My latest musing has been the way a person drives their vehicle. It’s been 8-1/2 years that I’ve been commuting to and from work by road and it has brought me quite some experience on some road maps. It has also given me some driving confidence when I’ve been on my own, either in a familiar locale or venturing out in uncharted territory.

I’ve been with an organization that requires me to be working in shifts and I’ve had several guys who have driven me to and from work, each one equipped with a different level of skill, temperament, and abilities. The drivers have ranged in ages from the young to the old ones who have been at the wheel since they don’t know when.

What is most noticeable among these guys is the difference in how they feel like driving when they own a vehicle or when they are just mere drivers. An owner-driver usually has a lot riding along with him than just a job. He’s driving his investment, the Sumo or Indica, as the case may be. He feels, and is indebted to, the “oohs” and “aahs” his vehicle may make while he’s transporting his clientele. That emotion is not emulated when a hired driver is at the wheel. Driving the vehicle for the hired driver is just a job, an end to his means. What matters most for him is a paypacket for him and his family. And that includes the temperament the driver carries and exudes. Most of my drivers have been hired. Very few of them have been owner-drivers and the emotion towards their vehicle is quite clear. They are the ones who can understand the roar and the purr of their vehicles. The hired drivers don’t know about it and may never learn the skill.

Those of you who own a vehicle and drive it, for pleasure or to work, will get my drift. For the other group of people, I’ll leave it to your imagination to understand the roar and the purr…

Finally this goes to publish. This is not one of my best works, but I had run out of literary steam to finish the post. Now I’m glad I’ve finished it. Do let me know your thoughts. You probably will plant the seed for my next post. Ciao!

Were the British so short sighted to not envision a situation when the train would not be able to get through that pass? Did they not instruct the train driver to look ahead before he proceeded, especially when it meant the safety of his passengers? That would have definitely avoided the urgency the father felt to close the bridge in time and save his own son and then let the bridge back in place so the train could pass.
The post is available in a Google search. The tag name is Pamban Bridge. Do read that post and let me know your reactions.

The journey started off as usual a nice ride through the city with its empty streets and the morning bustle of people getting to work, the newspaper vendors getting ready with the distribution, the chaiwalas getting their kettles warmed up and all that morning jazz.

Since it was a new place I would be visiting, we decided to get as much of distance cleared out before we started to fatigue and hence make the journey a long and tiresome one.

Our journey began at 5.30 a.m., and the first toll point came on by 6.00 a.m.  So far, good time.  Once we crossed out onto the highway, we were able to pick up some speed and managed to get through most of the tolls points in reasonable time.

The best part of the lap was the Vadodara-Ahmedabad Expressway.  81 bucks for the toll for a stretch of about 100 km, but worth every penny.  A superb expressway that is well maintained and totally clear of any roadblocks.  We didn’t see any accidents on this stretch of the road.  Also, this expressway is part of the Golden Quadrilateral.

The journey back also was a pleasant one.  I drove the expressway at 125-130 kph and since my wife was asleep on the backseat, the journey from Ahmedabad to Vadodara, a distance of about 100 km, took 1 hour 15 minutes.  There was cloud cover on some parts of the expressway and the scenery was just awesome.

The long drive from Ahmedabad to Ghodbunder can be rated as a 7.5 on a scale of 1 through 10, with 1 being the worst and 10 being the best.  The quality of the trip from Ghodbunder to Kalyan was a 5, and the trip from Kalyan to Badlapur can be rated as a 2.

The roads were terrible, the traffic congestion didn’t help and my fuel efficiency was drastically reduced due to this last stretch of 9 km.  It took me nearly 1.5 hours to traverse the distance from Kalyan to Badlapur.

The expressway was the longest drive I enjoyed, and the Kalyan-Badlapur route was the longest drive I’ve suffered.

Safe and tired after the two days of driving, I gladly plopped into bed at 10.30 p.m.  The next day, Sunday, also went into sleeping off the fatigue that had developed.

See you later on another post.

At first, I thought of creating a poll to seek answers and compile it;
Then I thought of writing about the musical instruments I have owned and currently own;
Since I didn’t have much to go on and the idea went off due to lack of material to post, I went through the thought of things my mum makes out of “fossils” (yeah, it is a pretty humorous term in our house, I’ll explain a little later.).

So now since I’ve got a solid thought, I’m back with some of my pattering.

To start out, I’ll just brief you about my second thought:

My dad owned a guitar since he was single (he stayed at a club for young Goan boys and learned to play from his roomies). He carried that skill on to after he got married and always aspired his children to learn the art of playing the guitar. Well, he coaxed and goaded me to learn, but my tender fingers at that young age wouldn’t cooperate with his lessons and patience. So I kind of gave up on learning to play the guitar, but could sing to save my life, so it was at least a glimmer of hope for my father.

When my younger brother was old enough to hold the guitar, he learned a little and dad was content at least one of the boys has got some of his skills (guitar playing and singing). Dad even employed a tutor to teach us the guitar, but it was not to happen that I could be taught how to play the guitar. I practiced the scales and chords, but it was just not good enough.

In the meanwhile my dad bought me a small Casio PT-20. Very small, but quite a good device for that time. I still have it with me though two or three keys are broken and the power adaptor is broken. Played it for a good number of years, actually till I finished school.

Then I had to move on, get an upgrade, get a keyboard big enough for my fingers. I pestered my dad for a new keyboard. Well he relented after quite some time (actually it was a whole lot of time later).

I did play in church with this keyboard, had my good days and bad days with it, but it is a nice piece of history I own till this day. I learned on this keyboard and can owe my future keyboard fascination to this keyboard.

Then, during my higher school exams, I needed a stress buster, something that really took my mind off my studies. I took up the guitar. Yeah, you’re wondering how come I picked it up. As it turned out, I wanted to break free from my studies and the guitar was a ready and good option. I learned to play the guitar in just seven days! Yes, exam stress is pretty good sometimes. I learned the guitar, can’t say much of the education that went into my head, but the guitar studies were great. Picked up all I needed to know in those seven days. And yes, it is possible to learn to play the guitar in just seven days, with a whole lot of dedication and concentration.

Finally, when in my second grad year, dad finally agreed and he got me a Casio CTK 450. It was a marvelous piece of equipment when it was bought. I liked the simplicity of the keyboard. Looking back now, the one thing I didn’t quite appreciate about this keyboard was it didn’t have a recording facility. I wasn’t quite a good player then and it was an “okay” for me to not worry about that.

It had some good styles, but no MIDI. It just had a fill-in in the styles for playing along. Made do with this keyboard and when I visited my cousin in Goa and the things he could do with his keyboard I was fascinated, but didn’t want to burden my dad with the expense of another keyboard. So I bided my time, finished college, went to work, collected dime after measly dime and lived without thinking much of buying a new keyboard. Money was scarce and lack of that “extra” buck can make you feel deprived.

After a series of jobs, and my pocket a little richer than from whence I started out, I saved up enough to buy myself my next keyboard. But what about the keyboard I already had? I sold it, yeah, for 5K. I sold it to a friend who wanted his daughter to learn to play. I guess they still have it.

The sale proceeds went towards the purchase of my next keyboard. I had done some research for my next keyboard and I was looking for something which had recording capabilities, had possibilities of being connected to a computer (though I didn’t own one at that time), something that could play MIDI files, could play styles more than what were contained onboard. I even contacted various distributors to get a good bargain. I narrowed down my search within my budget and arrived at my next keyboard, the Yamaha PSR 350. It put a hole in my savings, but it was a wow machine. The keyboard was bought from a merchant in Bombay itself, but the delivery had to be taken from Bhiwandi and we didn’t own a four wheeler then to easily cart it off. We drove our bikes, dad, my brother and myself all the way to the warehouse and carried the 7 kilo keyboard on my shoulders.

I was part of a forum that has generously provided styles and assistance for some of my needs and problems respectively. And there was language being used in the forum that I sometimes never understood. Until you stand in the beam of light you are not illuminated. The penumbra doesn’t brighten your palm as it should. So I lacked the knowledge these wizened people discussed. That made me think of an upgrade, once again. This time the budget had to be bigger since the cost of the keyboard was sensational.

I looked and researched the kind of keyboard I now wanted and finally came to the conclusion of getting myself the PSR S900. It had a host of tools for creating wonderful music. It was just a great keyboard. I sold off some time shares I had and had enough money to buy the keyboard.

When I weighed the benefits of the S900 with the S700 and S500, the difference didn’t seem too much, but the S900 cost more than the other two boards, so I had to make a choice, the color LCD with MIC input or a monochrome LCD without MIC input. The difference was 13K bucks. A little short of that sum, but I finally settled for the S700, since the S500 didn’t tingle me much. So I went ahead and bought my next keyboard the PSR S700. It cost me a bomb, but I love the keyboard. I’ve yet to compose something on it, but it will be done. I have done remixes of stuff I’ve done on the 350, but nothing original so far.

I bought the keyboard just a little after my beautiful daughter was born. She’s two years old now and loves to sit along with me when I’m playing on the music workstation.

That was one loooooonnnnng brief about my second thought. Should have used that for my blog material. Anyway, now to my actual post, Fossils:

Like any Indian family (or any family around the world), when the meal is prepared, there usually or sometimes is leftover food. A side dish, a salad, just plain rotis, or even just cooked rice. What happens to it after it has stayed in the fridge for say a day or two? You might just take it out of fridge, if it meets with your “edible” criteria, either pop it in the microwave and warm it up or toss it on a tava to get it to be a bit more edible.

My mum is the masterchef of “fossils”. Yes, leftover food that has stayed in the fridge for more than two days and meets the “edible” criteria will turn up on the table, not just for mum, who extracts the leftover, but for all at home. Mum is pretty smart at being the paleontologist that she is. She will extract the leftovers, use her secret spice recipe, use some fresh stuff and voila, a brand new dish which has no resemblance to what its origins were is on the table, fresh for the picking. When it usually is something that we don’t recognize, but happen to stumble upon an “ingredient” in the dish, we strike gold by declaring it is “fossils”. Once discovered, everyone is engrossed in trying to figure out the different ingredients. Sometimes we are able to catch them, but most of the time they are cleverly disguised. The best fossils so far have been cutlets that mum made out of vegetable that both my brother and myself didn’t like when it was made. It was served with tomato sauce. Ummmmm, scrumptious and delightful treats they were. After they were all gone, mum revealed the actual ingredients. Well, too late, buuuuurrrrrrp!

I’ve enjoyed my trips so far, especially since I’ve got my new car. I previously drove, albeit dad owned, a Maruti van. A real antique, got it converted to LPG, did up the tin work and all that, jazzed it up and finally sold it; yes it felt bad to give up on that van because that’s the vehicle I formally learned to drive though I had already gotten my license, wink, wink. Anyway sold off the van really cheap and got myself a Maruti Alto. I like the car a lot. The maneuverability and comfort is quite good. Also it has a stereo system that I desperately lacked in my van.

My first long drive was a trip to Lonavla via the Pune express highway. Wow, what a rush that was! There is an alternate route via Khopoli but I wanted to experience the highway firsthand. While en route to Panvel we hit a roadblock, a major one, that had not moved since the night prior. I was not going to let that roadblock get to my trip’s plan. We sought a diversion and followed the traffic till we got out onto proper blacktop. We ended up at New Panvel. I love driving my new car but am, and have always been, prone to getting lost in unknown territory, just can’t seem to get my bearings right. So we asked around for a way out of there and when we finally made it to the on-ramp of the expressway I was happy we weren’t too far out of the way. As soon as we reached the expressway there was the speed radar and a lot of speeding vehicles were being stopped for going beyond the speed limit. Well the roads are so tempting to just step on the metal for that adrenalin rush. So I smoothly made my entrance on the highway and started pushing the needle. 60, 80, 100, 110 it was an exhilarating first of its kind. I had been on the highway before but not at the wheel on any of those rendezvous. Well the fastest I could go at that point was 110 because I had the air conditioner on at that time. Yeah, this was another comfort I had in this car compared to my van. With the windows rolled up, the car is more aerodynamic since there is lesser drag, but it does make the interiors a bit stuffy and that leads you to switch on the air conditioner, so either way your fuel economy is out of the window, literally. After not being able to hit the magic 120 I decided to roll down the shutters and touch the 120 mark. And yes I did reach that mark in a very short time.

Now you’ll say “speed thrills, but it kills”, well if the other cars are traveling as fast as you, you really don’t realize that you are traveling at 120. But I carried it out for another two minutes and eased off the pedal. My wife was getting a bit nervous.

The ride there was fun, we saw a few places around and bought some chikki from the market, had a late lunch and packed off back home. This was around 5:00 p.m. I knew it was going to get late reaching home, but I was in no hurry.

This time round, I decided to take the Khopoli route. I took the exit on the expressway and the journey on that route was much different than the one I came on in the morning. The scenic view, including the roads, was quite different. The scenes while traveling the expressway is of mountain ranges and clouds, and the route via Khopoli is more rural.

We had to ask around for some directions (eyes rolling as we were lost for another time) and after a few wrong turns, finally made it to the right route.

There was some mountainous terrain, but quite shallow as compared to the expressway.

We reached Karjat by about 7:30 and it started getting dark, so that means lesser landmarks that can be identified. We made our way down winding hills and dusty and bumpy roads. When I finally reached Neral, I heaved a sigh of relief that we were on the right track. The trip from Neral to Badlapur was a very bumpy and tortuous one. But now I had started to be a bit rash while driving since it was getting dark and needed that confirmation that I was really on the right road and not just wandering in the wilderness in the fading light.

Once we reached the outskirts of Badlapur, I eased off the gas a bit, feeling relaxed and maneuvered my way home in a more safe way.

By the time I reached home, it was pretty late, 9:30 to be exact, so the trip had been a long, tiring and trying one. I enjoyed my trip, it was an experience.

So far, I’ve been on a few long trips, one was to Kashid Beach, a little way off Alibaug, that journey was another exhilarating one, rode the ghats and enjoyed the beach, but it got a bit boring at the beach since the place we shacked up for the night was pretty hot and there wasn’t much to do. But in my driving experiences, it was quite a journey. Enjoyed every bit of it. I’m planning another loooooong trip, by the end of the year. Hope to have some pictures of the scenery this time. But nothing is finalized as yet. Till then see ya around…

Some friends tend to be more than friends, someone who you can trust with your life’s secrets, some lovers, some just over-the-top caring though not lovers, and sometimes there are siblings who can be very good friends.

Friends come in all variants, but share the same thread, respect for the other person.

“Love can build a bridge, between your heart and mine,” Judds sang in a song.  This is the love of friendship.  Sometimes when this “friendship love” is taken to higher levels it can be with the love of your life; a friend who is so close to you that you never wish that person to be away from you.  A person who you share so much with, that you feel they are your spitting image, just with a different face and a different personality.

Like any other individual, there have been a lot of friends in my life, some of which I see on a daily basis, some on an occasional basis, and some who are really far away but have been brought together through social networking sites.

We share a bit of our life with our long-lost friends, over the phone, on a chat, or just a chance meeting.  There is immense joy when you come across a friend on a chance meeting.

Friendship is an essence in our DNA that cannot be rubbed off even with the most advanced technology.

To all my friends, cheers and thanks for being there.

“A friend on the left and a friend on the right.
In love and good fellowship, let us unite.
Ch:  Viva la, viva la, viva l’amour
Viva la, viva la, viva l’amour
Viva l’amour, viva l’amour,
Viva la compagnie.
Now wider and wider our circle expands
We sing to our comrades in far away lands.”

I’ve rambled enough for my first post, let’s hope the next post is a bit more structured and organized.  Till then, ciao.