Kolhapuri Misal

Kaustubh took the whole responsibility of arranging Kolhapur picnic. He has stayed in Kolhapur so he knows all the places very well. Saurabh, kaustubh's friend, who is also from Kolhapur made it easy for Kaustubh to arrange the things. Here onwards I won't refer Saurabh as Kaustubh's friend as it will be wrong to call him only Kaustubh's friend. He joined us as Kaustubh's friend four five months back in Shrivardhan picnic and since then he has become a confirmed member of our picnic group.

We had option of 3 long weekends to choose for and finally we decided on last weekend of 

September. Unfortunately our group has dispersed now. Some of the people have moved to other companies so we were only 9 members for the picnic. Kaustubh, Vinayak, Deepa, Atul(for a change he was with us, after his marriage he has stopped coming to picnics), Saurabh from Pune and Pravin, Pratima, Ranjana and me from Mumbai.

We reached Kolhapur early in the morning and took auto to reach our hotel which is very close to Mahalaxmi temple. We had 3 days to roam around. We got ready quickly and we were set for the first rocking day in Kolhapur. We had hired a car: Sumo.

 As everyone was hungry, we went to a small tapari type restaurant nearby. 

I had a misal as usual and we left to Jyotiba temple. It is situated on a beautiful hill calledJyotibacha dongar. We just heard that it was raining heavily in Mumbai and Pune but the weather in Kolhapur was fantastic. It was completely surrounded by clouds and we were experiencing a cold breeze. I love cold. We parked the car and went to Jyotiba mandir. It was not at all crowded so we took darshan of all gods comfortably :). We wanted to spend some time on the hill and enjoy the weather, so while coming back, we just stopped there. We clicked some snaps too. 

Our next location was Panhala fort. I was very much excited to see the fort. It has a huge history behind it. The history of bravery that motivates to die for the nation. The history of pain that brings tears to eyes. The history of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj and his spirited mavale. 

In 1660 when Siddhi Johar attacked Maratha Empire, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj intentionally latched himself in siege to Panhala  laid by Siddhi Johar to keep him busy at Panhala and let the rest of the Empire be safe. The fort had capacity of feeding the army of Shivaji Maharaj for 3 years. But the siege continued for more that 3 months so Shivaji Maharaj put a high risk plan into action on a full moon night. Shiva Kashid who had physical resemblance with Shivaji Maharaj, dressed like Shivaji Maharaj and got himself captured to divert Siddhi Johar's attention. As expected Siddhi Johar killed Shiva Kashid when he found that he had been fooled and started chasing real Shivaji. Meanwhile Shivaji Maharaj fled to Vishal gadh with a small force lead by Baji Prabhu. As Sidhhi Johar's force was very close, Baji Prabhu forced Shivaji Maharaj to leave for Vishal gadh while he was fighting with a very huge army of Siddhi Johar. It was not easy to climb Vishal gadh as it was already under siege and Shivaji Maharaj had to defeat Bijapuri Sardar to reach Vishal gadh. Baji Prabhu continued his fight with his few men for almost two days despite serious injuries and inspired his men to fight against all odds. Baji Prabhu let himself die only after Shivaji Maharaj's safe journey to Vishal gadh was signaled by 3 cannon volleys. Ghodkhind, the place where Baji Prabhu and his men sacrificed their lives for the Maratha Empire was named as Pavankhind(Holy pass).

On reaching Panhala, we hired a guide who took us through every place properly and bombardedus with a lot of history.   Among many places Sajja Kothi was very special. Sambhaji Maharaj, son of Shivaji Maharaj, was imprisoned(najar-kaid) here. 

Then we visited 3 huge warehouses which were used to keep food grains. The size of these warehouses is just un-believable and the mechanism to fill in grains and empty it back is commendable. The guide told us the story of a lady named Ganga. The fort Panhala was developed by King Bhoj in around 12th century. After so many failed attempts to build a particular wall, he consulted an astrologer to know what the problem was. The astrologer advised him to sacrifice a pregnant woman to ensure the wall is built up successfully. A lady named Ganga (teli by profession) came up to sacrifice her life. In return she asked the king to take care of her two daughters: Jamuna and Saraswati. She also asked the King to do something so that the world would remember her. After Ganga's sacrifice the wall was successfully built. As promised the King took care of her daughters, got them married and also offered them good wealth. He also named 3 warehouses after Ganga, Jamuna and Saraswati. The hindi phrase "Kaha raja Bhoj, kaha Gangu teli" must have been originated here. This is the story as told by the guide.Now it was time for lunch.

We had already placed an order 1 hour back so we didn't have to wait much. It was a good lunch. 
We had Kolhapuri special Pandhara Rassa (white gravy) and Tambada Rassa (Red gravy) too. They taste fantastic. After lunch, we spent some time in the restaurant enjoying cool breeze again.

After lunch we went to Tabak garden. It is full of trees. Wherever we went that day, we were enjoying cold weather. It is not so big garden but you can spend some time there. It was almost 5 when we left Panhala fort. 

Our next stop was Rankala lake which is in the city. By the time we reached Rankala, it was already dark. We walked for some time on the bank of the lake. We spent some time there eating Pani puri, Paav Bhaji, Kulfi etc. It was too early to have dinner that time so we decided to go to room and get fresh. After refreshing we went to Mahalxmi temple. We didn't go inside the temple as it was in the itinerary of the last day. The setup of the temple is such that one can see the goddess from the gate of the temple also. When it was around 10 pm we decided to have dinner. We were too late to get any restaurant this late in Kolhapur. After a big search we managed to find a restaurant that served snacks. After coming back to room we played cards before sleeping. I spent the whole day in pain as my left shoulder had developed a boil. 

Next day started with rain. We were afraid that the rain would spoil the plan completely. Though it was raining very heavily in Mumbai and Pune, rain here was comparatively very less. We had a plan to visit Bahubali temple, Narsobachi wadi (place of LordDatta) and Kanheri math. We left for Narsobachi wadi after having breakfast. Bahubali temple is on the way to Narsobachi wadi but we were not sure whether to visit Bahubali temple first or not. After some travel the rain stopped so we decided to visitBahubali temple and then go to Narsobachi wadi.

The temple is place to see. It has a big idol of lord Bahubali.  Around the idol there are models of other places of lord Bahubali. Many Rushis (monks) have achieved Moksha (Spiritual liberation) from these places. These models also show count of monks who have achieved Moksha. We noticed few followers of lord Bahubali who were completely naked. Near this temple there is one more temple which has shape of a ship. We saw it from outside only as were running out of time.

It took us another half an hour to reach Narsobachi wadi. The temple is not very crowded that made it easy to take darshan. We spent some time in mandir. After buying prasad, we went to a restaurant. Ranjana and I were on fast so decided to have lunch and skip dinner as we were treating the lunch as prasad. 

After an hour journey back to Kolhapur we arrived at Kanheri math. This is a place of Siddhatek Maharaj. There is a Shankar mandir which looks too old but beautiful. There is a hall which has an idol of Siddhatek Maharaj (I guess). This is a nice place for meditation. I didnt do meditation but spent 20 mins inside the hall. Outside the temple there are two huge models of elephants. There is a mammoth idol of lord Shankar just in front of the math with Nandi (Bull). Kaustubh mentioned that there was a good museum in the math. Surrounding of the math is not less than a museum. Before entering into the museum we did shopping. I bought two sarees for my mother. When we came out of the shop it was almost dark. Nobody had enthusiasm to go in the museum except kaustubh, Pratima, Ranjana and me. Others had to regret. The museum starts with a long tunnel. 

On every 2 meters there are statues of ancientRushis (monks) including Vyas, Kanad, Gargi etc. There is also information on their contribution to the world. Unfortunately we were not allowed camera. Inside the museum, there are lots of models of people depicting life of every profession of rural life. The models are so realistic that sometimes we were wondering whether these were real people or what. We thought that we should have come much before in the museum so that we could have seen them properly in light. The people who didnt come inside missed something that they wont see anywhere. Museum staff told us that they were not yet done with all the models. What we saw was just 40% of the planned work. It means if we go there after 2 years, we will need a full day to see the whole museum.

Before going for the dinner we went to Saurabh's place. His mother treated us with Kande pohe. Unfortunately Ranjana and me could not eat it as we were on fast. :(.  Saurabh and his brother are great musicians. They play various instruments including Guitar, Sitar, Keyboard etc. We asked them to play some tune for us. He played "Duba duba" on guitar and we all were singing. It was a fantastic experience. Then he played Dilruba, which he had just started learning. we all were lost in the tunes of the instrument. Finally Saurabh and his brother together played few songs on Guitar and Keyboard. Everybody was enjoying the music and nobody wanted to leave the place. But finally we had to take a leave as we knew that if we get late we would not get dinner. After the dinner we arrived at home and started playing cards again. I spent another day with pain due to a boil on my left shoulder. Next day's plan was Mahalaxmi temple, Dudhganga dam and city palace.

We left for Mahalaxmi temple as and when we got ready as the temple was very close to our room. Recently I visited so many famous temples. But everywhere there is a lot of mess. Most of the temples are not clean and are  full of beggars. But this is an exception. It was very clean and i didnt see a single beggar. The queue was very well managed. The temple is very beautiful and stood on hundreds of pillars. It was marvelously decorated from inside with flowers. It didnt take us too long to reach inside the temple. 

Before leaving for Dudhganga dam, we had breakfast. Dudhganga dam is quite far from Kolhapur city. The road is also not good so it took us almost 3 hours to reach. The dam is very huge. As the place was open, wind was rocking and almost pushing us. Photography is not allowed there to protect it from terrorism. Atul wanted to see turbines, which are not functional, but they didnt allow us to go near turbines. Anyways we didnt enough have time. 

We had lunch on the way back. After another 3 hours journey we were back in the city to see the city palace. The palace is now a museum; obviously. You can see various things used by kings including their general accessories. You can also see different weapons possessed by those kings. Specialty of the palace is, it has live models of all the animals hunted by the kings. All the models are made using skin and horns of the animals. The models are recreated so brilliantly that they look like real animals. There is one garden near the palace which has peacocks and stags. 

It was almost 7 pm and we had to quickly come back to room, take our bags and go to station to catch our train back to Mumbai. Bye bye Kolhapur.....

Atul's marriage in Latur

It was RAC 1 when I checked it last time before leaving the office at 6:15 pm and the chart was not prepared. I thought it was too late and i had to settle with RAC 1. When I reached Dadar I asked Ranju to check the PNR status again and the good news was that it was confirmed as B1/49. "Thank god I don’t have to spend the whole night sitting", i thought. Train reached on time and i jumped into B1. I thought i made a mistake as it was AC coach. I again checked if it was really B1, but it was B1 only. How can I get my seat in AC when I had booked sleeper class ticket!I didn’t want to spend 3 rupees on sms that’s why i called up Ranju again and asked her to recheck. But it was B1/49 only. I had no option but to check PNR status on sms. No luck it was B1/49. I thought there must be some error in the software so decided to wait for TC. We do believe that softwares have bugs. :) Meanwhile I just thought of going to seat no. 49 and check who was there. There were 3 elderly looking people sitting. Just to confirm again I asked them if their seat number is 49 or something else. As i thought they were allotted seat number 49, they showed me their ticket also. Then it was clear to me that there is definitely some goof up. First I thought if Ranju has booked ticket for 25 June or for some other day. I checked the ticket and found that I was wrong in doubting her. I started making my mind to spend the whole night sitting some where in the train.

Then came the TC and gave me the most pleasant surprising news that i had been allotted seat number 49 in AC and the people sitting there had to move to other coach as their booking had been upgraded. I could not believe that these things happen in India. Somebody has rightly said "Bade bade deshonme aisi chhoti chhoti baate hoti rehti hai!" But it was not a small thing for me.
I was actually traveling in AC coach with sleeper coach ticket. Really a big thing for me. Pravin had taken parcel so that we can eat properly in the train. As I could not join them in their bogie leaving my bag all alone, Devidas came and gave me my bag which had Tripple Chicken Shejvan rice, my favorite Chinese dish. It was very delicious, I enjoyed it a lot. I was getting a royal treatment that day!.

I was actually going to Atul's marriage which was on 26 June 09. What a day he selected. 26! It was on Friday, he intentionally kept it on Friday so that his friends can attend the marriage. The plans for travel were already going on one month before the marriage. Kaustubh, Pravin, Devidas, Mehul, Gurdeep, Vinayak and Vinayakee (Deepa) had decided to attend the marriage. They had decided to spend the weekend in Latur visiting Akkalkot, Tulajapur and Chakur. Kaustubh was taking care of all the logistics. I confirmed myself just 5 days before and that’s why I got tickets in waiting list for both onward and return journey.

Train reached Latur at 7:30 am as per schedule. Atul had already arranged a car for us which took us to his aunt’s hospital. No.. no… nobody was sick or injured but we were supposed to stay in the hospital. They had made sure that no patient was admitted for 2, 3 days so that all the guests can comfortably spend 2 days. We quickly got ready in an hour and took 2 autos to reach the hall which was in the city.

We started having breakfast; no need to say we were hungry. Atul was all set to go to Hanuman mandir which is just 10 minutes walking distance away from the hall. But it took us half an hour to go and another half an hour to come back. Atul was sitting on a horse and we all were dancing in front of him on the tunes of a local band. When we reached the mandir, Atul was not allowed to set his feet on the ground. His mama (maternal uncle) while going and his elder brother while coming back picked him up. All were so happy and enthusiastic that we saw them, the whole day, doing similar things which looked funny sometimes. We didn’t waste the chance of clicking some photographs around the mandir. While coming back somebody asked Atul to dance and without any hesitation he started dancing as if he was just waiting for somebody to ask him for dancing. It’s quite unusual that the groom dances in his own marriage.

When we came back to the hall, a Purohit was already waiting for Atul to start the marriage ritual. The bride and the groom both are Maharastrian but the marriage was being done in north Indian fashion. Thanks to the Purohit who was taking all sort of promises from Atul and Anjali. He was also giving some gyan to the couple so that they spend their life together happily. It was all funny that no one including mothers and fathers of the bride and the groom was able to hide laugh. On one occasion he asked Atul to bend. Atul thought it is one of the rituals and bent down. The Purohit announced then that on a normal occasion he would not have bent but he bent just for Anjali. He dint forget to add “Jhukati hai duniya, jhukane wala chahiye!” The hall packed of people burst out into a laugh.

Initially when we entered into the hall it was not full. Since one side of the hall was relatively full, we all boys sat in the other side. Soon the hall started getting full. It was too late to realize that the other was for ladies. We were completely surrounding by ladies from all side and we started feeling embarrassed. Finally the Mangalashtaka started and at the end of it the bride and the groom got ready to garland each other. But it was still not easy as Atul’s friends picked up Atul so high that Anjali could not reach him to garland. It would have been a defeat for Anjali’s family if she failed to reach him so they also picked up Anjali. Finally both garlanded each other. This is the moment when the bride and the groom turn into wife and husband.

Somebody announced to proceed for lunch and we went downstairs for a buffet lunch. It was full chaotic situation but we managed to enjoy the lunch. It was time for reception and we decided to go and meet Atul and Anjali on the stage. We were not carrying his marriage gift there as it would have been difficult for him to carry it back to Mumbai where they will be staying. We tried to arrange for a bouquet but we didn’t find it anywhere. Anyway it doesn’t matter. We went on the stage and clicked a couple of photographs with the newly married couple. Here comes the real fun. Atul is known among his friends for troubling badly newly married couple on their marriage. He always carries a small dairy milk chocolate and asks the bride to hold it in her mouth. Now the groom has to snatch half of it in front of the whole crowd. You can imagine how embarrassing it will be for them. So his college friends decided to return it back with enough interest. For him it would not be a chocolate, it would be a piece of khadi sakhar (rock candy). Anjali hesitated initially but there would not be an escape for both as his friends were not ready to spare him. Finally like a brave man, Atul managed to break the piece of khadi sakhar, which Anjali was holding in her teeth, into two pieces. One was in Anjali’s mouth and other was in Atul’s mouth. They had to show it to everybody as a proof!

It was 2:30 by that time so we decided to go back to the hospital and rest for some time. We took rest till 6 pm and again joined them in barat. They had arranged for a DJ. This is the first time I saw DJ in barat. We all danced like crazy for 2 to 3 hours on the tunes of dhinchak songs which included mostly Hindi and Marathi dance numbers, Marathi koli songs and few Telgu songs too. I don’t know the words of Telgu songs but the tunes are still playing in my mind; contact Deepa to know the words. Mehul, who is a Gujju, was doing Garba on every song. He didn’t even leave Telgu songs for that. When we came at Atul’s home, knowing these are final moments of dancing, we danced in full swing. This time we didn’t spare Anjali also. This is the first time I saw a bride dancing in her own marriage.

Just before the dinner we sat together in hall with Atul and Anjali where. They were forced to play few games. We call it a tradition. One of the games includes hiding a ring in a pot full of red color water. Then they have to search the ring, whoever finds it, wins. Atul won it two times while Anjali once. Another game involved Atul holding a Supari (betelnum) in his two fingers and Anjali could use her both hands to snatch it from him. She did it easily. Second part of it was, Anjali enclosing a supari in her palms and Atul needed to remove it using only 2 fingers. So bad huh….this is not fair. Atul took time but managed to do it. Some of us started wondering if it was match fixing. We came to know it later that he used his nails to make it possible. There is a ritual in Hindus that every lady has to take name of her husband in a poem. Atul and Anjali both were prepared and easily took names of each other. Old ladies sitting there made sure every married lady does the same. One of the best was “Marutichya mandirat udbatticha suvas, **** chya tondala bear cha vaas.” Ladies sitting there forced married men to take names of their wives. Now it was turn of all bachelors. I was horrified by the idea so I silently left the room. But it was not at all difficult for them to know that I had left. They forced me to come back. Some bachelors sitting there made poems on the spot to take names of their dash dash. Some of the poems were so stupid that you can’t even call them poems. This one was narrated by Atul’s elder bother. “Aaj aahe India ani West indies chi match. Dash dash che naav gheto Atul, Anjali chya lagnachya divshi!”. Pravin too made a poem on the spot: “Chalu aahe pandharichi vaari and mi shodhato aahe bayko bhaari!” By the time my turn came it was too late and all decided to have dinner. Thank god! We had dinner and enjoyed first innings of India and WI match where India scored 300 odd runs. We went back to the hospital and had a nice sleep. We were supposed to go to Akkalkot and Tulajapur the next day.

Vinayak arrived in the hospital early in the morning. When they reached I was still sleeping. They could not join us yesterday for marriage as they joined their respective new companies very recently and didn’t get a leave. I was the last one to wake up but I got ready ahead of everyone. I still had some time before everyone could get ready so I decided to continue reading “Paths of Glory”, a novel by Jeffery Archer on mountaineering. It’s quite exciting to read it. It was 9:30 am by the time everyone got ready. Atul had invited us for breakfast so we went to Atul’s home which 10 minutes walking distance away from the hospital. It was Saturday so I had fast and I could not have anything there. We left for Akkalkot, which is around 150 kms away from Latur, at 11 am. Kaustubh, who had left us yesterday after marriage to visit his relatives in Solapur, joined us on the way.

We reached Akkalkot at around 1:45 pm. We decided to have maha-prasad, for which we had to stand in queue for one hour. We can at least stand in queue for one hour to get maha-prasad. I decided to break fast by taking lunch and then not to have dinner. They have, not so great, but decent arrangement for maha-prasad where more that 500 people can have maha-prasad together. I had almost started having maha-prasad when I heard them announcing that we needed to remember Shri Swami Samarth and then have maha-prasad together. The maha-prasad was tasty. We decided to make some donations for maha-prasad. My donation of Rs 100 was nothing in front of mammoth donations of Rs 10,000 by some people. Then we went for Darshan of Swami. We spent some time there before leaving. I bought a couple of CDs for Baba. I won a bet of a sugarcane juice against Vinayak and Kaustubh where they were claiming that the song being played there is sung by Kartiki and not not by Mugdha (Sa Re Ga Ma Pa contestant). It took us few seconds to verify as the song was being shown on a TV. Before leaving Akkalkot we visited another mandir where Swami took Samadhi.

It was around 60 Kms Journey towards Latur to reach Tuljapur. We had to again stand in a queue for one hour for a couple of seconds Darshan of Tulja Bhavani. Neverthless it is worth. We took some snaps after the Darshan. It was almost 8 pm when we finally left for Latur. Before arriving at the hospital, we went to Hotel Eaden garden, which is quite away from the city, for dinner. Our cab driver refused to drop us back as it was already 10 pm. Fortunately Atul arranged for another cab. It was 12 am when we finally reached the hospital. We had good chat before going to bed. We had to explain Mehul the motive behind Atul’s snatching khadi sakhar from Anjali’s mouth. Deepa was quite reluctant to come to Chakur next day as she wanted to rest. But finally we agreed that we would leave for Chakur little late at around 11 am. I read some part of “Paths of Glory” again before going to sleep.

As usual I was the last person to wake up but not the last person to get ready. Without wasting time I got ready within 30 minutes as I wanted to ready the novel before we leave for Chakur. While I was getting ready, all other had gone outside to have tea. They also brought morning snacks. So one problem was solved. There was still some time left before the cab came so we utilized that time enjoying taking snaps in the hospital garden. This is not just a hospital; it is also home of Atul’s aunt.

It was almost 12 when we left for Chakur which is 40 Km away from Latur. It took us hardly one hour to reach there as the road is pretty decent. The atmosphere was ideal. The sun was hiding behind the clouds and still it was not raining. When we reached there, we realized that the place is worth coming all the way from Mumbai. Its is newly made temple of various gods. The temple is on a hill and takes shape of Pindi. It has enough space to sit and spend hours peacefully. The main temple is surrounded by many small temples of Lord Ganpati, Kartik, Godess Parvati, Gayatri and other gods. There is small artificial lake in front of the temple with many ducks swimming inside. We spotted few tortoises too. We took enough time to click photographs but we could not manage to fit the whole temple in one snap.

Near the temple there is an amusement park and also a Water Park. For the Water Park you have to pay Rs 215 and for the amusement park the entry fee is only Rs 35, but you need to pay separately at each play station if you decide to enjoy it. It was almost 2:30 pm and we needed lunch badly. We didnt have much expectation, we simply needed something to fill the stomach. It took some time for food to arrive; meanwhile we spent time clicking photographs. Finally when lunch arrived, we were surprised by the taste. It was delicious! I was expecting few of us to sleep after the lunch but we had become kids the moment we saw toy train. Though most of us travel in train every day, we were excited as if we have seen a train first time in our life. It was a small round in the train but still we enjoyed it clicking photographs. We spent a lot of time playing dashing car and gun shooting before we finally decided to sit for a while. We had to leave by 5:15 pm to ensure we reach back Latur on time to catch 9:30 train. Obviously we felt we should have spent more time sitting there.

We reached Latur in an hour after we left Chakur. I had a bath to feel fresh. When everybody had left to have tea outside, I remained with Archit, who was sleeping, and enjoyed reading the novel. Archit and me is an unbelievable combination, one who has been in any of our picnics will know why. Archit, the son of Vinayak and Deepa, is just 7 years old. Though when you meet him for the first time you will think that he is the most innocent guy on the planet, you will soon realize he is not. He is very naughty and will do exactly opposite of what you say. In one of the picnics, I gave him a scold stare for some reason and since then he is very much scared of me. Though I want to, I try not to be friend with him so that I can control him. The last night, as usual he was making a lot of noise, accidentally came into my room. It was very unfortunate for him and he soon realized his mistake when I asked him to sleep there. He had no option but to sleep. For five minutes he kept his eyes closed waiting somebody to come for his rescue. Though his eyes were closed I could easily see movement inside his eyes. Poor boy! Finally Deepa came and asked him to brush the teeth. That’s all he needed; He quickly jumped from the bed.

We reached Latur station 15 minutes before the scheduled departure of the train. The trip was excellent except only one thing to worry about for me. My seat was not confirmed. It was RAC 14 this time. I was hoping for some miracle like last time but this time the luck was not with me. To make it worse another 2 passengers were sharing a seat with me. However TC told that at around 12:30 we might get seat. As usual we all enjoyed dinner in the train which we had carried from Latur city. I spent some time, after the dinner, reading the novel before somebody switched off the lights. As he said, TC gave me a seat at around 11:30. I was happy as it would not have been possible to stay awake in the office the next day. But there was a small problem; a person was already sleeping there. When TC asked him to leave the seat, he claimed that he was a PSI at Osmanabad and should be given proper treatment. But TC was not ready and asked him to go to a general bogie. While I was sleeping there, that person was still sitting there for half an hour. I finally decided to take on with him. But fortunately he left the place before I could say anything. The journey was very good as I slept peacefully.
I have a plan in my mind to take Aai and Baba to Akkalkot and Tuljapur and also to Chakur. Let’s see when we go there. All the best to me. :)

Back to pavilion on Mahashivratri

This is the first time I am writing for any blog. I am not a good writer but I still want to write. I am sure you won’t find it exciting but I just wonder how interesting it will be for me to read after 10 years from now. I am damn sure I will enjoy reading it.

Let me try writing about a small trip to my native, Mochemad for mahashivratri. This year it was on 22nd February. We have a Giroba (actually Mahadev) temple in our village. This is swayambhu which means the Ling (Pindi) has emerged on its own through ground. I may be wrong here. So on the occasion of Mahashivratri almost everyone, no matter where they work, comes back home for a couple of days. Typically people gather in the temple at night. At around 11 pm Rath (chariot) starts and completes a Pradakshina (rotation) around the temple. The Rath carries the god Giroba and interestingly different gods appear there but in the bodies of few selected people. I don’t expect you to believe it :)

We caught the bus at Vashi and as usual the bus was around 1.5 hrs late. Suman my sister was coming with me. I was in the bus and was already dreaming about what I would be doing next 3 days. First of all I need to visit Varad and Viniya. Varad and Viniya are kids of my eldest sister Bai and are 7 and 3 years old respectively. They are upset with me because I didn’t go to their birthdays. They are too young to be upset for such reasons but they are. :) So I decided this time that I would surely go to Ozari: a small village in Goa where they stay. Then I had to go to Kerim: my mama's place. And of course I wanted to play a lot of cricket all 3 days. If I don’t get to play cricket its all waste for me. I was hoping that our team had advanced to next round in Wayangani's cricket tournament. But the first news i heard when i reached was we were out in the first round only. :(

I suffered a lot in the bus as it was very cold in the night and I had to give my wind cheater to Suman because as usual she had not carried anything for her. The bus was very late and finally we reached home at 11:30 in the morning. Fortunately I had booked a bus which goes via Vengurla.

I decided to go to Keri the very first day: Saturday. I wanted to come back before 4:30 so that I ccould play cricket. So I left for Keri at 2:30 only. After changing her decision 100 times, Suman finally decided to come with me. I was excited to go to Keri as it is very beautiful place and I was meeting Kunal, Vishal, and Dattaraj: my mama's kids. I just wanted to see how they look in the jeans and T shirt which I got for Kunal and Vishal. The jeans and T shirt were fitting well on both so I was happy. I could not buy anything for Dattaraj and so I promised him that when I come next time, I would get him something. He asked for a school bag so I will get a school bag for him. Promise. :)
While leaving, we went to Aajoba's temple which is just on the beach. An amazing place.

I reached home just before 5; I was on time and was happy because of that. Missing even 5 minutes of cricket would have been disappointing. Now next challenge was to take few guys to beach to play cricket. Three four years back this would not be a problem. These days they don’t play cricket rather they spend their evening playing cards. Disappointing for Shyam, Santosh and me. Politics has divided our team Daryavardi into two parts. Once it was the strongest team in that area. The team doesn’t play together anymore. Anyway this can’t stop us from playing cricket. We had already played a trick in the morning. Knowing tjis is the only way, we challenged the guys to beat us: Shyam, Santosh, Satish bhai and me. Rs 500 was the bet amount. You know it’s insulting for them if we beat them as we don’t play cricket much these days and they think they are the lords of the rings.

We start playing cricket on the beach. Initially only few guys turn up but later when we have around 15/16 players we decide to play a match. Can you believe we beat them? Nobody took it so seriously as the whole team was not present. We need to play a better trick tomorrow to get everybody on the ground (I mean beach) .

Bai invited me for lunch; she had planned to cook my favorite dish: chicken. Varad and Viniya were already waiting for us since yesterday. Suman and me left for Ozari at 9 in the morning. Viniya was so happy that finally we were at her new home. We spent a lot of time playing with Viniya and Varad. The lunch was very delicious. Viniya wanted to come with us. I was quite reluctant as she is just 3 and she would miss her mom in the night. But Viniya was not ready to listen. We had no option but to take her with us.

Now it was time for cricket again. So we challenged them again, "even if players from both the teams play together, you cant beat us". The trick worked. Mohan, Jaggi, Satya all big players of Daryavardi turnd up. We have enough players today at the beginning only so we decide to directly play a match. I told Santosh, Shyam and Satish bhai that we need to have a match of maximum possible overs. These days they play matches of 4 or 6 overs. So they generally go after the bowlers. And we are traditionally Rahul Dravids and Laxmns so if we play a match of 4 overs, we will surely lose. Everyone agrees with me. So we decide to play a match of 8 overs.

We win the toss and elect to bat. Who cares about the result of the match, we just wanted to play cricket. But the opponents were damn serious about the match. After all it was matter of their pride. He he he... We start very well; I go for the batting at number four and we put a descent score of 80 runs. Considering our batting style, 80 runs were too much more than our capacity especially against regular bowlers. They were not at all worried about 80 runs as they had to face bowlers like Santosh, Satish bhai and me. And they don’t think we are good bowlers by any angle. They begin the chase quite confidently but lose some wickets intermittently. We drop few catches as we don’t have regular players in our teams. But still we manage to come to a stage where they need 10 runs from 6 balls. Thanks to good bowling performance by Santosh, Satish Bhai and me. I happen to be the bowler. Normally this would have been easy but this time we have Jaggi in front of us and he is known pinch hitter of the area. As expected Jaggi hits me to a six and so they just need 4 runs now. I remove Jaggi on the next ball only. A big wicket! They get one more run and need 3 runs from 3 balls now. I bowl this delivery properly and ball goes to the third man. A good fielder would have definitely had a run out wicket for us. But unfortunately we have Satish (not Satish bhai) on the third man. Who runs after the ball making sure the mobile in his hand doesn’t fall down. Oops we give them 2 runs. Now the match is almost over for us and they level the score and they need just 1 run from 2 ball.

I bowl the ball on the off stump. This happens to be a dot ball. I ask Satish to throw his mobile if ball comes his way. I bowl the ball again on the off stump and to our surprise it was a dot ball. Can you imagine we don’t lose the match against a very strong team? So what if we don’t win the match. Its a great achievement. Heeeeeeeeeeeeee ..........

We still have some sunlight left so we decide to have one more match. But this time it was just 3 overs. They bat first and score 36 runs. We started chase and don’t make enough runs in the first over. When I come to bat we had almost lost the match. Still I decide to give a try. Afterall there was nothing to lose. I hit few fours and sixes. I got out in the third over. We finally needed 6 runs on the last ball. Shyam was on strike. Nobody can expect a six from Shyam. Once he had hit a six and he waved his bat as if he scored a century. So hitting six is near to impossible for Shyam. I thought, if he gets the ball on half alley, he can do something. And yes he gets the ball just under his bat the way I was hoping. He applies all the force he has....but they catch him on long on....they start celebrating. We console each other saying 3 overs match is not our cup of tea. Suddenly, Pandu, a guy from our team start shouting "This is not a catch". We go to the boundary and find that, the fielder has actually touched the boundary line. Can you believe...We win the match....heeeeeeeeeeee But nobody from their team accepts this. Who cares :) A typical gully cricket....I mean beach cricket!

I was in the mandir the whole night and enjoyed a lot there. I was back home at 3 in the morning. Next day I woke the very late. Quite obvious. I was supposed to leave for Mumbai in the evening. As usual there was problem with the return ticket. I had booked tickets of Matsyagandha because of its late timing. It arrives kudal at 10 in night so I thought I could play cricket one more day. But unfortunately the tickets were not confirmed till 10 in the morning. So I booked bus tickets worth Rs 700.

Suman and I then went to Redi for Ganpati. This is very famous Ganpati temple. The Ganpati idol was found under the ground in 70s and since then the place is very famous.

While I was having lunch, I got an sms from Ranjana that the train tickets have confirmed. What to do now....I immediately went to Vengurla to cancel the bus tickets. As expected the agent was not ready to cancel. Finally he was ready and I had to pay Rs 200 as cancellation charges. Too bad... :( but no matter I was happy because I would go by train so I could sleep and more importantly I could play cricket in the evening.

As Shyam had already left for Mumbai, we didn’t have enough players to play over arm cricket on beach today. So we played under arm cricket.
Finally it was time to leave for Mumbai. We reached station at 9 and the train was 30 mins late L. No problem, anyway I didn’t want to reach Mumbai very early in the morning. I had a very good sleep in the train planning when to come back again next time. I did almost everything as planned. Just could not do one thing. I had promised Ranjana that I would meet her on Saturday. She wanted to show me Navnath temple in Kudal. But sorry Ranjana, some other time….Promise :)