BlogStep#5

After you have decided why, what, whom and how, it is important to plan out the goal. I had planned to cover about my perceptive about U.S culture along with my past perceptions and incidences. I am also one among many who never had any desire to step in U.S, at the same time I also longed to see how my birthday was celebrated in U.S. People like me who hesitate to travel to U.S, I would only recommend to visit U.S given a chance just to admire their culture and automated things. The contents in each of my post are 100% true except for four posts. I have covered all possible interesting areas that I adored the most in U.S. It is easy to plan and hard to execute but consistent planning and execution would definitely help to progress. That's exactly what I tried for the past one year. I could not complete my initial count of 365 (which later got down to 360) due to my India trip. As per my original plan I had to post my last write up on 6th August which could give me the correct count of 365. I thought I would compensate for the remaining posts by blogging two topics everyday. But due to hectic work and health conditions I could not even think of writing one everyday so planning to write two on a single day seemed bit impossible. In spite of many deviations and hiccups, I still consider my first step towards writing a big success. I am here with closing my personal blog from this day.

Log Home

Before I close my personal blog I thought of completing my week pending task of writing in detail about our two day stay in log home.

Our trip started on a Friday evening to this place. We are got split into two cars with four and five members in each car. I should also give some good qualities that I like in each of the members in car 1 and car 2.

Car#1 Gang:

If you have to blame me for hanging a camera with me always for any outing then he is the guy you should blame for. He knowingly or unknowingly did a big mistake of forcing me to buy a rechargeable battery due to which I never used my camera for the past one year. What I learnt from this person is the sheer determination, we have tried a lot to brain wash his mind to eat non-veg but he seems to be lot steady and strong to stick to his values and view point.

Building a relationship in a first meet and retaining the same after is not a easy task my friends and I love this person only for this sole reason she knows how to maintain relationship and one gets easily attracted my the way she speaks. kattabomman movie is associated with her for some reason not sure why :)

I have never seen this person lose his temper and not sure how he has trained himself to maintain his nerve to be calm even when things get miserable. If he doesn't find someone agree to his point, he stays silent and saves his energy wisely.

I would set this person as a role model who loves to maintain perfection in everything be it be dancing, singing or teasing or getting ready on time or taking the responsibility to arrange things at home.

Mite be new to our gang but she comfortably mingled with everyone and got close with each of us. Everyone in our gang calls her Mrs. Question mark that is because she poses tooooooo many questions. That is exactly what I like in her.

Car#2 Gang:

She has very good observation and a razor sharp mind. Even during night time she was able to guide our driver. Her presence of mind is something I really appreciate.

He likes to read a lot and if I recall correctly he loves winter season that the time he gets more time to read things online. Well I admire his reading habits.

Many could be talented and knowledgeable but few are modest. I came to know more about this person only after this trip. I respect his humbleness and hidden talent. I damn sure he will soon showcase his talent to everyone in near future.

Person known for energy and enthusiasm also traveled along with this gang in car2.

Day#1 Adventures

we thought we would reach our destination by 10 or so but we stepped our log home close to 12 as we looped around one point for sometime. We all lined up to arrange our things in the log home. Some were arranging kitchen things and some were pulling the luggages from the car. After a tiring drive we all took turns to prepare Dosai and Adai. After so called heavy dinner we all headed to have a night view of the lake. Our log home is almost in the middle of the forest which is lined with lake on one side. The lake was at walk able distance from our log home. We all walked in 4-5 rows with group of 2-3 people in each row. We carried our torch light as it was pitch dark outside. We reached the lake and admired the reflection of water, sound of frogs and grumble of our stomach. After few clicks in the dark we headed back to the log home. It was almost 2-2.30 when everyone went to bed.

Day#2 Adventures

Morning people attacked water melon, bread and kellogs to energize them to canoe for long time. I and one other friend got up at 11 am as we were pretty much unworried about canoeing. First thing that attracted me in the morning was the water bottle arranged with white Nymphaea stellata(Ambal flower). I guessed that our folks had plucked from the lake during their boating. People had gone for many rounds of canoeing and I landed late but ensured I carried my breakfast along even when people pulled me to row in the boat with six people of which five were gals. I had a very interesting ride that day as the canoe was only turning 360 degrees rotation and never navigated to any direction. Everyone in the boat had suggested individual direction that kept the boat turn turn and turn but never allowed it to move in any single direction. Finally we made up our mind and reached the shore.

Close to 1 pm we headed our way to hike in the forest with individual self survival kit of water bottle and snacks. Still I am not sure to what distance we walked as some say 3 and some say 6 miles either way we had a long walk. The weather was very favorable factor to us in the end as it neither poured rain nor appeared hot. There was one who throughout our hiking had a constant eye on the route number and map directions. We walked on sand, ran between tall grasses and jumped on soggy grasses.
Whenever we lost our energy we either sang loud or aimed for flower stem shots on bushy hairs or took snaps or did something really crazy. After 3 hours we reached our log home again. Prepared sumptuous Briyani and passed couple of hours playing phase 10 cards. The game was not interesting as before one could gather cards, someone or the other completed that phase easily if the cards were not shuffled properly. Still we continued to play for four phases. Our head started to ache and eyes wanted to catch a wink. In this state some compromised to stay at home and some were desperately waiting to take bath in the lake. Later we pulled everyone to visit the nearby lake. Oh my god can't express how much fun each of had in playing in the lake water.

After getting refreshed most of them got ready to set the camp fire at 9.30 pm, I was feeling bit weak by then and started to lay flat on the sofa. I went after the fire was high and corn was roasted. After seeing everyone's energy level my level got lot heightened. One side people were roasting sweet corn and on the other side people grilled chicken. After dancing, singing and eating we headed back home.

All of us had decided to sleep only at 3 am that day so we had to find some way to keep ourselves awake. We finally decided to play dumb-c only with Tamil movies. Guys and gals formed separate teams. It was fun confusing our opponent from guessing and giving the right answer. Of the entire movie names only 123 GO retained in our minds for ever as our friend really had a tough time in explaining about this movie to us. Back to bed after having mini breakfast (idli/Chapathi) along with ice cream.


Day#3 Adventures

At least today most of us decided to wake up late in the morning, those who got up early went for another round of canoeing. As we had to vacate the log home by 3P.M we had to complete our cooking, cleaning and packing in a very shot time. We managed everything easily as each of us took responsibility of some task or the other. Half heartedly we all left the place and headed to hear a 30 minutes lecture in wolf center. After the wolf center visit we took a short break in a park to fill in our stomach with Sundal and water melon. As we waited for our friends to gather in the parking lot we decided to play a game and I was the target for this game. My friends tied my eyes and asked me catch them. To spice this game one of my friend suggested me to call out Marko for which my friends would reply back polo just to indicate their positions and move. People clapped, scratched and shouted to hint about the existence of people close to me. It took long time and I was unable to catch hold of anyone at the end I found someone whom I grabbed strongly and there you go our game ended and each gang later pulled their respective cars to drive for a scenic view. After dinner break at pizza hut we all reached home before 3 a.m. That's the end of our sweet memories of our two day stay in log home.

I might have missed out few interesting points from our trip which I guess my friend might help me to recall. Anyway I have tried my best to at least jot down the highlights of our trip.

Life in Chennai

I always tried to keep myself busy with something or the other when I was in Chennai. After joining software industry I hardly found any time for my personal activities. That's when I decided to use my one hour to and fro bus time for personal daily routine. I only remember the days of running from home to the bus stop with a huge back pack on my shoulders, bread sandwich in my left hand and Hindu newspaper in my right hand. I would stand next to someone who usually boards the office bus from my stop, that way I needn't even look up for the bus number. While standing in the bus stop and while travelling to office I read the headlines and editorial section of Hindu Newspaper. After work while returning back home I used to sketch/replicate cartoon pictures from the same newspaper. During night time as I needed light to sketch my drawings I always ensured to occupy the seat right behind the driver. I continued this hectic routine of reading and drawing during my travel time. Too much of anything is good for nothing and that's exactly what I realized when I suffered from severe eye pain. Saturday and Sunday's were usually packed with tennis for 3-4 hours, washing and sleeping. Life probably will not be that busy at least for the next three weeks in my hometown.

My liking

From childhood I have a habit of collecting quotations from news paper, books and magazines. I like to paste spirit boosting quotes around my place. During my school days I had gathered and organized humongous list of quotes that I loved the most. Today When I went through one of the great quote mailed across by my friend I got reminded of my ever loving hobby.

Direct Heat

My sleep was completely disturbed in the morning when I heard this message "Ashwini" application hanged. Well not a big issue but hearing this message my pressure raised a lot as I have been getting back and forth issues and escalations with this application which has almost taken my breathe for the past 3-4 weeks. I was happy last Friday as the application worked as expected. I was under the impression that I will have a peaceful disperse for my India trip coming Saturday. But this application escalation really sucks and sometimes peaks my stress level. Onsite folks in general get the direct heat/tension when the team does not meet client’s deadline and quality deliverables even when things are dependent on clients. Hearing few comments from one of my clients made me feel very bad and pathetic when things really go out of our control. What worked yesterday hangs up today and causes a delay to business and ultimately you are blamed for something unusual that happens all of sudden makes you feel that your efforts are in vain. I felt much stressed out today and didn't even have the energy to do anything much.

Grave Day

Trip was just amazing, I ate for the whole day and slept for at least eight hours. I have promised my friends to write a detailed blog to capture our evergreen memories of our two day stay in the log home. I am damn tired today and will probably find sometime this week to elaborate about our short trip.

Gone

No more offshore calls
No more staring at the monitor
No more bug fixes and requirement analysis
No more status updates
No more follow ups
No more shopping and roaming
No more sleeping for less time
No more tennis
No more blogging
No more eating in rush
No more willing to take deadline pressure

I am refraining all of the above activities just for the next two days. I am gone to live between the woods and lakes just to eat and invigorate.