My first century - 17th April 2010

Guys, I am not talking about Cricket here. Cycling is the sport.

I did my first 100 Km + cycling and that too on my 6 speed BSA Mach II (which is a highly relaible bike)

A recce for the Bangalore Bicycle Championships (BBCh) race to be held on 18th April 2010 was my intention (yeah... I know, I am not supposed to do such stupid things before the race day, but I had too much of energy and thought... why not)

I had to go running in the morning (training for Sunfeast 10K), but I never realised when I switched the alarm off ;) Finally got up at 6:45 as my kids never let me sleep beyond that (13 month old twin boys want to get up and play too). I had a lazy breakfast and finally started at 9:45 AM. As there was no one else coming with me, there was no pressure on the starting time. I was caught up by Arun (a new 'to be' cyclist) within 10 minutes of the start and had a hold up for 10 minutes explaining "Road Bikes Vs Mountain Bikes" and which dealer stores what bikes etc etc.

The initial 15Kms up to Hebbal flyover is a regular route to office for me. From there turned right on the Bellary road and went ahead and I turned left at the Doddaballapur junction and was asked to turn right at the police station, only to realise that I was back on bellary road... which was the correct way to go (last I went was as a kid, so no memories of the route for sure). I kept pedalling away and stopped for a Tender Coconut break near Olde Bangalore. Back on the saddle again, past the airport and I see Devanahalli and yet no sign of the turn to Nandi Hills. I can see the obscure shape of two huge mountains far ahead of me. I checked my Garmin, it said 38Kms and I was getting worried... "I have a race tomorrow and atleast 38 Kms to cycle back and considering doing the race route once, another 35 Kms atleast" and it was an amazing summer noon sun beating down on me.

I reached the turn to Nandi when my Garmin showed exactly 45 Kms. Started to Idli point and had another Tender Coconut stop. I was carrying about 3 litres of water of which atleast 1.5 Litres were already missing. I found the 8.5 Kms to idly point never ending and the little inclines was hitting me already. Then the left turn and some more incline. I was ready to hitch a ride, the only issue was that, there was nobody around to offer one. I was looking forward to the good descents that Sriram was talking about, but other than some small ones, nothing came. Then came the killer, it had been a long time since I had stopped and pushed my cycle, I did that for the second half of the incline and then went happily down the descent with a max speed of 55 Kmph and did not pedal until I hit the first double road hump at the Nandi Village. Stopped at a store to buy water and an Amul Buttermilk and back on the saddle again. The chain had come off only four times until now and thankfully there were no other problems.

I decided that I will take a Volvo from the airport stop. I stopped at Devanahalli for another Tender Coconut. 3pm, no lunch and wanting a break, I got off the bike to drink the cocnut water. The shop guy was telling another guy "I can bet anything you cannot ride this bike", they asked me for a ride and I obliged since it was my favorite Mach II ;). He tried for a few meters, another guy got him off and rode away and the shop guys were having a big laugh at the guy trying to ride. I said "who the hell is he" and in reply came, "Oh dont worry, he will come back". I waited for a few more minutes and no sign of my bike, I started fuminng and started walking in the direction of where this guy had cycled to. I see the chain has just continued and somebody else is now riding my bike another 300 meters down the road. I got furious and screamed at the guy. Back again on the bike, I cycled hard to hit the airport at 80 Kms odo and stood for some time. A few Volvo's went by and nobody thought I was fit to board the bus. I told myself... 80... why not a century and started off again. Hit the century at the Yelahanka Police station, stood at the bus stop, then sat down and then laid down for 2 minutes. No bus wanted to give a poor cyclist a drop, so, I said 100 up what the hell is another few kms going to do to me.

But the heat again took a toll and I was ready to give up by Hebbal. Stopped at a street orange juice vendor and had two glass full and stopped a bus, this time atleast he stopped. Driver was looking at me (oh the poor man looks half dead) and asking me where I wanted to go, but the conductor was incharge and told me clearly..."no cycles on board my bus please". 15 Kms left, I have done 110 already. let me finish it.

Cycled all the way back home with no further abnormal activity. People there thought, I am just about to go over the line with my head (bonkers). The first 1 hour was okay and the feeling of achieving the feat is satisfying, but overall the ride, in hindsight was good, but not enjoyable at all. But, what the heck, I want to do it again and do it right. Waiting for my Fuji Cross Pro :)

A visit to "The Windsor Castle", London

My first trip to the United Kingdom started off on the 19th of April, 2009, with the 1 hour 20 minutes British Airways flight BA307 landing at the London Heathrow airport, 5 minutes before schedule at 11:10 am. Immigration took another 20 minutes to clear. Ismail’s flight from Switzerland would land at 7:00 pm and I was free until then to visit Windsor (which was Ismail’s idea).

I had too much luggage to carry around on a small trip so, I left two bags at the ‘Left Baggage section’ (not my idea again) and boarded bus no. 77 from Terminal 5 and headed towards Windsor, which was to be my first city of visit in England. 30 minutes at the bus stand and another 45 minutes later I was getting off a bus on which I was the only £4 worth passenger. I had the entire Mercedes Benz bus to myself all the way.

I got off and walked a couple of hundred meters to come face to face with the massive walls of the fort known as the “Windsor Castle”.



A Horse drawn carriage immediately confronted me and there was Queen Victoria in the background. Once the carriage went by, I caught the Queen alone and got a picture of her



The flag flying high above the fort indicated that the Queen was in the Castle. As advised, I boarded the “Sight Seeing, Hop on and Hop off” tourist bus, where I met Mr. Bhatti, who was the driver of the bus. Since it was already 2:00 pm and my stomach was rumbling, I asked Mr. Bhatti the whereabouts of Indian food in that part of the city and he told me the many options that I could take.

The tour started and I got on top of the half open Double Decker to get clear pictures of the city and the Castle. I had to keep ducking through out the route though, to make sure that the overhanging trees didn’t get me off the bus. The trip took me around Windsor and Eton and I saw many monuments including the Eton College, where a lot of royalty once studied. The kids looked very smart in their designer suit uniforms. The bus stopped at a few places and I kept clicking away to get as many good pictures as I could. Check out a few pics of the beautiful cities Windsor and Eton, I am sure you will love them




These are plain houses - believe that!

A Chapel in Eton

A Street in Eton

What a sight, that's not paddy for sure!

The Thames river can be found almost everywhere in England :)

This is a train station



That's my house...


Once back from the city tour, which took about 30 minutes, I made my way to the Pizza Hut and ordered for a personal pan ‘vegetarian chilli’ pizza for lunch and a ‘Tiramisu’ for dessert. £10 later, I was at the entrance of the Castle,

where I picked up a fridge magnet of a picture of Windsor Castle (this is a habit I have picked up from Rekha and Arvind, who collect fridge magnets of all places they visit). I then bought my entrance ticket which saw me poorer by £15.50 and with a temporary wireless set, which would tell me all about the Castle.

The grounds are expansive and beautiful and very well maintained.

The grounds... what a sight

I was there inside too :)





This is the Chapel inside the Castle

Here, I got an opportunity to be photographed with the world famous Queen's guard.



The impressive sections inside for me, were the state apartments with all the residential chambers, collection of paintings, crockery, weapons, other artifacts and the Queen’s doll house (ohhh! that was mind blowing, only a queen can afford a doll house of this sort). But the most impressive were the paintings of Leonardo da Vinci. The collections were not only proper regular paintings, but also his notes etc. There was one detailed drawing of the anatomy of the human neck, the details were mind boggling. This reasserted the established fact that he was probably the best scientist of his time (and long after that as well). This section was also a no photo / video section, which was disappointing.


The State Apartments

I then made my way out of the Castle at 5:30 pm, after spending two and half hours exploring the beautiful monument and then set off to the beginning of the road which is the actual entrance to the Castle which was a good 3Km walk. With hardly any battery left in the camera, I managed to get a few pictures of the whole castle before the battery died completely.

Here are the pictures of the complete Castle, beauuutttiiifulllllll

Beautiful isn't it, was worth the walk

I did walk a long way

This should tell you the distance I walked

I then headed back to the bus stop and boarded 77 again to get back to London Heathrow, Terminal 5 . I reached back at 6:50 pm got by luggage back from the ‘Left Baggage section’ and waited for Mr. Ismail Sidat to arrive and take me to his home, which would be my base for the next couple of days.

These are a few more pictures of the magnificent castle for you to savour

The Queen's guard - alone









Cricket Match in the city, view from the Castle

Windsor city from inside the Castle

Another step in life

Parenthood is another dimension that life takes you into. 26th of February, 2009 was the day, when life decided it was time for me to step into that dimension.

Sandhya was due for delivering our twins into this world sometime during the first week of March. This was supposed to be confirmed by a scan to be done on 2nd of March, 2009. But life had other plans.

She messaged me a good night as usual at about 10:30pm and I fell into a deep sleep after that. Next I heard was my Dad at my door saying Sandhya has been admitted to hospital. All my sleep flew out of window, I was wide awake and ready to do anything, but what was to be my next option? My Dad told me that, Sandhya had called on her way that she was being admitted. I looked at my cell phone and got the detail of the proceedings after I had fallen asleep. She was unable to sleep at all and tried to sleep and not wake her mother up until 02:00am, after which she woke her mother up and got herself a cup of coffee.

But there was to be no respite and she called a family friend Raghavendra Agari, who immediately sent his brand new Swift with his driver (which is also the first time somebody else handled his car). His driver normally drives around transport vehicles and supposedly drove the car also similarly. During the drive,, she first called me, but I was in dreamland and did not hear a ring after which she called the residence number. After the agonizing drive, Sandhya reached Mangalore Nursing Home by 04:30am and I had just woken up around the same time.

Now was the time for logistics, how could I get there as soon as possible? Driving will take a minimum of 6 to 7 hours and those were the days of amazing roads on Shiradi Ghats. Knowing my style of driving, that option was strictly negated by my parents. Flight remains the only other option. By now I was resigned to the fact that the kids would be born (safely with all three mother and kids in good health) before I reach, so I checked when the next flight was. It was about 05:00am and Jet Airways said they have a flight at 07:50am.

With nothing to lose, I called Vikram (my brother in law) and asked him if he could book the ticket for me and gave him my credit card number. He said the flight was rescheduled to 08:50am, but he was unable to book on my credit card, so he gave me their phone banking number. I had in the meanwhile assuming the flight to be at 07:50am, had called for a cab, which arrived at 05:45am. I thought that instead of getting frustrated here, let me wait at the airport and book the ticket on my way.

Once inside the cab, I made the call to Jet Airways and to my surprise, the flight was at 07:50am and the reschedule had not been affected. For once I thought "fortunes are favouring me this time", because, on a normal day, I would have left late for a delayed flight. Before boarding the flight I called my mother in law to check on the status at the hospital. Sandhya was having delivery pain and at any moment the delivery was due. With more nerves, I boarded the flight and switched off the cell phone. The short journey of 45 minutes seemed so long.

I landed at the airport, switched my cell phone on immediately and called my mother in law. She told me that delivery had not yet happened and might happen anytime. I went in for a de-route from Bajpe Airport to Surathkal (where my father in law had gone back to get some more stuff) and then to planned to go to the hospital. Mom in law called in a few minutes saying the delivery may take time as a normal delivery had not happened after waiting for more than 6 hours and that a Cesarean will be performed, and that it would be better if I could come straight. The taxi driver took another route and drove like mad to get me to the hospital. Ran into the maternity section and checked with my mother in law. The operation was still in process. I sat down nervously. In five minutes the nurse called me in and I was greeted by Dr. Murali Keshava, Paediatrician, congratulating me on becoming a father of two boys. Both were on weighing scales, the elder (recognized by a band on his right arm) weighed 2.40 Kgs, while the younger one weighed 2.15 Kgs (which is supposedly very good weight for twins). I next checked on Sandhya's status and was told that they were still stitching her up after the operation.

I am now a proud Papa of two boys...