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Related Post - Atrocity in a Metro City - Hyderabad   I haven’t had a decent cup of tea in a long time – the kind that refreshes you within seconds. Bhubaneswar has no dearth of tea stalls that do not shy in putting enough milk in the cup. However, the hot weather doesn’t allow one to drink as many cups of tea as one would have while living in Guwahati. After the third cup of the day, I feel nauseas. And when tea isn’t there to sweep you off your worries, everything else starts bothering you. When I first landed in the city last year in September I was impressed by how the cabs arrive just minutes after you’ve booked one, how the roads are free of potholes in the major parts of the city, how the highway helps me travel anywhere in twenty minutes even when I live a little outside of the main city. Perceptions do not take long to change and I am now often reminded of the quote in Sanskrit that says दूरस्थाः पर्वताः रम्याः – the hills look lovely but only from a ...

"You'll always be late for the previous train, a nd always on time for the next.”  ― Piet Hein I rejoice whenever I get a window seat on Indian trains whenever it’s a chair car (otherwise Upper Berth would be my spot), more so when it is the last seat near the door, usually marked 4. There’s always more legroom for those who get the last seat. The TTE (Train Ticket Examiner) sits in the same seat on the other column, marked 1, which feels quite safe for a single woman traveller. When I need to leave my seat for a short break, it’s the TT (in short for TTE) who would watch over my luggage. When I need to ask how delayed the train was, it was again the TT, my neighbour for the journey. However, sitting near the TT comes with other experiences too apart from the sense of security. There would be travellers without a ticket, looking for a vacant seat, who would sit on the TT’s seat itself pretending it’s theirs and later being laughed at, when busted. There would be peop...

If you’re someone who has traveled long distances holding the urge to pee and hence, doubtful of drinking another gulp of water, you’ll probably understand what I’m going to talk about. Every time the vehicle I’m traveling in gets a jerk because of the bumpy road, I fear I’ll get back to being the 5-year old who peed her pants in her sleep. If you’re a woman and traveling, here are some pee stories that may act as a caveat or a tip for your next journey. :-P Mumbai to Hyderabad I remember taking an overnight bus from Mumbai to Hyderabad which I had boarded at 8pm. By 11pm I knew I couldn’t sleep if I didn’t pee. I go to the driver and ask him to stop at a hotel I see ahead. He doesn’t. I stand near him for more than fifteen minutes asking him to stop because I had to pee but he just wouldn’t stop anywhere else but the dhaba he usually stops in. He would say we would reach there in ten minutes. I finally had to hold my pee for around two hours walking to and fro the ais...

My stories of sheer stupidity needs documenting. This one needs to be a blog post for when my memory wouldn’t remind me of the glorious night that kept from an epic trip to an epic failure within minutes, this post would always be there to remind me of my experience. It was all going well – as planned. I met Vibhor (Dhote) in the Zagreb Bus Terminal on an early morning to reach Plitvice by noon. Of course we had some trouble finding each other in the terminal because I had no internet connection and I went to the wrong shop at first, but my memory doesn’t aid me with those details for what entailed in the evening was far more chaotic. In a nutshell, we met each other just in time to catch the bus Dhote had booked. Yes, the credits of planning the trip goes to Dhote for I love it to just show up and go with the flow. I remember the previous evening at Zagreb, all I did was ask the hostel receptionist to tell me about the important spots, take a map from him and just walk whereve...

Five years back on this day I wrote my first ever blogpost. So, despite the fact that I haven’t written much after I returned to India from my Euro Trip, I decided to celebrate the 5 th anniversary of my blog with another blogpost. And although it’s been a month that I am back here, memories of Europe remain vividly etched on the canvas of my mind and I fail to not reminisce them every single day, every single night. Some of the questions I faced when I returned (and I still face sometimes) were about how much I spent on the trip, more so because I was the one who had managed to spoil three cellphones and one laptop during the trip. But besides these major damages there were minute disappearances that kept on happening with my trivial belongings. Surprisingly, I felt happier when I lost my clothing items since it implied that I had to carry less in my baggage during the rest of the trip. Here’s a list of items I lost during the Euro Trip and the places where I lost them bec...

I always thought it was to my disadvantage that I can never hold back my tears when I need to. I have cried in places I swear I wouldn’t. I am the person in a movie hall who cries whenever the protagonist is in a bad situation. I am the person who is going to cry when you tell her something bad about your own life. And if I don’t, in front of you, I am going to run to the washroom a little while later to let the tears flow, after patting my back for holding them for a while. Reminiscing the conversation and crying later just before sleeping is my thing to. I have lost the count of the times I have cried in the presence of someone I wouldn’t want to show my sensitive side to. But that’s me – 25 and still a crybaby in situations of frustration, anger and sadness, with no consideration to whoever is around me. I remember the time I cried in Venice in front of two guys I just met that day and two other guys I had known only from a couple of days. But that’s a story for another day;...

Photo taken at Plitvice National Park, Croatia by Vibhor Dhote Oh! What are these days I have found myself in! The bagpacks I carry no longer feel that heavy; What have they lost if not for a few coins, a few notes, some letters written long ago, a few locks, a few clothes? Or is it the loss of some fears, some shackles, some thoughts tied to their waist belts several years ago? Where is the fatigue? Where are the tears that drenched my pillow? Where is the inability to wake up early in the morning and the incessant desire to sleep forever? Today, every time I close my eyes, I need to type, I need to write. Where is the indolence, the procrastination, the lack of, as I would say whenever they ask, the "limited time"? What is this insouciance called? Where have eloped the eternal need for love, money and the things I've already sold? Why Plath has shut her eyes today whom I so deeply adored? Bukowski's Bluebird is set free now while Sahir's pleas ...

I am at Budapest now, in a safe and comfortable hostel, as I narrate my story of a few days back. Strange is this age when we think we are capable of experiencing all kinds of adventures. Maybe we are, when we leave matters at the hands of destiny, situations and have a strong belief that in the end all would be well. Or maybe we aren’t, maybe we just experience one fluke after another until the day the bank of chances will run out of serendipity. It was at Nice where I was supposed to spend the late hours of night; I had a train to catch at five in the morning and I reached Nice at around midnight. The time from midnight till dawn was supposed to be spent walking around the city – after all, why would a youngster give in to spending money and sleeping in a hostel just for some five hours? Europe has been a place of freedom for a woman like me. I can never imagine roaming around the streets of Gurgaon, where my college MDI is located, in the evening. Traveling around Delhi at nig...