Is this obsession with or what? In a series of Low-fat, Low-transfat, Low-Cholesterol, Low-Sugar, Low calorie, No-(added)MSG... these companies have gone a step ahead of their competitors. They have reduced Sodium in Sodium Chloride and call it healthy?
Seriously, is it even possible to have salt (NaCl) without Na? or with less Na? Or is it chlorinated salt? Can they not leave something as simple as salt alone?
I was perplexed with this chemical mystery. Some searching on the Internet showed that for some people, it is sometimes good to avoid Sodium in their diet - and salt is half sodium any way. So, they replace NaCl with some other "salts", that taste like salt but is not salt (NaCl). The effects of these alternatives are yet to be seen though. It is the illusion of being "in control" that these companies are exploiting. That's it.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Fitness obsession?
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
"Charities are experiencing the toughest year"
This is totally true. 2009 was tough. 2010 does not look promising either.
"Charity" is considered as an optional-nice-to-have expenditure by all corporates and individuals. Needless to say, it becomes the first casualty of any frugality drive - either at home or corporate or global level (countries giving money through UN).
Frankly, $20 mil is too less for the size of Google. But I do assume that it is in addition to what it is already doing... via google.org $20 mil is just an additional Christmas gift. Hope it is true.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Why lacking conviction is sometimes good?
In China, the powerless (Tibetian theocracy) dealt oppression with Gandhian non-violence. Whether they had any other choice is left for the historians to dissect. But Gandhian non-violence makes some basic assumptions - the oppressor has a conscience, the oppressor cares for his image in international politics. Attaining moral high ground was in itself the greatest weapon. for the oppressed. Unfortunately in this case, neither assumptions hold. Result: total failure.
In Srilanka, the powerless (Lankan Tamil) cornered themselves in the north and carved their own territory and exercised their God given right to equality. In guise of exercising their right, they violated the the Lankan right of national sovereignty. Perhaps, this was situation for which Gandhian non-violence was a tailor made solution. A democratically elected government was there. There was tamil representation in the electoral process. Yet, things got out of hand. There powerless we quite resourceful too... and hence became powerful in their own back yard. There started a new problem with in the bigger problem. The LTTE (the new powerful) estranged themselves from the common tamilian (still powerless). There are two powerful groups fighting against each other while the real powerless suffers. Result: total failure.
In Pakistan, the 3 groups of people are the cunning, the stupid and the intelligent. The cunning are running the government (and hence powerful) and intelligent are all in jail (physically or ideologically). Those who are neither counted as cunning nor as intelligent form the biggest group - the stupid who are stupid enough to repeatedly vote the cunning (either this one or that one) into power. They (the stupid - technically oppressed) have chosen the path of indifference to deal with their problems. They don't care if their own go hungry as long as they can see Indians in trouble. The rogues (the cunning) have managed to evoke such strong emotions among the stupid. Result: laughable failure
In most of Africa, there is very less differentiating the oppressor and the oppressed. In the grand scheme of things (world wide), they are both oppressed. The rest of world (developed world) is looting the continent of its resources with out it even realizing it. Immediate annihilation of perceived enemy tops the agenda of every warlord - leading to frequent violence, stagnant development. If every body involved just step back about 200 years and find reasons for their present state - they would all unite against the common enemy. The industrial world. Instead, their solutions (or even approach towards it) have always been short sighted and shows evidence of tunnel vision. Result: Pitiable failure
Putting that in perspective... in India, we have all sorts of problems - small ones. But none of those problems have grown out of proportion. We have all the makings of a colossal screw up. Yet, we do not fail. We are one of the success stories of recent times. One reason I can think of for this failure to fail is the lack of conviction. Indian rogues lack the conviction to do substantial evil and thank GOD (everybody's) for that.
Monday, March 16, 2009
NTSE / NMMS results - Karnataka - held on November, 2008
The NTSE (National Talent Search Examination) results for the state level exam held in the month of November, 2008 are out. Finally!! These pertain to students from 8th standard only.
DSERT keeps the best interest of students in mind. However, they are exhibiting acute "once bitten - twice shy" syndrome. Here goes the possibel (wink wink) explanation:
The cut off marks for this year's state level NTSE exam was 119. There are a handful of students who appeared for NMMS that have scored more than that. It makes good sense in order to provide them with most opportunities to be allowed to write national level NTSE exam also. So far so good.
If the students who sat for NMMS and got better marks also qualify for interview and get the NTSE national level scholarship - well and good. But if not, then they have to fall back on the 4 year NMMS scholarship amouting to Rs 24,000/-. Other students who get through only state level NTSE get approximately Rs 4800/- as scholarship over the period of 2 years. Hence the fall back mechanism is good.
Problem now is, untill the NTSE final results are out DSERT will not know the exact people who have to be given NMMS scholarship in each district. Hence the long wait.
Possible solutions:
Declare result for the rest - If lets say a district has a NMMS quota of 200 and 5 students have qualified to write national level NTSE, then declare result for teh rest 195 - say results of 5 people are pending. If 2 of those 5 go on to get NTSE notional level scholarship, then at that time announce results for the remaining 3 and 2 more students (who will be pleasantly surprised).
But I guess, the DSERT does not have confidence in its staff to pull out such a mechanism without goofing it up some where. If it goofs up the results it will be bad PR. Hence they are taking the safe route of doing everything at once... albiet very late.
No need to worry about amount:
AFAIK, the arrears scholarships will be given. No need to worry that if the results are delayed, you will get lesser amount.
PS: Keeping fingers crossed so that Mr Veerappa Moily gets HRD and not the other guy with white hair.
DSERT claims that the NMMS results are finally dispatched the respective BEOs. Please check ASAP. However, the grape wine suggests that any body who got 36 marks in GMAT and SAT - all get the scholarship. Still, only 780-odd students qualify. While, the allotted scholarship for Karnataka is about 4 times that number. As ever, only successful students are intimated of the result - another BAD practice of DSERT.
The main reason for this poor show by Karnataka was the "out-of-sylabus" questions that came in the SAT paper. ~15 of them. These account to 16% of the marks. Hence, IMHO, the passing marks should be 20 and not 36. This exam was supposed to help the rural students - However, it has precisely avoided doing so.
Possible measures parents/head-masters can/should take:
1. File a RTI at DSERT to know the exact marks their child has got.
Cost: Rs 10/-
3. File another RTI to know exactly how many more scholarships are going waste this year.
Cost: Rs 10/-
2. If the marks >30 and Number of scholarships pending > number granted - then file a writ petition @ High Court of India requesting DSERT to remove the "out-of-syllabus" questions from the valuation so that the 40% pass-marks should be calculated only on the remaining questions.
Cost: I have no idea.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
May you live in interesting times
It is an old Chinese saying... never able to categorize it - a curse or a blessing?
I always felt nothing much is happening in India since Emergency. Perhaps my ignorance of the situation in Punjab and Kashmir in the 80s and 90s makes me make this statement. There was this economic boom of late 90s... An occasional riot - an Ayodhya, a Godhra, a Singur, a Kandhamal... Regular scams - be it fodder, coffins or petrol pumps. We have won two cricket world cups, couple of medals at Olympics (bronze mostly). There is the mobile phone revolution. Satellite TV brought the world into our living rooms. Yet, it is still not interesting enough. There has been nothing that has captured the attention of our entire country. Even IPL failed to a get a decent response from the Incredible North East. Even after all these prosperity, it is not interesting... I do not have even one story that I can narrate to my grand-son.
We are so deprived of interesting things that our news channels today are obsessed with interesting things rumored to be happening in neighboring democratic state of Pakistan. It seems it is really getting interesting there. The Honorable President (erstwhile Mr 10%) is out of the country visiting the only country US fears in the whole Arab world - Iran (for a change, the fear may be reasonable). Doing what?
The Chief of Army (who happens to be the ISI chief. Some say he is retired... But I don't buy it.) meets the Prime Minister and secretly tells him that the Honorable President is plotting to remove him from government. Just like the way he removed most of the judges. All the judges and lawyers (Gosh, I never knew Pakistan has so many of them) have united (really, lawyers can stick together) and are siding with the opposition leader and marching to the capital.
Men in camouflage (read: army) have been reported to have fenced the capital with barbed wire. The present judiciary (he he, a joke) issues warrants against the only philanthropist in Pakistan, who is now gone into hiding. Those poor cancer patients would be wishing their grandfather had never got out of the attic in Amritsar 62 years ago.
In the mean while, somebody advises the Honorable President not to come back home for security reasons. TV channels report that the adviser is none other than The Chief of Army. (you slimy double crosser!!) The Honorable President follows every other Honorable President before him. Decides to enjoy the hospitality of the city of Dubai. I hear they have a indoor ski resort there... Even after much resistance the "Nero fiddling..." idiom comes to my head... Well then, Pakistan in spite of all the feudalism and warlords, is not much of a Rome any way. As if none of these happened, the Taliban are partying (in their own psychedelic way) in Swat Valley. Rave Party?
Across the ocean people in Langley and Arlington County are spending sleepless nights trying to figure out "Who is in charge of Pakistan?". Across the border though, Indian politicians are worried only about the upcoming elections. They perhaps know that Pakistan can wait until August to get India's attention. (yes, I know results of election will be out in May... I gave 3 months for the coalition drama to settle down)
In an unrelated incident, a man in Alabama, US went on a killing spree wiping out his entire family. This was not an single shoot out... he killed all his victims in different ways. Another teenager in Germany opened fire in a school killing 16. My analysis is that these are direct consequences of living in a boring country for too long. Guess what!!! The entire international media is covering these two boring random killings. In both cases, the killer is already apprehended or killed. Case closed. But this intriguing puzzle in Pakistan does not even appear on CNN's front page. So much so for East meets West.
PS: The Pakistan commentary my understanding of the situation from watching IBN live@7. Some fiction may have crept in. Believe at your own risk.
PPS: The only philanthropist is cricketer Imran Khan. He has built a cancer institute cum Hospital in loving memory of his mother - whom he lost to cancer.
Thursday, January 01, 2009
Day 7: Celebration Rally
By 4:00 PM all riders had reached Jnana Bharati. The environment below fig tree had turned euphoric. A small party had started automatically. Drinks on the house - Tropicana, Gatorade or plain Aquafina. Some preferred Ganne-ka-juice. Starters included all chats - Masalapuri, Bhel and others. The joy and celebration attracted strange looks from curious on-lookers. It was a moment to remember for all riders and organizers alike. They wanted to immortalize the moment and posed for photos all around.
Standing:George, Datta Patil, Dickie, Naveen, Dipankar, Abhin, Francis, Sharath Sitting :Ethesh, Dinesh, Iggy, Sriram
Night Riders: Kaushik, Kamesh, Deeksha, Francis, Babu. 
Mysore Road Flyover traffic stopped for TFNQuarter of an hour later, the police escort arrived. They made quick checks on their walkie-talkie and signaled a "all-green" for us. That meant, the cyclists would be given VIP treatment all the way from Jnana Bharathi to Cubbon Park. All intersections would be closed so that we could get through traffic. The entire group of cyclists followed two support cars behind the police escort. Any comparison to 150 cyclists riding down the Champs-Elysees was only natural. It would be just like comapring a tender sapling that grows into a huge tree. TFN has all the making of a great event in cycling calendar.
Mysore Road Flyover traffic stopped for TFN
Bike Salute: Ethesh, Naveen, Kamesh, Francis
Dattatreya Patil announcing award to SukhdevThe message is clear : If 50 riders with no prior experience in endurance sports can do 919 Kms, any one can do a 10Km commute on a bicycle. Bangalore!! Get back on the saddle - for a green future.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Day 7: Riding back home
The day started with mixed feelings. The joy of going back home to the loved ones was all mixed up with sadness that the tour is going to end. Lot of hugs and wishes exchanged before the start. I am sure there would have been quite a few moist eyes. As an every day of the tour, people started leaving in groups. The slower riders who were determined to complete the stage left ahead followed by the faster riders. I was on board the Scorpio loaded with Gatorade and Water. Along with me were a couple of riders who opted out of this stage since it was the same highway that they rode on Day 1.
[George][Nachiket][Sangwan][Saurabh]
This gave opportunity for lot of riders to try new bikes out. Nachiket was on a road bike (for the first time?) - A Trek-1.2. Dickie has been riding a MTB (his specialty anyway) since later part of yesterday. We started the stage 0700 hrs. In less than 30 minutes, we were on the Bangalore - Mysore Highway. The highway was monotonous and riders stuck to their rhythm and moved ahead steadily. The weather was so pleasant that they did not even feel any discomfort.
We reached the food point between Maddur and Chennapatna - a BP gas station with McDonalds. Soon a few riders Venky, Iggy, Sangwan... mostly road bikers. By their calculation, they would need another 2 hours to be at JnanaBharati from where our Victory lap would start. So they decided to take a break - long one. Nilgiri's food was served - Curd Rice, a version of Bisibelebath, set curd, badam milk, cold coffee and so on... Somebody even cut some water-melon and everybody feasted on it. Nelly was at his usual - showing off tricks on a MTB.
Back on the road, we caught up with most of the riders who were battling the heat and head wind. Some of them were glad to replenish their fluids. Once we entered the ciy, limits the wind got reduced and riding more easier. The excitement of completing the tour was also high. So the pace picked up. Srikanth was the first to be at the finish line - followed by Dinesh, Datta Patil, Sourabh and Mani. All of them relaxed under the fig tree sipping fresh Sugarcane juice and Tropicana. Many more riders finished in a matter of minutes and everybody jumped and cried in joy. More on our grand entry into Bangalore in the next post.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Pune Cycle Prathistan in TFN
One of the objectives of TFN is to create a network of cyclists. In order to do so, RAC-F (Ride-a-cycle Foundation) has tried to include people from different backgrounds and cities into the TFN08. Three riders from Pune have joined us on the tour - Ulhas, Nachiket and Shantanu. They represent the PCP - Pune Cycle Pratisthan. It is an organization, much like our RAC-F. Like most cycling organizations their charter puts promoting bicycle use as their main mission.
[Left <= Nachiket & Shantanu]
The obvious way to get people into cycling is to make them feel that it is fun. Ulhas & his friend Dileep started to go on small rides (get-aways outside the city). The first week only two turned up for the start even though more than 20 had enrolled. Ulhas simply described how wonderful he felt on the ride to those who missed. Next week, there were 6 guys... the numbers started growing and growing... 8, 10, 20... now, after two years, they have a strong contingent of about 120 people who ride on 20Km get-aways every first week-end of the month.
For the more adventurous, the longer version of the ride also happens on the third week-end. That has an average attendance of 60 to 80. Pune Rocks. Apart from local rides the PCP also organizes expeditions that are carried out on no-profit-no-loss basis. There is a Ladakh expedition that happens in July-August every year. As Ulhas says, Ladakh is best explored on a bicycle. The monasteries, the white deserts, the never ending inclines, the pristine air, visibility up to infinity are all very easy to be missed on a motorized transport. To give you a few stats, the Ladakh expedition has 7 stages and covers 480 Kms. The entire tour has altitude of 10000+ feet. The highest point on the tour is 18385 feet. The entire stretch is on very rough road and tough conditions. Road bikers, please excuse them - this tour is only for MTBs. 
[Right ==> Ulhas]
If you thought such expeditions are for adrenaline junkies with costly high end bikes, the PCP has a different solution for you. The Konkan expedition involves riding country roads along the Konkan coast line. It is for the normal people. It aims at getting even the house-wives on the bike. It happens in January and has 30 ladies and 30 men enrolled. Most of them beginners. Hence they pedal only 50Km a day for 4 days. It is a joy ride with short climbs of steep gradient. The message is clear - if beginners can do such a tour "cycling as a mode of transport is feasible and safe"
Good job guys!! Long live Pune Cycling Pratisthan.
Day 6: A ride through the jungle
The rest day has given a chance for every one to attend to their body aches and socialize. Today, we will descend from the Queen of hills through the precarious Kalahatti (or Shigur) ghats. It is a long long highly technical descent. Beyond that we will pass through two long stretches of reserved forest before we come back in touch with people. The rest day talent show had prolonged till late in the night. Nights get really cold in Ooty. -3 was the lowest temperature of the night. Most of us got up early. Not because we wanted to, but because of small holes in the blanket that lets the cold air in. A small fire was made and everybody awake huddled around it. People who slept in the tent outside told stories about what body parts froze in what order... Somebody got tea ready. Pongal and Vada was served as breakfast. A photo shoot for local media was arranged and our enterprising riders posed very nicely.
Since it was a treacherous descent the organizers wanted to make sure that make sure that the fog had lifted. In the briefing the riders were asked to check their brakes and reduce saddle height to gain more control. After all riders completed necessary checks, we could flag off by 0945hrs. It took a while to get out of the Ooty city. We re-traced the same path until the bridge at the 8Km mark. Here, we go straight instead of left. There is a small uphill section to be climbed before we start the Kalahatti descent.
The Kalahatti (aka Shigur) ghat takes us down by about a 1.6 Kms in 14 kms. That's 12% average gradient. It has a total of 36 hairpin curves. The idea was to allow the MTB riders ahead since they would take more time to get used to the gradient. 10 minutes and 3 curves later we could smell the rubber burning. But it was heartening to see that riders had realized the virtues of group riding (although a descent like this is not suited for it). At the check post the policeman promptly stopped our ambulance from going ahead. He said he had orders that vehicles as large our Ambulance were not to be allowed to descend the Kalahatti ghat. (no problem for climbing it up). He was just following his boss's orders. Dr Renu spoke to the right people at right offices and got orders passed to make an exception for our Ambulance. 
Even though the riders were cautious, they set a good pace. I am sure thoughts of climbing the Kalahatti ghats would have crossed every riders mind... It would be hard, but worth every inch of the incline we climb. This is a tailor made for anybody who wants to train. Most of the hairpin curves turn inwards. If it was difficult for us to navigate the curves on a Scorpio, one can imagine how hard it would be on a cycle with V brakes. The first double bend is at curves 20-21. The boards along the road always reminded riders that if they did not break in time, they would be plummeting into deep valley below. If you break late, you will be on the ground face first. You have to break just enough and just at the right time. We were descending so rapidly that our ears would pop every 15 minutes. There are are small stretches of straight road now and then - we would feel imbalanced driving through them. The curves are addictive. We ticked off one bend after another... more of the same.
We passed the beautiful forests of Madhumalai and Bandipur with out much action. I gathered later from the riders that they enjoyed every stretch of it. Who would not? gentle slopes, green every where, ocassional brush with wild life (monkeys, deers, boars sighted). Some riders did have an anxious moment or two when they found themselves too close to an elephant. Once we were out of the Bandipur range, we had lunch at Pugmark restaurant run by the jungle lodges fellows. A complete buffet... salad to dessert. The road from Bandipur to Gundlupet is horrible. The road bikers struggled to get accross. The MTBs had no problems at all. They formed a small groups among themselves and enjoyed every bit of their ride.
The road bikers found their rythem after they crossed Gundlupet. They also formed drafting groups and started setting some super pace. Since most of the road bikers took an hour long nap at Pugmark, they were riding as if it were a new day. Since most of them had now found out their own speeds we got to see a lot of single file riding. As the sun started setting, the temperature cooled down and made riding much more easier. Some city riding in the dark got us back to YHAI, Mysore. Rest for the day.Monday, December 29, 2008
Day 4: The mother of all climbs on TFN08
Today we would head towards Ooty from Sulthan Bathery using the round about way through Gudalur. The day involves at least two major climbs - one at Devarsholai (5% to 7%) and another one being the Ooty climb (7%-8%) itself. Last night's nightmares spilled over even to this morning. Breakfast got delayed (in spite of shifting to Wind Flower. Ethesh, Naveen, Kamesh and me decided to try out local restaurant. We had puttus and baked bananas. Yes, you can bake bananas (if you get the nendra variety from Kerala) and they taste yummy - sweet and sour. One need not worry about how it is cooked because it is boiled with the skin and it is peeled right in front of you.
For some reason I chose this day to ride. After much searching, I found the bike I would be riding - a Firefox Tempest, six gears, front shocks, and V-brakes. The best part of the bike was that it has a bell. It comes in handy in crowded villages that are not used to seeing fast moving cycles ;-) Today we decided to ride as a group - that would be the best bet against the being swept. Since I am riding today, I may not have any images for the rest of the post. Apologies. Those that are posted are cliked by Modi, Nelly, Deepak and others on support cars. Thanks Guys. Finally we started the day around 0900hrs.
The day started off slowly. We were cautions even on the gentle downhills - riding slow and steady, cracking jokes and waving to excied children. We passed through many tea and coffee estates and small villages untill we come to the first climb of the day. It would be approximately 5% and for 7kms. This was supposed to be the pre-cursor for what was to come later in the day. The reward for climbing Devarsholai was the food van would be waiting for us. The climb as really mild. So mild that at Devarsholai we kept asking if the climb was over or still to come. On top of Devarsholai, we were welcomed by courteous Nilgiris crew serving us cold Badam milk. "Excellent!" I told my self. The brunch consisted of nice chapatis, mixed veg subji and set yogurt. I felt fully charged up after that. There were couple of people leaving the tour from Gudalur. This is junction where one road leads to Ooty and one to Bangalore. Ram, Vishal and Ullas would take the Bangalore road. Hence I took a some time to take leave of them.
After Devarsholai, the road goes winding down the hill. Since I had to catch Ethesh and Naveen, I flew through this down hill. I stopped only at couple of places to get the first look at the Blue Mountain Range. I caught up with Ethesh in the next up hill climb. There would be couple of more mild (3%-4%) climbs before we reach Gudalur. I was accompanied by Ashwin for the last few Kms before Gudalur. Ashwin is an enterprising kid studying in 8th grade in the local convent. He inquired about the shocks on my bike and proudly exhibited his. He said, he had to removed the gears on them because it would not work. He took leave of the tour just as we hit the Ooty highway. A Sunday well spent for him. 
The start of the ooty climb is vicious. I remembered that I had plain water only. So, stopped at a house to add salt into it. The family was so forthcoming to help us. A kilometer later, I saw the Manipal ambulance waiting for us. We filled Gatorade into our water bottles - to form a potent concoction, ate one banana each and owed to stop only at the 10Km mark (he he he... what were we thinking?) For the first few kilometers, I was scared about the heavy traffic that was mentioned in the rider's docket. However, the traffic was not much... They were surprisingly well mannered too... (barring a couple of morons any way). We Put our heads down and marched ahead. We rode past villages, churches and shops before we felt totally alone. 30Kms of hard climb was ahead of us. I later understood from Rajesh that the gradient never dropped below 4%. This is still acceptable considering that the other way to Ooty is through Masinagudi (Shigur ghats) involving up to 12% gradients - even if it were for just 14 Kms. (It will be fun to get down the route tomorrow).
After 5 Kms up the climb, we lose touch with any civilization. On either side of the road there are nice tall Eucalyptus trees. I was on the road with hill on one side, valley on the other side. Eucalyptus trees on both sides seemed to be of the same height. Ethesh was ahead of me. It is amazing how tall these trees are... they grow absolutely straight. The bark on them seem to curl up counter-clockwise. The reason I worked out in mind was that it had to do with movement of Sun from Uttarayana and Dakshinayana. When you are on a bicycle, and going so slow - up hill, you tend to think observe and think about a lot of stuff... On a car you can stop only when there is a shoulder... On a cycle, you are always on the shoulder watching everything ;-)
There is a signage on the road, an enlarged "Z". This is the most dreaded sign. This means that there are two back-to-back hairpin bends coming your way. If you see this when you are in the last ring, you better get off the saddle to get some momentum going. While we are at the road signages, the speed limit for the vehicles going up the gradient is 30. That's seemed so irrelevant. Ethesh and me, people who owed to stop only after 10Kms, were waiting for the other to call for a stop to take in some fluids... or a leak break... or to eat the honey-cake. We passed Shankar a couple of times who had some hard time due to shoulder discomfort. Ooty road is being repaired... nothing is wrong with the road, but it was the embankments along the road that were being reinforced. The up hill lane was closed at many points for this work which caused many anxious moments for me. [last but one] The only way was up up and up. I changed to my 1st gear (last ring) some time between 10th and 12th Km of the climb. I was under the impression that there would be a support car at the 40Km to go mark... did not find one. After some more Eucalyptus (Nilgiri trees), I spotted the Black Santro of Amit. They were watching the green forest from the Madhumalai Forest View point. We replenished our Gatorade bottles and marched ahead... When I saw a shop board that said Naduvattam, I was ecstatic. I remembered that the rider docket mentioned that it was the end of the 8% climbs... the toughest part of the climb was behind us. The Manipal ambulance was once again there to hand out Gatorade and water.
From then on the climb relaxed a bit. It was still about 4%... However, I had some chance to go back to the second gear. I will tell you why it is important to be in 2nd gear. It will give you some hope that if it gets worse and you are about to hit the wall, you can change to one lower gear. If you are already in the first gear (the biggest ring in the rear), then there is no way to escape. You are looking at the wall... an you will hit it. Luckily, today I was not in such a situation. When ever I felt totally down I remembered the two bus full beautiful girls from Bangalore that went past us. Two of them even wished us luck. "Have to catch them at Ooty!" I kept remembering.
After some time, the gentle gradients turned into a steep downhill. I went to 2nd, 3rd and the 4th gear. This sudden difference in tension was flagged by some muscle behind the knee... Ouch!! It was also an alarm that I had not taken any fluids for the last half hour... I stopped to stretch a bit and more Gatorade. That was when Ethesh passed me egging me on to continue. Both of us did not know at that time, that the road ahead was winding up and down - mostly down. With 29 Kms to go, we tailed one another on all the slopes until we reached the last support car - 22Kms to go. I stopped for a Gatorade refill. But Ethesh did not stop. That's when I lost him. Only 22 more to go, filled with fluids I started pedaling hard - hoping to catch Ethesh again. The road was being less and less harsh on us. Downhills got lengthier and up hills shorter and milder. For once the Kms stoned seemed to be fair. We were happy to see some "Drive Slowly" boards which clearly mean that road went down. The kilometer stones kept passing by with ease. At the 8Km to go point, I was inspired by the encouraging words of Dikki sir. Thank You. Further more the gradients did not matter. I just kept peddling asking for directions to Charing Cross. At Charing Cross, Dikkie was still asking for directions to the Youth Hostel. There are three such hostels in Ooty. After pedaling around for some more time, we finally ended our ride at YHAI, that was next to the cemetery near the bus-stand. All the riders thoroughly enjoyed the ride in spite of aching buttocks. Its that thing with us cyclist - the harder it gets, the happier we are.
After a hot water bath, cozy campfire, spicy dinner (not ready to make), singing and dancing we all called it a day. Tomorrow is a rest day. May God bless us.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Day 3: Enter the God's own country
Today we leave Madikeri, heading towards Sultan Bathery. That will be the halt for the stage 3 of the TFN'08. One can imagine how cold it gets in Coorg during this time of the year. But we did not expect it to be this cold. Riders felt way too comfortable in the Wildcraft fleece jacket. Apparently it was a very good combination of style and comfort. Nevertheless, We had to wait for the fog to lift to make it safer for the riders. Even though the scheduled start was @ 0630hrs, the fog delay, birthday celebration of Kaushik Iyer and some logistical issues pushed the start to almost 0720hrs. It was a bright and upbeat start. Two riders joined us today. Arun Katiyar will be there for a day. George was representing Swiss people in the tour. Everybody started pedaling hard and wanted to make as much distance as possible before the sun came over the head and roads got bad. The roads were supposed to get very bad after Gonikoppal when we take a right turn towards Kearla. So, TFN had organized for a "bike float" - a ferry service for all the road bikes that would find hard to navigate. This would shuttle the bikes beyond the Kerala-Karnataka border when the roads would be magically good.
Until Gonikoppal, the road was manageable - not good not bad. Weather was fantastic... We (people in the makeshift support car) stuck to the same strategy of zoom-halt-serve-zoom. Within a couple of hours we (and about 30 riders) were at Gonikoppa. Although the roads were marked ahead using chalk, many riders missed the sharp left. This was the start of bike ferry. But many road bikers hard a long look at the road ahead and siad "This aint that bad after all!!" and pedaled ahead. Many other riders like Shankar took opportunity to take in fluids and chat up with others. Cyclists riding expensive cycles just did not want to take the risk of getting mechanical failures. The road apparently got better and better, encouraging the road bikers. But just before the Kerala Border the road got really worse. If became a pain for the car drivers of Bangalore, you can imagine how hard it would have been for the Road Bikers.
At the Karnataka - Kerala Border, the police were over whelmed with what was happening. They were not sure whether the cars were support cars, or trafficing food. They made us open the boot up and peered inside the back seats and let us go only after they were fully satisfied. Menakshi used her linguistic skills and the cops let us go easily. Other cars were not that lucky. They got more suspicious when they say truck loads of Aquafina and Nilgiris foodies. Since we got the clearance and many riders were ahead of us, we did not wait for everything to be sorted out. The roads in Wynad district of Kerala is maintained much better then Karnataka (Are you hearing Mr Dr BSY?) 
After the border check-post, the roads were just wonderful. The forest was dense... the vegetation alternated between bamboo and teak. The terrain was a gentle downhill all the way through interleaved by mild gradients. One can climb thousand such gradients if he were going through such a beautiful forest. The bamboo portion of the forest is called as "Bitherkaad" (forest of bamboos). This stretch of bamboo along the road was planted some 60 years ago. Six months ago, they all came of age and bloomed with flowers. It must have been wonderful. Too bad that the main stream media did not cover such a wonderful event. Yes, some or other bamboos bloom every year. But since these lay so close to the road - it would have been very accessible wonder to watch. 
To see such grand scale blooming, we may have to go deep into forest, or wait for another 60 years. Bitherkaad is home for a tribe named - Paniyas. Dino had a good two hour chat with them after some off riding. Like all good things, the reserved forest had to end and we came back to civilization. I am disturbed at the shrinking size of our forests. My concern about all kinds of forest dwellers - including the humans. Do they not have the right to exist? and in the manner they choose to be? That's another debate reserved for another day.
Once we were out of the forest, we came to Katrikulam. This was our lunch stop. I had full meals - while boiled rice (the huge ones), bhendi sabji, tomato subji and majjige huli (more kalingu in tamil). But it was predominantly a non-veg place. The waiter was surprised when I inistested on eating vegetarian dishes only. At Katrikullam, we were updated about the change in plans. We are not going through the scenic shortcut through another forest - but a long cut right through Manathvadi to Sultan Bathery. That made the rest of the journey (ride) boring. The last few kilometers to Sulthan Bathery was made a little interesting by the slanting rays of the setting Sun.
At S. Bathery, a accommodation was a mess. I am told, that was the best available in the city at the time of planning. That is a fair explanation considering that all the other hotels in the city were equally horrible - except for the newly constructed Wind Flower. The rest of the night is best left alone.
Hopefully, tomorrow will be a nice ride. After all, we are going to ride to the queen of hills - Ooty.
Friday, December 26, 2008
Day 2: Warm and Cozy Home stay
The road from Mysore to Hunsur was excellent. This is perhaps the best stretch of road available on the entire tour. Road was perhaps only as good as yesterday, but the X factor was the lack of traffic. This frees up 50% of mental energy that a rider would have to spend worrying about monsters running them down. Looks like they used the free 50% to set some fast pace, and keep smiling at the same time. We were riding the un-official support car - Ram's Swift. Like all other support vehicles, we were fully loaded - Gatorade, Aquafina, Cream bun, cup cakes, Glucose anything that any rider could ask for. Since we were operating in addition to the "planned" support vehicles, we worked out a plan for ourselves. We would drive past many riders and then pull-over at a nice location (most photo worthy). 
Get the foodies out on the roof and chill out. As soon as any one of us spots a rider, we offered all things we had and waited for him to choose. A few riders felt so welcome that took a little break chatting with us. When we were satisfied that we had served quite a few riders, we would zip past all of them to our next pitstop... So on and on till Mercera. But there are always disadvantages of travelling so fast. Apparently, every rider remembers seeing a tree full of honey combs. This was one of the most discussed topic today. However, for guys in the car for us, it was just a passing remark.
Just before Kushalanagara, the road condition drastically changes. It gets a lot worse - and hence tilts the power balance towards the MTB riders (for the first time). We could see the first few MTB riders gleefully zipping over the rough roads. The road bikers need only 6 inches of good road to ride on. They struggled to find even that. The road was not only bad for their biceps, but their mind also had to think about the impact every jerk had on the truing of the wheels. I slept through most of the climb to Madikeri while Thej was driving. By the time, we came to Madikeri the overall plan had changed a bit. The Raja's seat assembly had been skipped and we were asked to directly go to the home stay. We hit the Madikeri-Virajpet road and at the sixth KM mark we get a bridge. This is the landmark at which we must turn left. But the road at the bridge was so bad that, the bridge could easily go un-noticed.
Once inside the home stay, we just hung around doing nothing. Riders as usual were exchanging notes about the morons manning motorized vehicles. This time around the road condition also came in their line of fire (mostly from the road bikers). The riders could still not freshen up because the luggage van is either lost its way or doubling up as sweeper vehicle. Nobody was actually minding that since the ride was so good. People just spent time just chatting about everything under the sun - career choices, american depression, FM Kariappa's son's home so on and on... By the time lunch was being served, the last few riders on the road were encouraged to cross the finish line by loud applauses. Poor Samim and Dipanker... there is no one to clap when they arrive at any finish lines on this tour ;-)
By the time we got through lunch it was time to get ready for the press meet (if any) at the Raja's seat. Since the local ride was unanimously cancelled, all of us boarded all possible support vehicles and headed to down town Madikeri. We entered the Raja's garden with just enough time to witness the sun set. There were sooooo many people. If they are all tourists, then the tourist season must be good. If they were localites, they have way too much free time to be there on a week-day. In any case, it was way off from my imagination of the romantic sunset that the Raja must have enjoying with this dear Rani. It was dark by the time we got back and dinner was about to be served. Somebody had a campfire going too... Dinner was cyleon parantha, jeera-rice and alu mutter. Pineapple (or strawberry was it?) pastry made a awesome dessert. A can of diet pepsi each completed a satisfying 3 course meal. (ayyo, are you wondering how can one be satisfied unless he has curd rice with mango pickle?)Thursday, December 25, 2008
Day 2: A good start - gentle slopes.
The scheduled flag off was at 0600 Hrs. Got a wake-up call from Deepak... 0442 hrs. Damn! is the night over already? I am pretty sure every rider felt the same. We were very orderly in our dealings... Fold the blankets, sheets, pillow covers and return them to YHAI. We had to wait a while for our breakfast to be made. In the mean while, the tea/coffee was served with all the snacks we had yesterday. All the riders came down with their bags and lined it up to be loaded on the support van. The bicycles were unlocked and most of the riders got busy mending their bikes. Almost every one added the "biking cleaning cloth" to their must-bring-next-time list. It's seems so mundane in hindsight, but only the pros had got them ;-)
By 0630, the breakfast was ready - to the delight of any South Indian. Idly-Vada and sambar. All by Nilgiri's ready-to-eat range. My grandmother needs to hear this... "Now even I can make idli, in 10 minutes". Pradeep arrived a little late and took control of the arrangements. He made some quick positive announcements. Plan of action for the day: To keep it simple, there would be no brunch. It would only be heavy carb loading breakfast and a late lunch at the halting place. He gave very clear road directions, notes on road conditions and arrangements to get through the short stretch of really bad roads. The simple no-stop plan made really good sense. The Raja's seat at Madikeri is going to be the finish line for the day. From there, riders will be shuttled to the night camp in 2 batches of 20 each. Freshen up, and do the *optional* local ride. The optional part was very well received.
7:15 start: This was special for the birthday boy - Sharath Raju. After savouring the pineapple pastry Sharath lead the bunch out of the hostel campus for the Stage 2 of the tour. The first 80 Kms of the stage boasts really wonderful roads with gentle slopes (both ways)... Riders seems like they are enjoying... All smiles and no aches. Body aches seem like are a history now that every body is sufficiently warmed up. We are now at Kushalanagar. Roads have gotten worse in the last 5 Kms or so. I do not know if this is the bad patch that the tour director was mentioning about. I hope, the canopy of trees will make up for the bad roads. One worrying niggle is that food van is still behind us ;-) Will be updating this post from Madikeri.
TFN08 - Let's hit the road - Day One
A lot of people braved the morning mist and freezing temperatures. It is encouraging to see such a turnout for a cycling event. Mostly friends and family of the riders... But a few did turn up just for the event. Nilgiri's had sandwiches, bun, bananas ready on time. The hydration packs were all loaded. Hugs, kisses, wishes, claps and we were all set to go. At 6:45, just 15 minutes past the scheduled start we did have a flag off. (believe me, just 15 minutes delay in the very first edition of such a huge tour is actually commendable).
As a result, the not-so-fast bunch got stretched too long. There are only limited support cars. And they had to operate in multiple modes - stand still, follow a slow rider (shielding him from traffic), zip through the same traffic to reach the next rider on the road. I stress on the fact that we had to zip through, because even on a Scorpio, catching these riders was not easy. Scortching pace.
Next pit stop was for lunch (brunch V2.0) about 10 Kms after Chennapatna. It was also the halfway point. I was surprised that it was so early. Samim and Dipanker (both pro-riders) did not want to stop anywhere until finish. They rode on. About 20 riders were already assembled there by the time we (Crew on the white Scorpio) reached there. Since the cooking of the food would take time, we were asked to help ourselves to a wide range of bakery snacks from the Nilgiri's kitchen. Honey cake, chocolate cake, cup cake and what not. Nelly brought a home-made energy potion - honey + salt + water/Gatorade. It is supposed to work wonders if you had been dehydrated earlier. The snacks were so filling that one bunch of riders (about 10 of them) decided not to wait for the elaborate lunch and took off. Most of us waited for the lunch, taking a much need break in that pretext. This break gave riders to talk to each others and exchange stories and laugh about their aching muscles.
Holiday traffic on Mysore road was intense. Driving in these conditions is not easy - let alone riding. All our riders strictly adhered to traffic and tour rules. Yet there were three minor incidents - involving a dog, a road block and an idiot respectively. While the dog, the road block and the idiot got out of the incident unscathed, our riders were mildly hurt. But there was cheerful news when young Sukhdev completed half the distance in style. He quickly had his food, and was ready to tackle the other half as eagerly as the earlier.
After lunch, the fast just got faster. It got hotter and hotter also. This meant that the support cars had to do work that much harder to get water / gatorades to those who need it. Since we knew that were a bunch of riders (who did not wait for lunch) who would need fluids, we drove past one rider at a time handing over the magic drink. In some instances we were a tad late. One rider found himself asking for salt to mix with his Aquafina. The shop keeper lady had helped him - no strings attached. Pradeep was quick to spot this genuine helping nature and returned the gesture by offering her our supplies. By the time we reached the top of Chamundi Hills (finish line for stage 1) we had replenished all the riders ahead of us (except Samim and Dipankar, who were cooling their heels under a tree).
Slowly people started trickling in. The first to come were the road bikers - because of their obvious advantage on this terrain. Couple of MTB guys rode their hearts out to match the road bikers. Some of them got unfortunate flats - Nelly and Iggy. A sense of accomplishment swept across the entire gathering. Riders were deservedly happy to have completed the longest stage of the tour. Organizers were happy that it went on without any major hiccups. The bikes seemed happy with the intense work out that they got. It was a time once again for riders to share stories. Most of them revolving around the newly discovered muscles that were making sure that their voice be heard. Some of the stories were about reckless drivers.
As the bikes rested and bikers waited for food, Aravind Teki - our star photographer took leave of TFN08 and returned to Bangalore. Riders kept cycling past the finish line to be welcomed by an orchestra of claps by other riders and wise-cracks by Nelly. Honestly, I did not believe no many riders could finish this stage, especially in this heat. We shifted our base from top of Chamundi Hills to the Mysore View point so that we could serve food well there. After all of us had food, we proceeded towards Wild Flower resort for the Mysore Press Meet. The hospitality at Wild Flower resort was amazing. Coffee, Tea, Samosa, cookies and pastries... as much as you like - and on the house. Are we just lucky or what?