Camera Critters

The pictures make me think how innocent people have been slaughtered by the terrorists in Mumbai last week. I was in no mood to post, until I saw the pictures that were taken in a small village called Chikeyelshetti in Bandipur , near Bangalore in Karnataka .

For more pictures around the world, click here

Some interesting posts that I found this week. There is Deepak'spost on Mahabaleshwar in CLAY . I would also recommend a post by Sandeep on Kabini where two tuskers are fighting and his sighting of a leopard published in Jungle Lodge's blog . My stories have been published. There is a story on Bandipur has been published in Bangalore Mirror today and also in JLR blog.The Inside Story in Metro Plus,The Hindu is about a small village called Kolanupaka.Click here to read it.

Do we need Jayanthi Natarajan and Alyque Padamsee's sound bites ?

The crisis is over and a new day will hopefully dawn. Questions are being asked.Some of the right questions are facilities and equipment for our police forces and what is the government doing..And media houses still want sound bites and we have spokespersons like Jayanthi Natarajan holding fort on " Mumbai spirit " and "resilience" and the politicians are doing , especially " someone like Sonia Gandhi who has suffered the loss of her husband.." Jayanthi even went to the extent to say that "she speaks on behalf of Congress and not the govt of India " ..why do we have to suffer such politicians ..and why is media doing such stories ? If it is not pontification, it is sensationalism or getting overdramatic..some of the well known anchors turn drama queens and mouth sentiments that will probably win them best actress awards..Just surfed and there was an old report on BBC on some of the international guests who had been released from the Trident-Oberois and most of them said they will come back to Mumbai. Something finally to feel good about..

Mumbai will pick itself up as it has always done . But this issue will soon become an "incident" and will probably be heard only in the studios in all the TV channels who will fan political opportunism by getting some of these trombones to speak and make a mockery of people's lives...and its sad that intelligent and sensitive people like us actually consume this nonsense ( and that included me , until now )

Let us salute the police, the army , the NSG and every single member who has fought for Mumbai's release. Let us salute the spirit of Hemant Karkare's wife who rejected the compensation, the courage and poise of Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan's father and many others who have given up their lives ....

Will someone just beep Jayanthi Natarajan and her likes out and focus on the real issues ..

A dark morning

Its dark in Chennai where I am currently, as it has been raining cats and dogs. My house is an island and I am stranded, waiting for the waters to recede .On the other side of the coast in Mumbai, it is been raining bullets. I feel extremely hollow and sad as I wake up to the killings in Mumbai. Besides Chennai, Mumbai is the city that has groomed me and I owe a lot to this city.I studied there, lived there, built my life and career there and lots of friends and colleagues are still there . It was the safest city at one time and I used to feel proud when I said I have walked around the city post midnight. My college (Sophia Polytechnique ) where I studied and stayed was much closer to South Mumbai and these areas are virtually home to me. It hurts to see so many people dead and the city waking up to terror...My heart goes out to those out there ...When will we ever wake up to stop this ? It is time to act now..no more analysis..

A wild trip to Londa and Goa

This trip was wild..though it had little to do with wild animals - we did manage to see a sambhar deer when we crossed the Dandeli forests at 3 am as we returned from Palolem Beach ..Where did I go ? Londa, Ganeshkudi, Dandeli and Goa and it was really a wild trip on the banks of the River Kali where we had hornbills for company..I am completely exhausted and defocussed ..Just returned to Bangalore to realize there has been no power for the last four hours. I am off to Chennai tomorrow and will be catching up on all your blogs this weekend..Have a great week

The Bandipur Diary . Wild Conversations - Part 3

" Can you see the cattle ?" A herd has just stopped our jeep from moving any further.."Yes, so .. in India, you see cattle everywhere." " Yes, but this is forestland and you see cattle grazing right in the middle of a forest ..thats the problem..beginning of man-animal conflict." Mithun opens the book "Romancing the Elephants" . With him in the jeep are the German couple and us gazing at a satellite map where the greens and the browns merge.." The forests have become overgrazed, its just shrubbery now . This is illegal. and you will find villagers complaining that animals walk into their homes and lift their cattle..but they are actually encroaching.."

" But where will they go ? I mean, the villagers .." "Ah ! thats what you city bred thinks..most of the villagers are migrant..they dont live here..or they are tribals who were living in the forests and have been rehabilitated..and the cattle, you think they are for milk ? Its mainly for manure..to send to neighbouring states and towns..""You mean, Tamil Nadu and Kerala ? They have their own cattle.".."not enough..agricultural lands need manure..all these cattle are raised and the dung is processed into manure and sent there..also beef.."

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" See that hillock ..that is the crucial chicken neck of this corridor..and that is the resort I told you about..they have fenced all 40 acres , but the built up area is only 10 acres.." " But isnt tourism good in a way..I mean they hire local people, prevent poaching..?" " " They have to hire local people as they cant get anyone..yes, tourism is good in a way, but not all resorts here are into eco tourism..they are into what you call green washing..just having some huts and less towels doesnt become eco tourism .."

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" Does he carry a rifle with him now ? " " A double barrel gun .."elephants attacking sarva sadhanam .." " Very common,he says, he uses it then .." Nim hesaru .." "Kempanna." " Idhe oora ?" Illa, Chikatti ,Nanjangudu hathra..familyala ooru alli ." " He stays in the quarters here ? " " Can you pls translate what he says ? "

"He is Kempanna , a watcher and his beat is the Moyar range...4500 acres and only 3 of them watch the entire area...the three go together all the time." "Poaching, wildlife chasing him, looking for dead beasts.. " ." yen maduthu ?" " Biggest problem is he says is of cattle grazers and they are not allowed into the range and they have lots of fights." " So what time does he start his day ? " 8 am till 6 pm and night sometimes...if there is any problem ..nights there are elephants..its dangerous .."

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"Hey, Baaro illi.. Nim Hesaru ? " "Gaviyappa" " Yen, nimuhasugule jaasthiaagbittidhe.." " Aye ..aye..manne, ondhu kempu huli bandhuhodathabidithu ."

"Howda ! kempu hulia..athara yennum ille .." " Aye..Aye..challenge ..yeradu kara idhe..ondhu kappubare, inondhu kempu bare..."

Mithun laughs . " He is challenging me that there is a red tiger.." You mean, he is referring to the stripes.." "Yes, he says there are two..one he claims is red and the other black..one of them lifted his cattle day before yesterday .. " " Wild animals here ?.." " yes, elephants, leopards, hyenas , wild dogs also.."

" So, how many villages are there ?.." " About 10 and more cattle than people.." " But why is this land fenced ? " "One North Indian - he has bought the land here and fenced it.." " and is he building a homestay ? " " No, grows seasonal crops - here try, these "? Gaviyappa picks up some horse grams and gives us." Hope these fences do not electrocute him " ..We leave

"Aye aye..alli nodhu ..guddatha mele..aane idhe.." Gaviyappa 's eyes strain as he points to elephants on the yonder hill.
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" This village is Lokhire..and it is the best among VFC ..villages and forests conservation ..they are managing the entire area, growing crops, and ensuring that the cattle does not graze into farm lands ..very good cooperation..we also wanted to set up a home stay here and ensure the villagers get the benefit..now we will go to Chikyelshetty."
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" We will sit under this tree...and have some refreshments by the stream.." " Nice temple ."."yes, the priest and his family helped us to run this home stay..amazing...and a modern toilet too..yes, they had this idea of having plants as well.." "So, can we stay here ? " " Yes, only for you..we had to close this down as the authorities did not approve..we were only giving tourists a taste of rural tourism and wildlife..food is cooked by the villagers..no alcohol as there is a temple here..but you can drink by the stream.. ! " " Where can you get a view like this ..fields and a hillock outside your door ? "

"Uchaya the main guy is behind the furniture project and we will pick him up in Bandipur..he is coming from his village there "" Oh ! we cant see the furniture or the workshop ? " " They are kept locked inside a school, the workshop has shifted .".."So who runs it ?" " Uchayya is the main guy and there are two NGOs - Atree and ForestScapes. "

" This village has about 70 people...where ..I hardly see a few homes ? " "Full of lantena" .."we will go towards the school....you can take the pictures from the window .." " School hogthiya ..yava class ?" "Eight standard ..Ivathu raja " "They want to pose for a picture..with goats.."" Where are these guys ? I think we have lost our way..this is real India..nice..can we buy a bell like that ? The one around the cow's neck " "Will try in the market.. " "School yelli..?" "These are the furniture..any orders coming in ? yes, one small homestay have placed an order".."why not the others who say they promote eco tourism ? "

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Thanks for your patience in reading this series.Bandipur is a national park located in the state of Karnataka beyond Mysore.The forests extend into Tamil Nadu as Mudhumalai and into Kerala as Wynad.I have deliberately kept away facts and travel related information from this posts. The idea is also to create a diary feel, raw, unedited and little choppy without information or details ..but I wanted to try a new style of writing and I wanted to bring out some aspects of wildlife and eco tourism. The tendency is to always describe a safari and focus on sighting..but there is more to wildlife than just game. The conversations are of different subjects and it doesnt matter who is talking or even sometimes the context or the descriptions...In fact I had recorded a conversation on my phone, but my file transfer is not working well..I deliberately avoided posting pictures as well..

I didnt want these posts to go into a series of descriptions and narratives and the idea was to cut to the chase and get readers into thinking..of wildlife, eco tourism, man animal conflict...I am not an authority on any of these things to pass a judgement or even a solution to some of these issues..but I wanted to create an awareness ..the trip opened my eyes and I hope I have tried in my limited way to open your minds to some real stories..thanks..and here is one last conversation....the last word, I would say ..By the way, I acknowledge my husband's impatient contributions in helping me with the Kannada while writing this post.

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"Ah smellu..yestu gama gama idhe..basmati rice thra.." " Cooking inside the forest right in the afternoon..?" " No, the smell of basmati rice..a tiger's urine smells like that.." " Eh ? " " You mean, there is a tiger here, behind these bushes..?" " No, a tiger's urine smells for more than half an hour..even after the tiger has left..sometimes over 1/2kms..even some plants give out that smell..gama gama idhe alva..sakath smell ! " I have sinus and a blocked nose..

The Bandipur Diary - Wild Conversations - 2

"Morning." " Morning ." "Good sighting yesterday - elephants, gaurs, deer .Didnt know South India had so much wildlife."

6 am and the moon shines out of a bright blue sky .There are only 3 of us in the jeep. Olaf ,Katja and I .

" First time here ?" Yes.But we've been to Kanha,Ranthambore, Kaziranga ..this is beautiful, we've just been to Periyar.. Back home, this part of India is not promoted at all..only Rajasthan and Goa . Must tell the tourists going to Jaipur to come down and see the wildlife..do you get foreign tourists ? A herd of spotted deer stare at us as we slow down. "Sir, a crested serpent eagle.."

"We stay in Cologne for just 5-6 months .We're mainly in africa..we run a project, a park in Zambia..Ah South Africa is good, Botswana is very expensive, Kenya is very crowded.. you can see one leopard surrounded by 4 jeeps of tourists..In Zambia, not much of crowds ..but you will see a leopard for sure, though mornings can be like this, no sighting.."

" Sir,"..the jeep slows..." gaur behind the bush.." Ah ! It's sitting, not a good picture.."

" Do you know of any good projects in India ? Our focus is on elephants now, man animal conflict,conservation of forests..." Sir, in Bandipur, 1200 -1400 elephants and 70-80 tigers.." "We do a lot of work in Burma ..we've taken elephants from there to Cologne and brought rhinos to Burma from Africa..we're going to Bangkok for the elephant conference..let me give you my card, we 're vets, conservationists and this is my travel agency..we will promote India too.."

" Yen sikhthu ?" Alli yennu illa".."dam hathira?" "Ok..lets go .." You see these orange flowers.. "Lantena ." Yes, yes..they are weeds..they make the forests into a shrubbery, good ornamental plants..but bad for the forests.." Are you coming to the village where they are making furniture out of lantena ..? Yes, we are.."

The Bandipur Diary - Wild conversations -Part 1

" Karnataka alone has lost 100 elephants in less than a year and it is mainly female elephants that are dying ." The wood cracked as the smoke curled up , warming up the air. Mithun the naturalist in Bandipur is speaking to the guests. He moves on from one group to the other .The conversation gets heated.More figures are rattled. Unofficially it is claimed that 40 elephants in just 15 days have died.."maybe an exaggeration," someone muttered, chewing on groundnuts."It is a serious concern," he cried indignantly. "Didnt you read the papers ? Its poisoning and not poaching," He moved on to the next table.." So , did you enjoy the safari ? Did you see the herd ? Oh ! yesterday, there was a herd at the hilltop..." conversations drown in the drinks as tourists take over the conversation from conservation. "Give me a beer please !And a sprite for me !"
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"Travelling today is all about badge value," I say. " I agree," he nods. Tourists , today have a lot of disposable income, are educated , but their idea of a holiday is to come, get drunk, listen to loud music , eat good food and party ! Thats ok, but why come to a wild life destination..you could do that in any resort ? " And of course,throw a mineral water bottle or a lays chips plastic cover around .." lol...

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"Hi,do you need a wake up call ? 5.30 am ..that would be great ?" "By the way, Mithun,what was that about elephants .. ? Mithun turns around and the conversation goes back to conservation ." They are electrocuted, poisoned as there is a conflict..last time 60 elephants barged into a sugarcane field..their corridor is taken over by man. Resorts are being set up in their corridor..a recent upmarket resort with just 10 acres of built up area has fenced 40 acres and thats the crucial corridor, " His fingers trace a satellite map which shows the elephant trail.." Hey, do you want to go tomorrow after the safari to the villages ? You will get their perspective."Sounds good to me !

Back from Bandipura

Thanks for your wishes. I am back in Bangalore and it has been a day of power cuts and traffic jams.It was refreshing to be in the wilds again..I was staying at Bandipur Safari Lodge, a beautiful property of Jungle Lodges and Resorts overlooking the hills.A bit of a bad luck as I missed out most of the sighting. We missed leopards and elephants, but saw this beautiful peacock ready to do a jig for us.I believe there is more to a wild holiday than just safaris and wildlife and I will be posting about it soon.

Off to Bandipur

After a long time, I am off to the jungles..The last time I went a bit wild was probably a year ago..2008 has largely been heritage except for Coorg and Karwar. Finally I get to go to Bandipur courtesy JLR (Jungle Lodges & Resorts .)Few destinations are alluring enough to be visited again and again and Bandipur is one of them. I will see you all next week and have a good weekend and I will leave you with some great posts at CLAY of Mridula's Prashar Lake and Gowreesh's Daroji.

The skies at 15,000 feet in Arunachal Pradesh

We were in Arunachal Pradesh beyond Tawang driving at 15,000 feet, probably a bit lesser as the picture indicates. It was bright and sunny out there although it was freezing and we were breathless , but the blue sky was a perfect foil to the rocky mountains .The mountains, sometimes filled with snow gave us directions on how to cross the border. We were closer to China and Tibet, but we had no proper documents to venture on the journey . Maybe sometime...

If you want to do sky gazing, do visit Skywatch

India through my eyes - Direct marketing !

The title says it all..in Warangal . No, we didnt eat or have a drink there .

Travel and travel stories

There has been a bit of a slow down recently in my writing as well..the reason being I dont want to become a factory churning articles by the day.Travel writing is an intense personal experience, sometimes even more exhilarating and draining than the journey itself and just putting it down in an avalanche of words does not make sense to me.I have three articles published last week and my favourite among them is my wild Masinagudi night safari .Please read it (you can click on the words "Masinagudi night safari and it will take you to the article )when you have the time and let me know your feedback . There was a story on a cave temple in Madurai published in Metro Plus, Inside Story and a piece on Kaidala, a small village in Karnataka which is the birthplace of a legendary 11th century sculptor . The links to these two are down and I will post the stories shortly. Meanwhile , the above picture is that of a man smoking in the Kaidala temple.

Thanjavur -The Big Temple against the sky

The 216 feet high Vimana (tower )of the Big Brihadeshwara Temple seems to be touching the sky in Thanjavur in interior Tamil Nadu. Built in the 11th century, by Raja Raja Chola 1 of the Chola Dynasty , this temple is one of its kind in the world and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site called The Great Living Chola temples .

If you want to do sky gazing, do visit Skywatch

Hampi Utsav

The annual Hampi Utsav (festival) starts from today and I am not going. I have been to Hampi many times before and it remains my all time favourite destination. I discovered Hampi in 1995 during a college trip . The Utsav was going on and the ancient Vijaynagar capital on the banks of the river Tungabhadra was completely colourful. The melange of tourists - foreign and domestic, the junkies and the folk artistes make this place special.The ruins, the temples , the rocks and the pillars have left an indelible mark in my mind.

Hampi is ageless. It even dates back to the days of Ramayana . This post is not about the story of Hampi, but about my tryst with this place. One of my favourite trips to Hampi was in 1999-2000 when I went there to cover the Hampi festival for a TV channel. It was a time when not many knew it was in the tourist map of India. The trip was very interesting for various reasons , one of them happens to be a man I met called Ceasar Baba .

He had come from Italy and he lived in Hampi for more than a decade. He spoke chaste Hindi and did not know much English. He took us to his little cave in the mountains , the entrance was a rock painted with a huge Shiva . He showed us his papers and passport and said he is not an illegal immigrant..although he shared with us stories of many ..including one "Meera" whom I will come to later.

Ceasar Baba willingly posed for our TV camera and allowed us to shoot him doing his usual routine. He gave us buttermilk and showed us around his humble abode which included a kitchen, a puja room, a small balcony/verandah and a bedroom with a makeshift toilet. All this on the rocks above a hillock . He had a roommate..a Scot who refused to speak to us. When we finished our shoot, we left Ceasar Baba and his Scot in a state of trance outside the puja room ringing the bell..

"Meera" according to Ceasar Baba was an illegal immigrant from Europe who came here as a tourist and then went on to be a travel agent.She befriended an Indian "swamy "and then lived in his " hermitage" after his death. When the Indian authorities went to chase her away, she chased them with her pets - a couple of dogs and snakes.

We went to meet Meera, and I really had to shake my fear of dogs to get there.. A small creaky gate opened as the dogs barked away and there was a woman with long matted hair wrapped in a towel. And she had a couple of fangs as well..she laughed saying that was to scare people away . Unlike Ceasar Baba, Meera refused to talk on camera or allow us to shoot her or even take a picture..But she didnt chase us away with snakes and dogs ..

The most interesting people I met were Susie Lumsden and her brother , Paul who had come down from London and had made Goa their home. It was Susie's 20th visit to Hampi as she knew every single nook and corner of the ruined town and every vendor as well. She was a familar face. They are bike enthusiasts and are ace riders. For a living, she brings foreign tourists to Hampi from Goa and they bike the entire route.

Needless to say, Susie became the "anchor" for one of my stories as it was through her eyes that I first discovered Hampi's little secrets . I went there again and every time I go, the place becomes magical. The stories from the Ramayana, the rise and fall of the Vijaynagar Empire echo from these rocks.

My husband went there last year with his colleagues and some of the pictures here are from his collection. I have lost the footage and the pictures, and just a couple of scanned pictures remain to tell the story. I hope to be going there before this year ends .