One Nyt @ Chamundi Hills

Me with a magnificent view of Mysore City in the backdrop

4 guys, 2 bikes and a late night excursion to Chamundi Hills, around 13 km from Mysore. Chamundi Hills is basically a temple built on a hill near Mysore. But we didn’t have any religious thoughts on our minds. It was a mere late night biking trip. Akash, Amrut, KT and I left around 11.00 PM. We had to follow road directions to find the right path for some time. But soon the bike wheels started to clock more revolutions per minute as we neared the foot of the hills and didn’t need more directions. Then started the climb and the first scene that struck me was the open, vast, unending sky filled with a million stars all shining brightly at us.
Soon we reached a point on the road where we were stunned… stunned on seeing the view on the down below the hill. There was the city of Mysore… brightly lit in yellow and expanding beyond the horizon to infinity… and in the center of it - the Mysore Palace stood distinguishing itself from the rest of the city. After a brief stopover and admiring the view we continued further above to the temple. I took the driving seat of the Pulsar and drove for the first time in a hilly terrain. We witnessed a similar magnificent view of the city from there and then returned to the old spot.

Akash sleepin on his bike with a view of Mysore in the Background
It was time to enjoy the sounds of silence now. All four of us sat there in silence, just looking at the grand view in front of us with a light, cold breeze soothing our souls. The feeling was wonderful.
Around 12.00 we decided to head back. I was behind Akash this time and after gliding down hill in neutral for some time, he decided to move on… and it was a thrilling move on.. Engine was revved up and given full throttle, which on the curvy, bendy roads of the hill was bone chilling.. Then after climbing downhill, there was a long stretch of straight road on which I saw the bike touching hundred. Sure the Pulsar is a good machine!!!
At the end of the long road, I took over the controls and then came the real one…
After crossing two speed breakers on a road, I had gathered some speed. I had some one telling me deep down that one more speed breaker will come..I ignored the call..Then suddenly realized that Amrut was braking in front of me. There indeed was one more breaker. So it was full brakes on.. the rear tyre skidding away to the right… Akash was shouting, don’t brake, jump over.. but strangely I was really calm inside.. the mind working quickly but like it knew what it was doing. On hindsight I feel that the bike may have really gone out of control but at that moment there was no such feeling. When I ponder I can’t find a reason for why there were no nerves. As we neared the speed breaker, I released the brake and accelerated. It was a clean pass over the speed breaker. May be playing games on computer does some good afterall. Because I had done this a lot of times while playing NFS, though on a computer console rather than real life!!!
Well, it was a cool, eventless ride back home after that. We reached back at around 1.00 AM after a thrilling as well as calm and exhilarating experience.

Natural vs Artificial

As I sat, taking steam bath in the gym today, a drop of sweat trickled down my nose, and fell down touching my lips on the way. My mind went back to the time when such a thing didn’t happen artificially. Artificially, in the sense that sitting in a room filled with steam and waiting to perspire.
They were the days of ‘natural’ sweat while playing cricket or football in the grounds of college or working out in the airless basement gym. It was the intensity, the passion, which resulted in the drops building around the forehead and tripping down, blinding our eyes just when the bowler was about to release the bowl.
You don’t get the natural feel until those beads of drops are mixed with the mud, the dirt, the smell of the soil. And believe me, that feel is a world apart, which you can never get while taking a steam bath or working out in the air conditioned gymnasiums. It’s difficult to get that time back and I guess as the days pass, we are getting further away from that sweet smelling, soil mixed Natural Sweat. Long Live those days….