The vada pav season

Monsoon has always felt like a watershed season in my life. Before I explain why, I want to mention some lucid memories of rains, chronologically; memories which I just need to close my eyes momentarily to cherish.

Kindergarten

The faintest oldest memories include heavy rain in Hyderabad as my sister and I are moving in a cycle rickshaw ridden by Ramu uncle, from our schools to hom. In a cycle rickshaw the hood being up doesn't really prevent the rain from making its presence felt especially if its even a bit windy. But worse was Ramu uncle getting completely drenched, but he seemed to not mind it!

School

Vada pav is certainly the snack of champions!

In Mumbai, when it rained, the skies came down to meet the ground. It was the kind of rain that can stop trains and shut schools. That would be the best day of my life. It felt like I had gained an extra day in my life to enjoy, play, and cherish. My fondest memory was collecting all the coins I could find around the house, inside drawers, old wallets, and in the prayer room and heading to the nearest snack shop for a steaming hot vada pav with fried chillis. Its literally the only thing that I miss of that city! 

College

In Bangalore, the rain was very well behaved; It would often stick to schedules and leave when done, no encores or unexpected downpours. You could go about doing your chores with just a raincoat or an umbrella. I don't remember a single day of college being closed due to rain, which was a pleasant expectation in Mumbai.

Later in life

In the Western Ghats, sipping tea, beer or rum with friends with a fire on the side while its raining is etched in my mind.

In Bomdo, Arunachal Pradesh, it could rain any time of the year but largely during 9 months of the year. Everyone would go about their chores with interesting rain gear, some made of bamboo and cane, some even stole my greenhouse plastic to make shelter from rain! Days were spent listening to the rain on tin roof and reading a book or writing. Or make a fire and cook a meal while having a drink since there was nothing much else to do. Weeks were spent in this way, when it felt that life and work were stuck in inertia. But those days taught me valuable lessons; to enjoy the moments when life slows down and to remain calm and occupied till it got sunny.

A Bomdo family planting rice seedlings in their jhum field in heavy rain

These days

Goa monsoons coincide with the tourist off-season; so its just wonderful. Beaches are empty and rains give me the same nostalgic vibe I used to feel in Bomdo, except there is electricity, internet, chores, and the phone! We did have a storm once though, some coconut trees broke like matchsticks! A big branch of our mango tree came down too.

Today

This year the monsoon is different though, too little rain and too late but yet the watershed moment in my life has been to be diagnosed of chondromalacia patella and meniscus tear in my knee. Remember the post in which I talked about underestimating normalcy? Well it turns out my meniscus had torn by then and I will be needing a surgery in a couple of weeks from now.

Either way, I look forward to getting the knee fixed and returning to active life within a month after the surgery. Reminiscing about the past is my favorite thing to do when its raining, which is probably clear from this post!

Finding Uno

Last August, I was trail-running in Divar island, Goa, a great place for that; mangrove bund trails all over with lots of birds and calming backwaters. One evening while passing a house, I saw a dog with half it's face swollen up and hanging quite badly. I wasn’t sure I saw it right. Also, I was training for a marathon and thought that instead of stopping, I would check on the dog after the run. But I did not go back to check on it as it had turned dark and I was tired.

Two days later at the Divar jetty point at Ribander, I possibly saw the same dog in the bus stand. It smelled like there was a dead animal around, and when I looked at this dog, it had lost half its face, including an eye. There were maggots feeding on the flesh. I was shocked, but I tried to focus on what I could do next. A kind man was also sitting at the bus stand and felt bad for this dog too. I asked him to stay there and check on the dog while I went to my place and got a disinfectant spray for the open wound, water and food for the dog. 

I returned, but as soon as I sprayed the wound it scurried into the mangroves and did not return. Half an hour later, I returned home and figured the next morning I would meet the dog, first feed it, and then spray the disinfectant. But the next morning the dog was not there. I thought to myself that maybe it's suffering had ended and that it had passed on.

But I saw the dog again the following morning in a worse condition. Considering it's state, I decided to call a vet to put it down and called Dr. Pinto who lives in Candolim. It is a 45 minute journey to Divar and he suggested we give it another chance and asked me to call PAWS - Panjim Animal Welfare Society. At the same time, my friend Russell Cardoso from Divar came around and made calls to PAWS too. An hour later they came and caught the dog and took it to their rescue centre in Panjim.

Of the two hours I had spent already with this dog, I observed two things, the dog was supremely resilient and never seemed like it had given up. The second observation was that the dogs yelp was so moving that I was in tears; once in a while when the pain got too much, he was yelping but not often. I heard about three of these long yelps and my heart sank for the dog.

At PAWS they started the long process of treating the dog. Cleaned the wound and the maggots, operated on the wound and the process of recovery had begun. They were kind enough to give me updates through videos too, considering they are working on dozens of dogs every day. They also spayed the dog. I decided that I would visit this dog twice a week at least with some food. The problem was that one cannot turn up there with food for only one dog since there are at least fifty dogs there being treated along with a couple dozen cats. Each time I went there, I would take a few supplies for the other dogs too. Hats off to the Heads Up for Tails folks at Panjim. When they got to know that I was taking food for a dog that was rescued, they gave me bags of treats each time I went there and asked me to go back there for more.

Meanwhile, he was recovering, very slowly but steadily. Two months later, PAWS called me to say that the dog is now healed, it was time to take a decision whether to leave him back where he was found. With one eye lost, he may not do well in the streets since he will not be able to judge the danger from moving vehicles. So, we decided to take him home. Only problem was the 7 dogs already at home! As an old dog, perhaps eight years old, will he be able to be part of the pack and will my dogs attack him. We decided to take the chance. It would definitely be better than dropping him back on the streets.

Elrika named him Uno – the one-eyed pirate dog! Gradually he adapted to us and to our home. First month he slept outside the home on the patio, then moved in to the hall. After a month he started going on long walks on the beach with the dogs. A month later he started doing two walks a day and playing with Elrika and me once in a while. When we would return from outside he would come wagging his tail and jumping, imitating my other dogs. That’s when we felt that he was now one with the pack. He also started walking part of the trail without a leash. The problem was that if he would smell any food he would follow that trail instead of walking with us. Initially too, in the first month, he would go running daily towards the wet waste collection truck in the morning and also regularly raid our compost bins. He probably ate trash all his life since all his front teeth are completely missing! Now he eats vanilla ice cream once a week, beef bones on Sunday, and chicken/fish/beef with rice two meals a day. Good life!

From a dog I was sure we had to put down to a member of the home pack, eating, playing and exercising well, he has come a long way. About eight years on the street, a week or more with an open wound on the face, two months recovering in a cage at PAWS, we finally found Uno and from Uno he became Numero Uno!

Uno is all healed up now. I tied some ghungroos on him just for this photo!

Cycling trivialities - Part II: A ride in the plains

Cycling often brings back childhood memories; growing up three decades or so ago, I used to take money from parents and rent bicycles for 5 bucks an hour or even less and ride all day; fell so many times but the wheels kept spinning. Then one day my parents succumbed to my demand and bought me a Hero Ranger bike, life changed after that. I often went to school on it and even remember a day when a traffic cop deflated my tyre because I skipped a light! He had a wicked sense of humour too, he asked me to return the next day to get the air back! The next bike my folks bought for me was a BSA SLR, what a wonderful bike it was, it felt way more mature than the Hero Ranger. I once took apart everything from the bike except the brakes and it used to fly! In the year 2010, I bought the first bike with my own money on my 30^th birthday: a white Btwin Rockrider 5.2; it was love at first ride – the bike I was planning to ride to Goa. And I had forgotten to carry the meticulously-packed two 15 litre panniers outside my home in Bangalore while packing the rest of the stuff into Matty’s car!

Panniers that I forgot!

I realise now that I haven't introduced Matty earlier. I knew Matty from the time when I worked in Greenpeace, way back in 2002. In the last two decades, we’ve had some wonderful times trekking, travelling and conversing about almost everything under the sun. Since then, Matty has worked in quite a few jobs and presently works at Decathlon. In his own words, he is an ‘occasional cyclist but a full time cycling evangelist!’, in mine, a perfect partner in ride. Leaving from the Coffee day in Davengere, Elrika and Matty could not help laughing at me every couple minutes and I was laughing myself too, although I ought to have been more shocked at my stupidity! But my mind was buzzing with solutions for this problem and so was Elrika’s. Quickly, Elrika and I made a basic list of things to buy from Hubli-Decathlon, things that will come in handy after this trip too and are also affordable. And this turned out to be the real list that one needs for a long ride: 4 ₹100 T-shirts, 4 inner wear, 2 cycling shorts, 2 sleeping shorts, 3 socks, 1 towel ('never leave home without a towel', a great man said once!), 1 big bag or two small pannier bags or one dry bag, battery bank (to charge the phone since the app Strava that records the trip drains the phone battery) & Balaclava (the single most useful thing when its cold, dusty, sunny or smoky on the way). 

Our own Mohammad, the long-distance cyclist!

We reached Hubli only by lunch time – the plan was to cycle from Hubli to the Tibetan colony at Mundgod the first day and stay there; a distance of about 50 km which would take us 3 hours at least. Going to the Tibetan colony would be like a prayer of sorts before the long ride, we thought. As we drove into the Decathlon store, we met our own Mohammad; the fourth member, Narendra Patil (who we affectionately call Patil) accompanying us for this ride. He has cycled over 3000 km in the last three years and has already cycled 500 km this year. The first time I met Patil was in the beautiful Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve almost two decades back when I volunteered with the Centre for Wildlife Studies for a week.

Mathew getting his super-model Surly ready!

Next, I met him next in 2014 in Bomdo, my PhD field site in Arunachal Pradesh and we had some spirited good times exchanging stories by the fireplace in my field station and doing field work for a couple of weeks. Keeping up with the tradition of meeting only during good times, this time I was meeting him ahead of a five-day cycling trip to Goa. He had brought his bike from Bagalkot to Hubli in a train which wasn’t a great experience since he had to wait for most of the journey along with the bike near the entrance so people could enter and exit. But anyway, he was here now and it was time to quickly assemble the bikes together, get them checked by the trusty Decathlon bike experts and buy the items listed earlier.

Panniers that I carried!

Elrika and I picked up all the stuff I needed in just about thirty minutes and one of the Decathlon folks mentioned to us that there were panniers of the old model they were trying to sell off at a big discount and for just 800 bucks I got my other pair of panniers, which Elrika can use for the next ride. They are just the perfect size to go to work in a city too. All the bikes checked, all the luggage packed, we thanked the Decathlon folks who helped us a lot and we took off into the bustling city of Hubli, trying to get out of it as soon as possible. The ride was on a road on rolling hills which was perfect to prep us up for the big hills coming up the next day. By the time we reached Tadas Cross though, it turned dark and Mundgod was still 26 km away. We took a quick decision to stay put and booked a room there to get a good meal and a rest and do the extra 26 km in the morning to reach Kulgi Nature camp, 90 odd km away, where I had make the booking for the first night. As we settled in, we realised how good the decision was. They allowed us to keep our bikes beside our beds, there was hot water for a bath and Patil and I made a quick trip to a bar 4 km away in the dark to get a can of beer each. We felt quite relaxed after the beer, we made a short trip to the neighbouring dhaba and had some nice rotis and curry and were off to bed early. The real trip is yet to begin!

A big thanks to Suraj and others at Decathlon- Hubli!