Recently my classmate and a friend of mine, Nachammai (fondly known as Nach) invited me out of the blue for a trek to the Guthereyan hills near Hosur. Taking a break from running due to my ankle injury, shin splint, and acute gout, I pounced on this opportunity like a starving guy on a thalapakatti biryani. 

Initially I ignored the COVID 2nd wave that was looming large, but as time progressed my worries were largely focused not cancelling the trip and safely entering and exiting Tamil Nadu the neighboring state. But things start to go out of control when the Karnataka state government imposed section 144 from 2200 to 0600 in the morning. From our North Bangalore house it was not possible to start at 0600 and still reach at 0730 so were left us with no choice but to stay the previous night in the sprawling house of Nach. 

The forest guards in the Aiyur eco tourism park had earlier agreed to organize the trek for a group of 10. Nach had gone to lengths to get the members, 3 from hers, 3 of mine, a runner classmate of ours, and 4 more from her township. Kannan, Nach's husband wanted to start the trek at around 0700, before the scorching heat from the early summer sun. Back calculating we had to leave the house at 0500.

Our runner classmate, Raj-Mohan, a protestant turned spiritual and yoga guru, married with 2 kids could not bring them as one of them was 7 months old and the other 7 years old. Difficult for a 600m ascent. The plan was for all us to stay the previous night at Nach's place, sleep early, wake up at 0415 and leave at 0500. But his guy shows up at 1015, had his dinner at 1800 and was a bit hungry and started savoring the Chettinad style curd rice, followed by a chat till 2300. I was both tensed and sleepy. But meeting him in person after 21 years meant that I actually enjoyed the small talk, but at 2315 timed out and went to sleep.

My 13 year old son who sleeps by himself these days had to sleep with us in the same king sized bed. These days he sleeps late, it seems and could not sleep but trying hard to. The poor chap was constantly changing position which woke me up from my REM sleep at least 3 times which meant that I was getting a mild ache. But managed to calm him down and went to sleep when my wife woke up with congested trachea and started complaining of some kind of breathing difficulty and chest pain. Head ache increased, but was careful in attending to her. Made her wear my Garmin and checked the HR which was at 90. It was so bad I was just short of calling the ambulance. All this drama ended at around 1230, and exhausted I crashed after that. I slept but had to wake up as sometimes the teen was all over me, and sometimes I was checking on my wife, if she is breathing. But all this ended at 0400 when I got up.

Normally I do not shower before a trek as I always thought showering takes out some useful energy, but this time I showered to just wake-me-up. Not a fan of milk tea but Kannan's early morning milk tea helped. I do not know to drive a car, not that I want to, meant we have a great driver. I planned to sleep all the way to the Aiyur camp. We started off in 3 cars shared our live locations but the constant back and forth communication kept me busy. But when I saw the breathtaking sunrise from inside the car I was spellbound. At these times I do not even think of taking out my camera, though Raj in our front seat clicked a few. Without sleeping at all in the car I had woken up completely.

We reached Aiyur camp at 0700, and were assigned 2 guides, Parthiban and Surya. While the former is a trained Forest Guard employed by the state government in its permanent roles, the later is a contract employee from the local village who I later learnt is also a snake charmer. On this day we had 2 groups, our group of 11, and another young group of 6 who I learnt trek almost every other week all around India. It was lead my a ultra-marathoner. But for the time being both the groups started together.

The ranger had arranged the breakfast, we got bread-jam-egg and about 25L of water. Each one of us carried a pack of bread, a jar of jam, and some eggs, filled our water bottles and setoff. The trek, was real, it started off from Kodakarai, a 20 min drive from Aiyur eco park. We started through a village alley where it is difficult for a motor bike, or even a normal cycle to venture. The place itself had a character on its own, the idyllic people, houses connected to each another is some odd jig-saw puzzled shape, the long horned cows, the less littered paths, and everything. The ascent was steep from the word go. Some of the 1st time trekkers were caught off guard with their Velcro walking shoes. While Parthiban was carefully guiding us with a smiling face, Surya had taken off with the younger and faster 6. Cows grazed what looked like dried grass, not from paddy cultivation the normal grass that had dried up in summer. The cows were tall, thin yet looked sturdy and looked back straight into our eyes when we tried to look at them. It was probably just a feeling when the guide mentioned that sometimes they attack. They are probably Kangayam or Hallikar, not sure.

Nach had mentioned about a seasoned trekker lady, Anjali who marched ahead of all of us with Parthiban, while we all followed with the group of beginners who had questionable fitness too. The 1st ascent was steep and blew the breath of many, but by then we had covered only 600M of the total 6KM, and about 50M in ascent of the total 600M. I could see that many were already visibly giving up. Throughout our ride we saw patches of the forest burned down, it looked like wild fires due to summer, but the weather was not so hot for wild fires and something was fishy. It's just Probably my ignorance.

After the 1st brief ascent, we snapped a lot of photos, the entire group, then ladies only, followed by kids only, solo, and what not. I could see at least most of us had the energy to do this, or the other way around we got energized from the photos. We continued towards the next milestone. It was a lake in the middle of the forest where the elephants might come to drink water. The water was a bit dirty, yet filled with fish. We had covered only 1.6KM. I wanted to cover at least half the distance of 3KM before the breakfast, but hungry kids forced our first stop to eat the bread. The bread was filled with tutti frutti, which we mistook for algae and fungus. After-all who would add sweet bits to breakfast bread. The jam had to be scooped out with our fingers as we had no spoons. But then Raj's bread had "real" fungus in a slice, which Parthiban vouched was cream. On a normal day we would have thrown the whole loaf away, but with less options inside the forest we threw only the slice and ate the rest.

Bread, Jam, Egg, Banana, and some packed croissants energized the team. Parthiban had breakfast with us. Most of the members were vegetarian and the non vegetarians had to finish off the hard boiled eggs. They did not complain though. We threw bio-degradable garbage while we carefully packed all forms of plastics. Reflecting on this now, I think we should have packed the bio-degradable ones too.

We started off again, but I was clearly irked with the pace. This trek at this pace was no more challenging for me, it was more like a glorified walk inside the forest with my family and friends. So, I went with fast pacing younger group. The group had some funny characters, like a guy named Preetham who was wearing Khaki tops and trousers, and I mistook him for a guide. I should have thought about it, as he looked shabby and his fitness level did not suite a guide. The group had people who looked like North Indians, but spoke fluent Tamil. I walked with them, sweating, breathing heavily, watching every single step of mine and not looking up. Leaving the noisy crowd behind, I could hear my own breathing, every single bird chirps, and was just enjoying feeling as if the world was playing everything just for me. 

If this trek is in any guide book, this will not be part of the easy ones. The ascent was too steep without much plains for recovery. I was starting to worry about my wife and kid, whose water and pocari sweat bottles were with me. After some 2KM of steep ascent we reached a rocky peak. The view was just breathtaking. I just sat down with the group of 6 and just enjoying myself and the view. The young group members were clicking snaps, and I joined the party too, felt a bit younger. But after a few minutes secluded myself to a corner of the peak and looked into the green valley in front of me. It was probably wilderness, it would have contained a lot of wild life, human beings, and what not, but it was now in front of me, completely within my sight. I felt a sense of pride, control and probably a sliver of arrogance that I am in control. When I was fighting this thought, the beauty of mother nature brought back peace. At this point I could see Raj coming along with Anjali. From about 80 or so meters away he snapped a few photos with his DSLR.

Both Raj and Anjali joined me in the peak, and suddenly the tranquility was taken over by ecstatic and noisy trekkers. It was time for me to descend. At this moment Parthiban showed up with the others. He broke the bad news that the actual peak was about 4KM away. My tired body was sad while my excited heart was happy to take up the remaining challenge. Along with the young group I started towards the next ascent through the thorny bushes. They scratched and bobbled out the sports t-shirt so bad that it cannot be used anymore.

But surprise struck when we reached the destined peak in another 300M, and Parthiban declared that it was the actual peak. It seems that his 4KM more story was to give all of us a pleasant surprise. The ladies were happy, but I missed the 3.7KM, and even contemplated descending and ascending again. But now, the team sat around Sadhguru Rajmohan who was giving a mountain peak lecture on religion. They were talking about pranic healing, some ritual, I remembered something called "sri vidhya", because it sounded like a beautiful Indian actress. I remember that my dad liked her too. The sermon continued for about 30minutes with all the ladies surrounding Raj and shooting questions which he was answering like a living encyclopedia. I was visibly bored, sensing this the members of the group resorted to group photos.

I was raring to go back did not know why. Probably just wanted to move away from this boredom or just wanted to keep myself moving. I was surprised to see that Parthiban buying time to take some more rest, in fact he had removed his shoes. Seeing me just roaming around, the team started the descent. As in any trek if the ascent is tough, the descent will be tougher. The slippery fallen leaves made things a bit tricky, many members including my wife fell and twisted their ankles. Lucky for me I just slipped 2 times but managed just to steady myself and did not fall.

We were walking back fast, at twice the pace, partly because we wanted the pain to end and partly because we wanted to drink some cold water. The increased walking pace meant we slipped more than usual. When we were walking, the leader of the young group Kali was trail running. After about 30 minutes hike we reached the breakfast-lake. The kids started throwing stones at the lake. I shamelessly joined them and in fact fared better. After sometime we got bored and waited for the others in the group to join. They joined us after about 30 minutes. I learnt that my wife had fallen twice and once twisted her ankle. She had brought the spray for the sprain, but was visibly limping.

As any normal husband I left her behind and started my final descent of what I thought was 1.6KM, but we took a different route from the lake and missed the path multiple times and reached back the car after walking for more than 2.5KM.

Again I waited near the car for another 1 hour before all the members reached back. I was sleeping in a thinnai of a villagers house, and also had time to feed the dog with the left over of the breakfast bread. I washed my face with the water from a nearby tank. The water was sweet very different from the water we use, which is pumped out from 1000 feet below the earth. After this we reached Aiyur camp and had our lunch. The simple vegetarian lunch was so delicious for the hungry tummies. We deserved the food.

After the food, 4 members of the group left, while the rest relaxed in the dining area. Suddenly the forest guard showed up and told us that there is an elephant near the lake. We rushed in our cars and were graced with the following photo. The elephant was graceful, relaxed, and had all the time in the world, yet healthy and probably even rich. It was moving at elephants pace :-). It was very different to witness this in real life. We were thrilled.

After this we wanted to drink panner soda, but just did not have enough energy to search for one and buy. We just left and returned home. The 90 minutes drive was filled a painful body and a joyous heart. Thanks to Nach, it was a Sunday well spent.

Family trekking to Daimonji-Yama

The company that I work for, ROHM, organizes trekking twice, during spring and autumn. During spring, Shanthi and Anto stayed back assuming that the trekking course would be difficult for our little Anto, while I trekked with my colleagues. But in spring it was no trekking but just walking, along the Kamogawa, to the takaragaike-park near the kokusai-kaikan. It was such a dull experience that I did not take out my camera once. Yes not even once. In the end the company provided subsidized packed lunch with beer and snacks, which we had to eat out in the cold-windy-day.

Many of my colleagues who trekked along with me wanted to meet Shanthi and Anto. So, when the autumn trekking was announced for Daimonji-yama, I signed up for Shanthi, Anto and me, immediately. I had read about this trekking trail in some of my friend Jeff’s posts. After I signed up, the leader of the trekking-club expressed his worries that it would be difficult for my 4.9 years old Anto, and also to the inexperienced Shanthi, who had never climbed a mountain in her entire life.

So, as a precursor to the trekking club’s event, Shanthi, Anto and me attempted to climb Daimonji-yama. A day after the tiring Sunday full of sporting events at Anto’s Kindergarten, we started out early in the morning toward Kinkakuji. I had seen the Japanese kanji “大” in the mountain near this temple and assumed it to be the “Daimonji”. When I landed in Kinkakuji, full of energy, I found out that the trekking course was near the similar sounding temple Ginkakuji. I lost half of my energy at that point. Around 4 years back, I planned to take Shanthi and Anto to Kinkakuji and took them Ginkakuji, by mistake. Anyway we took a direct bus from Kinkakuji to Ginkakuji, and in due course lost an hour.

We reached the Ginkakuji-michi bus stop, and immediately started our climb. It was kind of tricky to find the right way till the mountain trail, and we kept asking people around us till we reached the trail. Anto and Shanthi were full of energy. It was around 1115, and we started our climb just forgetting our lunch.

Anto was carrying his jacket and snacks in his own bag, which was kind of cute. We climbed along the trail, which was crowded. We soon came across Anto’s class mate, which made me think that this trail is popular among Kyoto-ites.

Anto posing with full of energy, while Shanthi had lost more than half of her health-points. Till half-way it was mostly mud stairs followed stone stairs. Note: It seems that the stone stairs was built by my colleagues father.

After climbing this never-ending-stairs we reached a place which we thought was the goal. With Kyoto in the background we took a lot of snaps one of which is our family photo.

Anto was given a lot of “funny” poses … which made me think that he has grown-up a bit ;-)

Soon we learnt that this spot was just the mid-point and we had to climb for another 30 minutes to reach the top. At this point, Solomon still retained all his health points, while Shanthi had lost all hers, and I started feeling hungry.

Solomon tried hard to pump-out energy from this stone for Shanthi and me, which refreshed both of us ;-). From this point on it was just climbing-climbing-followed by more climbing. But first came this steep-yet-narrow-dirty-stairs.

After climbing these mad and narrow stairs and walking we had to do some more rough climbing. I thought this is the first time for Shanthi, she was both frightened and exhausted, while Anto continued to try pumping out energy from the rocks for Shanthi.

45 minutes after leaving the mid-point we made it to the top, where we accidently ran over a colleague of mine. He also came along with his 4 year old kid.

This is Anto gazing at Kyoto. If you see carefully you can see the Kyoto tower in this snap. Actually my colleague shot a few snaps of our whole family here which was awfully off-focus. It was around 1315 when we reached the top. We were slow, but we made it, with my yet to be 5 kid putting an end to the worries to the trekking-club leader.

Oh wait! but we have to get down which is equally tricky as climbing.  We initially thought of descending towards Yamashina, but after finding that there were not many going in that direction, we decided to take the same route that we ascended. We were hungry which drove us to walk faster, and Anto was continuously slipping, which made me put away my camera and I took his hand. We walked-walked and we reached the foot at around 1500. Solomon still had enough health-points to play around.

I had always wanted to trek with Shanthi, and when I found that Solomon was enjoying climbing, I was very happy. In fact I was a bit proud that he walked this trail without any fuss.

But here comes the best part, I told him that we will taking the same course next week along with my colleagues. And he answered, “During this trek I had enjoyed fully, and so next week we can try something else”. I think he is correct, climbing twice is no fun. So … I have decided to trek to some other place .. hopefully Atago-san.

Solomon starts school

Its May, 2011, 5 months passed by without any blog, despite many blog-able events. I have been waiting for more than a month to just dispel the procrastination and sum-up all my energy to compose this post …

On 2011AD, April, 9th, Saturday, Antony Solomon Britto s/o Edward Victor Britto, started school. My friends Shin and Jeff accepted our invitation and snapped almost all the unforgettable moments. Anto, as we are used to calling him at home, and Solomon as many of my Japanese friends know him, was not nervous. In fact he looked very cute in his over-sized school uniform.

The school, hmnn… the kindergarten, that Solomon will be attending is one of the popular private Kindergarten's around. We wanted Solomon to attend a good school as most of the parents would want. Living in Japan, and not knowing the intricacies of schooling, we just took things easily. We just wanted Solomon to mingle with the local community and so initially we thought any school would do. Being a staunch catholic, my wife wanted Solomon to attend a catholic kindergarten. We found one far away from our home, but did not really like it.

When Solomon was just over 2 years old, one of our well wishers, the Tani-family, took us to Senzan youchien, which literally means “Senzan Kindergarten”, located on the scenic mountains east of Kyoto. It was love at first site. First, it is located on a scenic mountain far away from the Kyoto traffic, noise and other pollutions …

 

But there was one problem, it was a Buddhist establishment, and they teach each one of the kids about lord Buddha and carrying a Buddhist version of rosary is also mandatory. Initially we did not like this idea. But then there were too many positives and after many long long discussions … we just told ourselves that this is the place that Solomon would be starting his long … academic career.

But then there was another problem, we learnt that getting admitted in the Kindergarten was not easy. So we inquired with many parents of kids who already attended Senzan, and talked to the Principal teacher, and many more people who would give us some information or the other.  There were many drawbacks, the first one, both me and my wife are not fluent in Japanese, Solomon too … And then I do not have a permanent job in Kyoto, so my transfer is due any time. Anyway, it did not happen for the past 3 years … So on the day of application we went a lot lot earlier than everybody and waited outside. I had diligently filled out the application form in Japanese by myself. And we breathed a sigh of relief when we received the admit card a couple of weeks later.

I dressed in my only suite, with Shanthi and attended an Interview in the Kindergarten. Solomon was smart on that day, and we passed the interview with ease. He easily differentiated a small square from a bigger one, a lengthy pole from a shorter one, and drew a circle and the interview (children’s aptitude test) was over. Actually he knew to draw only a circle, and was asked to draw one. He was lucky. We were relived and was a bit proud of him. He did not cry and was at ease with everybody, a character passed on from my DNA.

Unlike India, in Japan, schools start on Saturday, enabling parents to attend the starting ceremony without taking a day off. So, on the 9th April, we were dressed in formals, Japanese style, which means we were dressed in black. Solomon in his school uniform.

As he woke earlier than his usual waking up time of 9AM, Solomon looked a bit tired, but somehow he was coping up. He looked happy on our way. Our Japanese father, who runs this flower shop, took us to Senzan in his car.

Most of the Kindergartens in Japan allow kids to attend classes well before they join, so my wife and Solomon visited Senzan every Thursday and so he was used to many of the, what I can say rules. As most of the building have wooden flooring we need to either change shoes or remove our shoes for some special slippers.

My friend and tennis coach Shin, snapped many of the photos along with Jeff, so all credits to them.

The picture of Solomon inside my mind did not really catch up with the speed of his growth. He was already starting his school. I was overwhelmed, with a sense of responsibility, which had come as a flash. I did not even imagine that it would be this big. I looked at other kids, and many of their fathers busy shooting their kids with video-cameras. I was clearly confused, and trying to smile all times.

Solomon was led inside his class-room, where only one guardian was allowed, so I had to come out, while I was chatting with Jeff, Shin had managed to sneak inside the class and took some snaps. そろもん is the Japanese character for Solomon, and you can see this in his chair, shoe stand and desk.

After some briefing inside the classroom, where they introduced the class-teacher and the kids, they distributed the school diary, Buddhist rosary, and repeated the instructions for the umpteenth time. While all the kids were sitting diligently, Solomon, tired of sitting in a place started playing.

And after I forced him to sit in his seat he starting playing with the kids around him. In all he was not sitting in a place and by far the naughtiest in his class. As usual I was a bit worried.

 

After the classroom session, the kids and parents were made to sit for a long lecture, which Solomon and the other kids would not understand. It was obvious that my wife did not understand, while I did not listen.

After this the senior kids of the Kindergarten performed some kind of prayer, with flowers and things like that … I could not see it, but Shin had snapped this photo.

Shin followed Solomon to all the places, to the point that he followed him to the toilet ;-) …

After all the formalities there was a group photo session. Solomon did not want to Stand in the usual line and wanted to sit with his mother. As foreigners we always get some (special) treatment, and here too, the principal gave away her seat for Shanthi.

We have a special rapport with the principal who we guess played a big part in our admission, we snapped a photo with her,

We also snapped some photos with Shin and Jeff. The tall one is Jeff and other one is Shin and here is one of them.

We also snapped a family photo under the cherry blossoms … we will cherish this photo for a lifetime I guess …

We did not directly return home as we were hungry, so we ate Pasta and Pizza, and went to hana-pot to take a snap with our Japanese parents ;) and also took a snap with the Tanis who were instrumental in Solomon joining Senzan …

 

Solomon got a wonderful cake from hana-pot, and we ate it on the next day … In the cake, there is a Patrol car which Solomon likes very much. It is written, “Riromon, Nyuen shiki omedetou” , Riromon is a mistake, I think it should be Solomon.

Solomon looked a lot smarter on the actual first day of school. I will write a lot more about his first few days at school later.

 

Galaxy in a river …

    My office is in Shiga, a 15 minutes walk from Kusatsu railway station. There is a small river called "Kusatsu-gawa" which flows over the railway line, yes, it's not a typo, this river actually is over the railway line. Though, I have never actual water flow, I thought it was for some kind of flood-prevention or something ... The dry river banks are adorned with "Cherry blossom trees" and it also has a newly-refurbished-jogging track" ...

    I guess the residents of Kusatsu were also bored with a dry river, and they probably wanted to fill it up with something ... On one fine day, when I was going to the office, I saw a group of people doing something inside the river, I presumed it to be some regular construction or some kind of maintenance work. What else can we assume if we see people working inside a not-so-happening-place.

    But in the evening while I was returning back home, I saw the following site …  a wonderful flow of candles. Yes 10,000 of them. It filled the whole river. What really amazed me was the time it would have taken to light it up. It was done manually by a group of volunteers. This shot was taken the next day, when I visited this place with Shanthi and Anto … 

    The following board says “7th lighting festival …”. I am working in this office for the 4th year now, and this is perhaps the first time I am seeing this. Probably, this is the first time it was made noticeable.

The following lights were made by some school going kids … wonderful …

   

    I was happy to see the river’s simulated flow. As with any other festival it was crowded, but not like the ones seen in Kyoto so it was manageable. I had ample space to set-up tripod ;-) …

Kudos Kusatsu …