Fresh Dates
I’ve always thought of dates as a dry fruit, so when I saw this packet labelled ‘fresh dates’ on the shelf of the local grocery store, I had to pick it up.
Fresh Dates
As you’d expect, the dates of the fresh variety don’t taste at all like the dates of the shriveled, dried variety. But what was surprising was that they tasted like something familiar and yet something I couldn’t quite place. I’ve settled on a cross between India Jujube (ber, बेर, Ziziphus mauritiana) and Sugarcane for now.
Chasing Monsoon
Yet another visit to Coorg. A detailed travelogue will have to wait but this picture deserved a post of its own:
Chasing Monsoon
Why I love Bangalore/Bengaluru
The weather gadget on Mac informs:
And if you are in Delhi, well, I feel for you:
My IPL Loyalty Equations
Living without a TV and a newspaper has many merits. For instance, last year’s IPL was a non-event in our house. Yes, we did visit a Barista at Indira Nagar (now long closed) for catching the IPL opening ceremony on the telly, but that was it. Bangalore’s loss in the opener didn’t help either and I ended up backing up the team I felt least connected to - Rajasthan Royals (though only after they were decidedly close to winning - everybody loves a winner).
This year is different though. I’ve warmed up to the tournament, mostly because cricket is a large part of what I do now but partly because I seem to have arrived at a complex set of “loyalty” equations that help me chose which team I put my money on during a match. Without going into too many details, this is how it works:
Bangalore Royal Challengers (I live in Bangalore! And I admire Kumble and Dravid. And Kevin Pietersen is no longer in the team.) > Chennai Super Kings (I admire Dhoni. Muralitharan and I share birth dates) > Deccan Chargers (I am partial to everything south of Vindhyas) > Rajasthan Royals (Love the fact that Warne gives a lot of chances to inexperienced youngsters) > Delhi Daredevils (ah well, I was born in Delhi and that ought to count for something) > Mumbai Indians (Mostly because they’ve got Tendulkar and Jayasuriya) > Punjab Kings XI (someone’s gotta give company to Kolkata) = Kolkata Knight Riders (well someone’s got to be last).
The equations are devoid of even traces of cricketing knowledge (oh come on, it is 20-20) and chances are that the points table at the end of the tournament (with the exception of Kolkata) looks totally the opposite.
Munnar
After the visit to Bhutan last year, I was convinced that I was not going to see hills or mountains so green ever again. The hills at Munnar might lack the grandeur of Eastern Himalayas, but when it comes to verdure and biodiversity they are an equal match.
We took a flight from Bangalore to Cochin and then took a cab to Munnar. Though just a little over 150 km from the airport, it takes close to 4 hours to negotiate the serpentine, hilly roads. The roads were in good shape throughout but the numerous sharp turns left my head reeling.
Sharp turn
Cochin was hot and humid and I had no idea how things were supposed to get any better just under a couple of hundred kilometers up the road. But things changed remakrably fast and once we were in the hills the air turned cool and refreshing.
We stayed at the Tea Valley Resort. Our room offered beautiful views of the hills and tea plantations in the valley below. We had reached late in the afternoon and after a quick lunch, found ourselves longing for a siesta. The weather too was conspiring to put us to sleep. Shortly it started raining. The thunder and the sound of the rain formed a perfect backdrop for our slumber.
View from the resort
Beautiful dusk
Next morning was sunny but pleasantly cool. We went for a long walk all the way to the main town - a walk that took us through tea estates and cardamom plantations.
A path leading to a tea plantation and beyond
Random plantation
This scale for measuring the tea plants’ height reminded me of of the an Complan ad (“but I am growing mummy. I am a Complan tea plant”).
I am a Complan tea plant
With Lok Sabha elections around the corner, the town was abuzz with political activity. Posters of candidates vied for attention of both men and cows.
Canvassing
The rest of the stay is a blur in my mind. The next two days are clumped together and all I remember is more long walks in the hills, through the tea estates and short drives to a river and a waterfall near-by. The camera agrees:
Yet another tea plantation
A waterfall (barely)
Yet another short trip to Coorg
When we went to Coorg two weeks ago, we already knew that it was not going to be siginficantally cooler than Bangalore. And indeed, save for an occasionally misty early morning, it was every bit as warm and sunny as Bangalore gets in March. A few distant clouds were seen rolling over the hills, but they were unorganized mutinous soldiers and not the disciplined brigade it takes to start a downpour. Yet, they did manage to tinge the sunset with a bit of color and drama that the clear blue sky of all day long could hardly have managed alone.
A beautiful sunset that could be anywhere (but was at Coorg)
But what this visit stands out in our minds for is coffee blossoms. Given how unpredictable the rains have been in Coorg, a lot of coffee estate owners have taken to irrigating their plantations themselves. Since everyone follows their own schedule, there is no one day you on which you’ll see all the estates blossom. Apparently this year, it had rained just a week before our arrival and practically every single coffee plant was bedecked with beautiful white blossoms. It was our noses that pointed this out first to us - the breeze in Coorg was fragrant with the scent of coffee flowers. Our eyes took notice of the unending sea of white much later.
Now if you are thinking ‘coffee smell’ here (you know the sort you get when you brew filter coffee, or step into a Café Coffee Day/Barista/Starbucks outlet), you are mistaken! Coffee flowers don’t smell even remotely like coffee. In fact, if you were classifying the coffee plant based on the smell of its flowers alone, you’ll place it somewhere next to Jasmine. This I think makes discovery of coffee an even more remarkable feat!
Unfortunately, the blossom is short-lived. Within a day, the flowers begin to wilt and turn brown. As we drove back to Bangalore, it was hard not to feel sad at their decay. But we had the smug satisfaction of knowing that hundreds of tourists who’d throng Coorg a week later (a long weekend) would have no idea what they had missed.