupuram - A Travelogue (Part - 1)

Alert: It’s gonna be a long post. I am trying to document every single thing here. So if you have some patience and the heart to tolerate my silly grammar mistakes and the long post, GO ON: D

Background

For a long time I was longing to start a solo backpacking after an unplanned solo travel to Mysore a year back, which made me feel the awesomeness of solo travelling. As usual, I was just planning for the last one year and nothing in action.

            But somehow, during the last 2 months I have been thinking about it a lot and decided on it. The plan is solo backpacking to all districts of Tamilnadu. The count is 32 and it’s only on weekends. At first, sounded weird to me itself but no other way due to office.

            The reason for choosing Tamilnadu is that I thought ‘it’s must that you should be aware of your people and culture before exploring others’. So, it’s decided and I chose Villupuram. There is no specific reason for Villupuram. It’s just a random choice. The last week was full of planning as it happens for every over-enthusiastic-first-time traveler. I sorted out the places to visit and the ways to reach them.

Day One

            So, everything was good to go. Packing done with all that I thought was necessary: Extra clothes, Camera, chargers, knife, matchbox, mosquito coil and a book. I started from my room at 2 am in the early morning

Kaiveli Bus stop 2am: 
            
            The start itself gave me the first dose of solo travelling. I was waiting at Kaiveli bus stop for a bus to Tambaram for like half an hour. I got tired and started asking for lifts. I even asked in cars. That’s how I stopped a van which turned to be a police van looking for suspicious persons. As soon as it stopped, the police man immediately radioed in like ‘One suspicious person found at Kaiveli signal’. I didn’t want to say that I am traveling to get him more suspicious. I told that I am travelling to my hometown, Namakkal since it got late at office and gave my ID card. He didn’t believe and asked my office card. So had to give it to him. Then, he warned not to roam like this and went off.

The Joy of Hitchhiking:

           And in next few minutes I got the best dose of solo travelling. After police went, I stopped asking lifts and waited for the bus. That’s when a guy in scooty stopped and asked where to go. I said Tambaram. Since he is going till Medavakkam, he said he can drop me at Medavakkam. So I hopped on. All the way while travelling, all thoughts of physco killers and thieves came to my mind. So I thought of jumping out if he changed the direction of travel. But nothing of that sort happened and we reached Medavakkam. Then the same case at Medavakkam. A guy returning home stopped and offered a lift till Tambaram. He dropped me at the bus stop itself and went away without waiting for a thank you.

Tambaram Bus stop 3 am: 

          Boarded a bus to Villupuram from here. Travelling in bus is one of the best part of travelling. I am not mentioning the AC sleeper buses here. The ordinary buses. You can find every single character available in this world in that bus. It won’t be visible unless you look deep.

The not-so-normal-but-awesome bus travels:

A drunken guy who puts old gaanaa songs with loud noise and keeps fighting with the passengers, guy who is returning late from work trying to sleep very badly by trying weird sleeping positions, couple who asks every single guy to change seats (which is always supposed to be me), conductor who keeps yelling at people for change, conductor who wakes you up correctly at your stop and gets you down, driver who thinks he is a racer, driver who acts like a snail, girl who sits only at the first half of bus (it’s a common practice that girls sit only at the first half maybe because the second half is bumpy due to back tires or maybe it is testosterone charged), kids fighting for window seat, couples doing unbearable things, guys who doesn’t leave their edge seat (because if you are seated at the edge seat, you can keep your legs straight and free it which you can’t do when you go inside), guy who falls on you sleeping and asking sorry but keeps doing it, guys immersed in their mobile phones and headphones, girls who are aware of their surroundings and keeps correcting their dresses even if they are sleeping, guy or girl who keeps pestering to inform when his/her stop comes, guy who comes prepared with bedsheet and uses it to sleep in the space between the seats, guy who stands all the way and looking around always for someone to get up, guy or girl who gives seat for older people and many more. I didn’t see all these characters in this travel itself. I just wanted to say how awesome this kind of bus travel will be.

Villupuram bus stand 6 am:

          Reached Villupuram bus stand at 6am. Thought of going to Gingee Fort first. Didn’t know which bus to board. So, resorted to the best conversation starter, Tea. The shop owner told me the place where the bus will stand. Went there and waited for 15 mins and boarded the bus. (Buses going to Thindivanam or Vellore will go to Gingee. Practically in Tamil, it’s senji. So ask like that).

Senji bus stop 7.20am:  

         Reached Senji at 7.20. Had breakfast near the bus stop. Locals said the place is nearby. So started walking towards the Gingee fort by foot. But, it seems that the distance is 2kms and if you don’t want to walk, there are many share autos between Fort and Senji bus stop. You can use them.

Senji aka Gingee Fort:  
        
         After walking half an hour, reached the fort. The fort is basically comprised of 2 forts on opposite sides of the road. The one on right is Rani Kottai (for the queen) and the other is Raja kottai (For the King).

Rani Kottai:

The Raja kottai is the major attraction but I didn’t know it in first place. I first chose the Rani Kottai and went inside at 8am.

But had to wait till 8.30 am for the caretaker to come and open the place. After the gates are opened, started climbing it. You don’t have to rock climb or anything. The steps are well laid but you have to be careful though. Went atop the fort by 11.30 with some photo sessions in between. The view from the top is blissful. Be sure to watch the way you came to the Rani Kottai from the top. It’s a nice view.

And there are green fields around which makes the view lovely.

And regarding the place above, it has some well-built places like storage places for grains, meeting place for the kingdom (like Durbar) etc.

A dream place for Photographers.

After a good photo session there, climbed down. Seems easy to climb down but a single wrong step will cost your life. So be careful on every step.

A selfie view of Gingee Fort:

An overview of the Gingee Fort (Rani Kottai)

Raja Kottai:

            After climbing down, was very tired. So thought to have lunch and continue to the next. Had lunch at a home nearby where they offered food for a fair price. The food was awesome and refilled the water bottle there. Finished with the lunch, headed to the Raja Kottai. If you can’t walk make sure you get a share auto. It’s because, the distance to Raja kottai from main road is again 2-3 km (excluding the 2km from Senji bus stop). So plan accordingly. And on the way to Raja Kottai, there is a park cum temple. (If you are going by walk you can stop here and take rest for some time)

            I went by walk – rest at the park and then to the Raja Kottai. The Raja kottai is bigger when compared to Rani Kottai.

Before climbing the Raja Kottai, be sure to watch the Queen’s palace which is nearby to it. It’s an artistically built one.

And coming to the climbing part, it’s a tough one which will test your stamina. So, take some stops in between and climb gradually. And the place is fully crawling with Monkeys. So, make sure you carry a very big stick with you. Big means very big because the old monkeys won’t be afraid of those small sticks. And I am saying this because I had a terrifying cum thrilling experience with one of the old monkeys.

The Not-So-Friendly-Monkey:

            I made a stop at a place where there was place to sit down comfortably (like the thinnai we have in front of most of our old Tamil houses). I kept my bag aside and was enjoying the view from there with a small stick in one hand. Suddenly I heard a voice ‘Ggggrrrrrrrrr’. It’s not much of a loud noise but it was terrifying. As soon as I heard it, the small stick automatically fell down from my hand and when I was about to pick it up there was this Monkey with an angry face. I couldn’t move because even if turn or bend a little bit it was ready to jump on me with that ‘Ggggrrrrrrrrr’.

So, I just froze. The monkey started opening every single zip in my bag and put every single thing out. Dresses, cam, book, charger and every single thing. It couldn’t find anything. So, it went for Camera bag. I started praying (to the Monkey, not the God though). Since it was clip type, it couldn’t open it and threw it away. Finally, 2 Mentos which I kept in one of the front zips came to my rescue. It took that, tore it, gulped it and went away. Then I came back alive.

The Finale:

Then continued the grueling climbing and reached the top at last. And seriously the pain was worth it for the view and the awesome air there.

There wasn’t much of artistic places in the top. It’s just the pain and the joy. Settled there with headphones on ear. I would say it was here, where I have felt the lovely feel of the ‘Kanave Kanave’ song. I was in some other world for those minutes.

Some Random Experiences:

And, forgot to mention a group of college boys (5-6 I think) with whom I raced to the top, which they won obviously. They were funny and fast, with a touch of Gaanaa songs. And also a group of travelers from North India. They were well equipped – good backpacks, food, water and even a portable speaker to hear songs at the top. And it was bad they were playing some English songs:(

            On the way down, met a group of 50 school girls who were climbing to the top. When I met them, they encircled me, took all the water I had and waved me around enthusiastically. On coming down only, I understood that those girls went without teacher’s permission. They were frustrated and angry. And when the girls came down, they got a nice welcome ;)

Other attractions:

            Apart from the fort, there are other places like Granary, Elephant Tank and Explosive storage place etc. And there was a little park like setup here too. So, if you are planning to Raja kottai, start climbing around by 9 am and by the time you reach down it will be afternoon and you can have your lunch (if you got some prepared) or you can take rest down. But, you won’t get that awesome air at the top though, in the afternoon.

Funny scene (that’s how it looked like to me):

            Came down, took some rest and walked back to the Senji bus stop. It was here I saw a funny scene. A girl in scooty came to pick up her relatives from the bus stop. A little kid climbed at the back. But, she instructed the kid to come front. Without climbing down, the kid literally climbed all over that girl and came front. And then three more women climbed at the back. This girl was barely sitting and she was asking to the back like “Shall we roll?” The women at the back were very embarrassed as the whole bus stop was looking at them. So they said like “Go from here as soon as you can before everyone start laughing”. Then the girl moved the vehicle with many twists and turns and somehow managed to drive away from there.

Return:

From there took bus to Villupuram and then to Kallakurichi since I had planned to visit Periyar falls and Vellai Malai there, the next day. Took a lodge (NLJ Lodge – 200 rupees only per night) there, had Dinner at a road shop opposite the lodge. Parottas there was one of the best I had. Took tablets to cold due to change of water. Charged both the phones and the cam and slept off with lights on

Checklist if you are planning:

     1) Backpack very lightly

     2) Have 2 water bottles with full water

     3) Make sure you have a big stick for the Monkey ;)

     4) Don’t climb up or down too fast unless you are doing it for a sport

     5) For girl travelers, take a company with you. If solo is your mantra, then try going along with any other group (because place is little dangerous since a girl was killed here one week back)

     6) If you want to climb both the forts in single day, start at 8.30 itself

    So, at last the solo backpacking dream had materialized. Let’s see how it goes. Will see in the next post about the Day 2 :)

For the Love of Travel aka Che aka McCandless <3