Greek God, Vellurous.

Greek, originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Vellurous Guitarous, Greek God of the Guitar.
photo acquired from his cell phone :)

Apollo Bunder

Apollo Bunder & the Gateway of India

Lots of talk, white wine, red wine, beer & some food at a nice restaurant which had a fantastic view of Apollo Bunder & the Gateway of India. Stayed back in Navy Nagar as it was late.


my boss, Hrush, hiding behind the menu

Cleartrip dinner

It was a busy day at Cleartrip. We started looking for dinner post 0230hrs ... But Mumbai city is cursed. There seemed no food available. Noorani, Sardar's ... all the tiny joints between Mahalaxmi and Grant Road -- they all seemed closed for business ...

Finally we found a bhurji-paw gaadi near Lamington Road. What days.

Happy Birthday Sanket

Panache : Vasu in Style


Unexpectedly, I had the pleasure of partaking in Sanket's Birthday celebrations. That I was invited, touched me. I was in Ghetto when I got a call from Vasu telling me my spirits were on the Naka and that I should join soon. I departed immediately. After a quick bite at the Naka we headed for Chembur and Adarsh Resto Bar. Pomfret fry and dosa with beer in the car. The resto bar provided entertainment in many forms, one of which was a dude who fancied his seksy dance.

Post 0200hrs we decided to head for Thane to feed. The night was wild and so was the ride. We reached ahead of a Skoda, a Esteem and a Santro. :) More drink and some good food. The rustic atmosphere of the dhaba with its wild night time crowd was a change. On the way back Mihir wanted to ride. He was waiting for us at Dadar. 0430hrs we head for Bandra and some minor sleep...


Adarsh Resto Bar @ Chembur

Happy Birthday Dude !!











Dhaba @ Thane

That is chicken handi, dhaba style.

all photos taken with a SE w800i cell phone cam

sher

kab kya kiya jo ab karu, kuch kiya to na, originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

kab kya kiya
jo ab karu,
kuch kiya to nahi
fir bhi bharu?

:)

615km, 48 hours : Fool's Errand

Scene on the Goa Highway


Once again the fools were on the way. The fat one had convinced all to visit his family home at Mahad. Six of them fell for it. (Actually 5 fools and a Sher) Astride their trusty rides they leave at 6pm having decided to leave at 3. But such is the way of fools. Paying no heed to the dangers lurking on the dark highway, staring blinding lights in the face they make their way to Panvel. No opportunity is left to take a halt and contemplate.

Panvel and the ubiquitous misal-pav at Shree Datta. The road to Mahad (Goa highway) has no divider. It was a free for all ride. Wadkhal Naka, Naghotne (yaha's pump) they all were left in the wake of the smoke as they burned the road. They reach to find the family awake with a good meal of mutton and wada. Spiritual equipment has been already acquired from nearby before entering the homestead. The bigger fool eats and eats grapes too. Only the bigger one has no spirituality. Well, he is like that only : he'll go to hell. After the fat foo's old folks are asleep (or pretending to be) the fools do fun stuff ...

Morning and a visit to the farmhouse nearby is planned. Warm beer is acquired on the way. The landscape has turned into an oven. The farmhouse has tiny mango trees with large mangoes. It looks funny. Warm beer and grapes under some trees. This is life.

By the time to head back has come, the bigger fool takes into his thick head to go visit Raigad. His arcane logic infuriates the fat one. But the wise fool agrees to go. Two creatures in shorts, one wearing a dirty t-shirt, the other a banyan, on a black motorcycle at noon in the oven. The villagers find this very fishy. No wonder there is no traffic on the road. Light as the breeze, they make speed towards the mountain fortress. Awed by the vastness of the spaces they reach the base village. The rope-way there is amazing deceptive. They chicken out and decide they have no time on this visit. After cheating an old lady for the parking fees they head back.

The rest of the fools have the responsibility to collect all collectables and reunite with the intrepid travellers at a spiritual joint. Typically like fools they imbibe the drink before heading back. The journey back goes over the same roads as the journey to Mahad. This was surprising.

The bigger fool drops his fellow traveller at Chembur. He has work the next day. He tries to avoid. But he has nothing else to do. So ignoring that his game is over he heads for Thane. The journey from Pryadarshini to Sion circle and back to Pryadarshini takes about 45 minutes in traffic. From here to Thane is covered in 20 minutes. The fools friends give him a warm welcome and take him to a place where good food and rest lie in wait. The bigger fool is blessed with good friends.

Next morning a new partner and a new journey. They head north towards Kasara. The journey is swift. Kasara is hot. 39C in shade. The arrid burned landscape is what they were looking for. With that they find poverty. They head back.

Finally at around 1830hrs Naka is reached, ending 48 hours of road, lights and wind on the face ...



On the old Thane creek bridge


Sunset on Palm Beach road


Drunk at Sujay's dad's house, Mahad


Dry countryside, on the way to Raigad


Jajamata Samadhi


Hirkani Buruz


Illegal affairs at Mahad


The wise fool and his wisdom


White onions at Wadkhal Naka


Hirkani Buruz, Raigad (150 degrees panorama)

Green, Shivaji Park

Green, Shivaji Park, originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Green, Shivaji Park

looking glass

DSC00144, originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Ek to teri aawaaz yaad aayegi
teri kahi hoi har baat yaad aayegi
din dhal jaayega raat yaad aayegi
har lamha pehli mulaqaat yaad aayegi
kabhi hasti kabhi roti kabhi muskurati
ye zindgi tere bin bhi kat jaayegi..
par kuch kami isme bhi to reh jayegi
dil ko tadpayegi kabhi tarsayegi
har lamha teri yaad aayegi
teri kahi hoi har baat yaad aayegi...


Some stuff I found online... It sets you thinking as to why would one end up having such a sad poem ? After all is it not that there is nothing really irreplacable in this life anyway. I mean it all depends on how you convince yourself to the relative importance of things. Which leaves us with a thought that all percieved important things are congruent. And the list of all percieved important things is very easily modified...

Or is it that the trancendental and not-very-reasonable aspects of life is what makes it so absorbing ? Is it so that we have poetry, art, freedom ... love ?

I will end with a "whatever" (as she would say) ...

:)

update : I happend to read this after a few hours of writing it. Such utter crap. Tells you what is possible with all you have on your mind for several weeks is just request-handlers, apache2, ab2, requests/sec, load size, memory leakage, thread-safety, concurrency, beer, intermittent sleep, smokes, two chicks, bad stomach, seks ...

Happy birthday dude.

Happy birthday dude., originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Happy birthday dude.

Naka

Evening of Lukkhagiri at the Naka after a long time ...


bekhabar se kahi ja raahi thi
baanjari nadi
lehera ke modo ke jaise
balkha rahi thi nadi

soocha, main hoon samundar
jaa ke uuse choo liya
kehke wo dur kho gayi vaadiyo mein
tu ne ye kya kiya

- silk route (tu wo nahi)

Gloriously drunk and happy.

Gloriously drunk and happy., originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Gloriously drunk and happy.

Sumedh and Steffi. Outside the marriage

Sumedh and Steffi. Outside the marriage, originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Sumedh and Steffi.



Outside the marriage registration office.

Contemplation.

Contemplation., originally uploaded by quasi's mobile.

Contemplation.