Up Until Kolhapur

Girish behind me, and Ketan on the other bike.
Nice easy flow to the ride, it's early morning time. Hardly any traffic on the road, and now Ketan is in the front, and now I.
The road is smooth, empty, wide open and inviting.
And it is COLD!
Neither Ketan nor I are wearing gloves, and the fingers go cold, colder and numb. Up Katraj Ghat and down, beyond the last far-flung outposts of Pune, out into the open countryside, and mother of God it is cold.
Brrrrrrr.
I remember not being able to sing all the verses of "Oh Mere Dil Ke Chain".
Which has nothing to do with anything, but I remember it.
About an hour into the ride, we stop for a couple of swigs of Electral laden water, and Ketan has his first smoke of the day.
I may have touched upon this before on these pages, but let it be said once more.
On bike rides, a cigarette smoker is a wonderful animal to have. His craving for the cigarette ensures that you stop every now and then, and it also ensures that your stops are not longer than they should be. You have enough time to take a couple of swigs of water, loosen your limbs, look around and pee. By that time, bhaisaab (whomsoever the bhaisaab may be) has whittled down his cigarette to nothingness and had a couple of swigs of water himself.
Nod at each other and ride on. Ess, ess... ciggies are good things.
Beyond Shirwal, which is a town that is fabled for it's vada pavs. Beyond that part of the NH4 that is still two laned, and will be for eternity, a brief stop for some chai and bicuits, and ride on.
After the Katraj Ghat, which is not much of anything, really, the first major Ghat that hits you on the way to Goa is the Khambatki Ghat.
Long long ago, the Khambatki Ghat curved its narrow curvaceous way up the mountains and down again, a small two laned monstrosity that threatened all who dared make their tremuluous way up it's treachorous path.
Try saying that after chugging a pint.
But anyways, one day, Authority, no doubt having flirted with death by choosing to commute on the damned road, decided to do something about it. And Authority went and built a tunnel through the mountain.
So now, while going away from Pune, you have a nice long ride up the Ghat, with no threat of oncoming vehicles, and while going back to Pune, you have a lovely wide long tunnel that bores right through the mountain, the Lord be praised.
So up the mountain we went, and down the mountain we came, and we passed the bypass to go to Mahabaleshwar.
And then got screwed.
Authority, in one of it's many manifestations, had decided that the country should be connected, or at any rate, it's four metros should be, by roads that were truly world class in nature. So, Bombay was to be connected to Chennai (eventually) by a nice long four laned highway. All part of a Grand Plan that was called the Golden Quadrilateral.
But the GPtwctGQ, when under construction, was a PitA. A RPitA.
It had half built flyovers that no one could use. It had construction firms crawling all over it. It had little muddy by lanes going around the half built flyovers that every truck, lorry, van and bus in India was using. Along with two rather frustrated bikes.
But now what to do. You take the rough with the rougher.
And that is how Ketan and self rode on, with Girish hanging on to the rails for dear life, every now and then telling the Good Lord up there that Agnosticism and Atheism were for the crows. Now a burst of speed, and now a halt behind a line of vehicles. Now wide empty spaces and fourth gear and belt along, hell for leather. Now halt because a cow has blocked the excuse for a road.
On and on and on.
A small halt for some kulfi under the shade of an age old tree, and on and on again.
At around noon, we turned in to the town of Kolhapur. Into the Loksatta gates, and in search of a restaurant that would serve us some mutton.
Meeshtake. Beeg meeshtake.

P.S. Pain in the Ass. Royal Pain in the Ass. For those who were wondering.

Reunion Time at Gokhale, Peoples!

Boys and Dear Girls,

There be a reunion of all things glorious in Gokhale, in August, 2007. One knows not if one may be there, since one may be off to Amreeka, but one encourages all other numbers to turn up in numbers to make up the numbers.
If there be any Gokhaleites reading this, rush and hurry and run and get yourself registered.
If there be any non-Gokhaleites reading this, rush and hurry and run and tell all the Gokhaleites you know.
Cheers, All.

Regular Transmission Will Resume Shortly...

A splash in a puddle of water,
A boat in water let free,
A smile on my face that tells of glee,
Bring back my childhood to me.

Bags and canvas shoes and waterbottles,
Vada pavs and jam roti,
Muddy socks and bloody knees,
Bring back my childhood to me.

DD and Sunday morning cartoons,
Good ol' Disney and Mowgli,
Just two ruddy channels on my TV,
Bring back my childhood to me.

Homework and classwork and schoolwork,
Cricket when the clock strikes three,
Lapa chappi, langdi and lagori!
Bring back my childhood to me.

Units and terms and finals,
Three months of summer so free,
Tales of Shivaji and Noddy,
Bring back my childhood to me.

Adulthood and and all things damned,
That kid's a faint memory,
Help me smile again with glee,
Oh, bring back my childhood to me.

Looky Who's Here!

Leetle beet of a digression from the tale at hand, ladies and ledas.

A warm welcoming round of applause to the latest entrant into the blogosphere.

Beer drinker, buddy, biraadar.

And now a blogger.

Say hullo to GTya. Welcome, bhaisaab.

Day 1

Two motorcycles.
One Yamaha, one Splendor, both as ready as they were ever going to be. Given cash constraints, that is.
Clothes, check. CD player, borrowed from Binoy, check.
CD's, hurriedly written, check. First aid kit, check. Toolkit, check.
Spare headlamp, spare accelarator cable, spare clutch cable, check. Two bottles of water, kept in the refrigerator, Electral duly mixed in, check.
Dinner at Roopali done, petrol filled at the Bharat Petroluem pump, using the Petro Card - check.
All done, all ready to go, all bags packed, and the time is 11.30 p.m. We leave at 4 tomorrow morning. Check.
OK, g'night all.

You can't see the ceiling when the lights are off. You can see streaks of light slant across the wall, as they filter in through the window. You can see approaching headlights bounce off the wall, and you can hear the engine. You can hear people talking as they walk out of Good Luck - we were sleeping in Naani House that night. You can go over the checklist a million times, you can think of the drive, you can think of possible problems, contingencies, about the bike, about Descartes, about Knopfler, about bikini clad babes on beaches.

You cannot sleep. No matter what the bloody hell you do, you cannot sleep. You lie awake, thinking, fearing, wondering, counting sheep. But no sleep.

At two in the morning, out of sheer exhaustion, you finally doze off. Only to bolt upright with the alarm at four in the morning. The adrenalin flowing, you wake the others up and start to get ready. Only to realise that Ketan is fast asleep still.
Naturally.
Girish and I are ready and raring to go, but the Australian version of Santa Claus refuses to stir. You prod, you yell, you scream, you rant and you rave.
Tickling him worked.
Biraadar woke up, insisted on having a long drawn out bath - we were to find out later that he was puking in the bathroom, oh joy - and finally stepped out.
Girish was to sit behind me, and the bag that held our clothing was to sit behind Ketan.
Which was to be affixed to the Splendor using what are known as bungee cords. The point is, they are easily stretchable, easily hooked up, and they save you time.
So half an hour after we started tying the bag up, we were all set to go.
I took the Yam out of the house, Girish sat behind me. I started her up.
Ketan dragged his baby out of that little gate, and started her up.
One quick glance, raised eyebrows, slight grin.
Gallic shrug of the shoulders, and off we go.
Out of the small lane, past Maharashtra Bank, on to Lakdi Pool. Up Tilak Road, turn right and head off towards City Pride. Away and beyond, out of the city, past the truck lay byes, and hit Katraj Ghat.
Onwards, you Philistines.