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This blog states: “The population of elephants in the wild in India has jumped by more than a thousand” and calls it a good news.

Actually, this clearly means imbalance in the wild. There is an alarming decline in population of wild beasts (Tigers, Lions) which is allowing the elephants’ population to grow by such huge number. This growth also means more nuisance to already worried farmers having farms near forests.

On 29th of September when me, Manoj and Amol set out to visit Gurdongmar lake, our reservations were not confirmed. But hoping for the best we reached the railway station. Surprisingly we got all tickets confirmed and I thought it is a victory over Mr. Murphy’s intentions. But I was clueless about his /real/ intentions. His law that says, ‘It always takes longer to get there than to get back’ applied to us. Train got 8 hours late because of the riots in Siliguri and New-Jalpaiguri and we reached there at 1630 Hrs.

The town was still under imposed curfew. After lot of searching we found rickshaws to take us to Bus Stand. From there we were to get bus as no other means of travel was available. But no matter which way you ride, its uphill and against wind. Buses were not running and we had to wait till 1800 Hrs for the curfew to be relaxed. Fortunately soon after, the curfew was relaxed and we found a taxi to take us to Gangtok.

Just out of the city limits of Siliguri, we saw a wild elephant standing beside road like a car neatly parked by law abiding citizen. After Rumtek, almost till Gangtok the travel was along Teesta River. Even in the darkness of the night, sound of Teesta seemed like an angry river roaring.

We reached Gangtok at 2345 Hrs. The city shops and restaurants were all closed (they close at 2300 Hrs) which left us without food, hungry. Thankfully the guest house we booked was OK even though they did not serve food.

Next morning before starting for Lachen, learning from previous night’s experience, we had heavy breakfast and made sure that we had enough food with us. Double checked that the vehicle is in really good condition, driver has a license, and fuel tank is full etc. so that nothing can possibly go wrong.

At 1000 Hrs we started our journey to Lachen, which is on the way to Gurdongmar Lake. All the time we traveled along Teesta. Breathtakingly high cliffs along the ridge and the green cover over it made me forget everything else. The journey was awe inspiring. The landscape was fascinating, which left me becharmed.

We reached Lachen at 1745 Hrs. The guest house there was clean and good for a town like Lachen. It is a small town, about 125 Km from Gangtok at an altitude of 9750 feet. The town is abundantly gifted by nature. The words fall short to describe its beauty.

We stayed in a guest house overnight and started early in the morning for Gurdongmar lake which was another 50 Km drive from Lachen. Soon after we started for the last leg of journey to Gurdongmar, the green cover over the ridges started disappearing. Mountain tops were snow covered, hills and hillocks were barren. The plateau is much similar to that of Leh and Ladakh.

After 4-5 hours of driving we reached Gurdongmar lake. Water in Gurdongmar Lake is crystal clear and calm. This lake is considered sacred and many pilgrims pay religious visits here. It is probably the highest in Sikkim situated at an altitude of 17,200 feet (5170m). The mountains around were untouched, covered with snow which was whiter than white. Nothing can be compared with that whiteness, not even “Rin ki chamkar”.

A kilometer’s run up there for a photograph demonstrated me the real and literal meaning the phrase “dizzying heights”, that it’s not the dizziness because of vertigo but it’s the dizziness that one feels because of lack of oxygen.

Gurdongmar is a distorted name of original name Guru Dongmar. 17th Jat Regiment and 247th Medical Regiment has built a “Sarv Dharam Sthal” on lake-shore. After spending an hour and half there we turned back to Lachen.

Fatigued us were drowsy in the return journey. We reached Lachen at around 1500 Hrs. After having lunch, we started again for Gangtok at around 1630 Hrs.

We barely drove for an hour from Lachen and it was dark already. Though it was cold, we all were happy that everything went as planned without any problems. But little did we know about Mr Murphy’s intentions. All of us but the driver were sleeping. That’s when Murphy’s quirks kicked in again. Despite all the checks on vehicle, it started giving us trouble.

Once again we realized yet another Murphy’s law which says “If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which something can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop”. No matter how well kept the vehicle is, a leak will develop and it did. The fuel supply line developed leaks and started taking air. As a result of which we had to stop every 2-3 kilometers and manually pump the fuel in.

We knew that, left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse. So we stopped at Chungthang. After spending one and a half hour there, driver fixed the leak.. or at least that is what we thought.

Evidently, soon enough we realized the corollary of Murphy’s Law, that says, “It will be impossible to fix the fifth fault, without breaking the fix on one or more of the others”, applied to us. The new leak was now developed in a small washer near the engine. I never understood why the vehicle only breaks down at the least convenient time! When a vehicle breaks down and it is a small repair, the mechanic is at least 100 Km away.

So we continued with same exercise again and on top of all this, it started raining. Rains made some patches of road worse. This slowed us to a great deal. As if all this was not enough, soon we reached to a bend where an army tow-truck was trying to tow another broken loaded truck on those narrow curved roads. Knowing that the largest vehicle always has the right of way, we followed the tow-truck that now formed a caravan behind it.

Finally we reached Gangtok at around 0100 Hrs. Yet again we knew that we were not to find any food. But thanks to our experience, we bought enough food before we started from Gangtok that saved us from sleeping empty stomach. We stayed in the same guest house in Gangtok.

Next day we woke up late as a result of fatigue from last night. Gathered ourselves and started back for Siliguri at 1200 Hrs. On our way back too, there was a landslide which forced us to take a diversion of about 3Km through jungle. The traffic jam at this diversion (in jungle) and slippery ground set us back by an hour. We entered Siliguri at 1900 Hrs. Here too we hit slow moving traffic.

The later you are running, the slower the people in front of you, and on any accessible side are going to drive. But somehow our taxi driver managed to drop us at New-Jalpaiguri railway station at 1950 Hrs. We had train at 2010 Hrs. After paying the taxi we realized the gravity of the situation that we have only 200 Rs collectively, we needed food and nearest ATM was in town, at least 5 Km away. We managed the show with the available money and reached Kolkata next morning. Though, we reached 2 hours late, we were only happy that Murphy failed its own law as it took longer to come back than it took to reach there.

Now when I look back, the height of mountains makes me think how small and helpless we are in front of nature when standing amidst mountain ranges. But on the other hand, roads made in those ranges by BRO, Sikkimese people and army that is guarding border in adverse conditions reminds me that faith and diligence can make seemingly impossible things easy.

Hence, I can’t abstain myself from recommending that one must visit Sikkim, this masterpiece of the creator, at least once in lifetime.

Looks like google.com is still running orkut on M$ plateform. It keeps failing every now and then. Sometimes I wonder if they ( DefectiveByDesign.org ) refer to M$ ?

Is it just me (poor victim of Murphy) or you too see one of these often these days?

Assume that the alphabets A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L.. bear points 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12.. respectively till Z = 26. What exactly constitutes 100% success..?

A = 1, B = 2, C = 3, D = 4, E = 5, F = 6, G = 7, H = 8, I = 9, J = 10, K = 11, L = 12, M = 13, N = 14, O = 15, P = 16, Q = 17, R = 18, S = 19, T = 20, U = 21, V = 22, W = 23, X = 24, Y = 25, Z = 26.

H + A + R + D + W + O + R + K = 8 + 1 + 18 + 4 + 23 + 15 + 18 + 11
= 98%

K + N + O + W + L + E + D + G + E = 11 + 14 + 15 + 23 + 12 + 5 + 4 + 7 + 5
= 96%

L + U + C + K = 12 + 21 + 3 + 11
= 47%

Clearly its not any of the above, then what it is? Is it money? Is it faith? .. or something else?

How we see a problem and how we think of a problem is a prime thing in most of the situations.

A + T + T + I + T + U + D + E = 1 + 20 + 20 + 9 + 20 + 21 + 4 + 5
= 100%

So attitude is the key to success.

This I found on Ravi Ratlami’s blog:

He writes, “मेरे मुहल्ले का राजू पनवाड़ी चीज़ों को दूसरी दृष्टि से देखता है. उधारी मांगने वालों से पीछा छुड़ाने के लिए उसने अभी-अभी ही यह सूचना चिपकाई है-”

Visit his blog here.

Zee Studio is showing a series of International movies. Today was the first day. Zee studio beamed a movie named “On The Other Side” today. I am not sure about the language but I think it was Arabic.

The movie starts with a small girl child asking about her father to her mother. Her father is working in Malaga, Spain. Knowing this, she decides to go and find her father and leaves for the coast, alone.

In the city, she steps into the trap of a racket involved in illegal trafficking of girls. They transport her to spain where the pimp looking at her age refuses to take her along but accepts other seven girls. The seven girls are then transported to some other place and the little girl child is left with the goons.

But later the pimp decides to take her home. At her place, the girl manages to convey the pimp that she managed to travel this far in search of her father Abdul subduing language barriers. The pimp’s subconscious drives her to help the girl child to find her father. Abdul who came to Spain illegally to earn money leaving his family back in Morocco. The pimp after a little search manages to find Abdul who is living with his Spanish girlfriend. The pimp leaves the child with her father. Despite the girlfriend’s pleadings not to leave the place Abdul decides to move back to Morocco.

The movie also shows two parallel stories of boys whose fathers lured by the wealth left the country leaving their family behind. In one of these stories, a boy tries to cross the ten-mile-wide Straight of Gibraltar which separates Morocco from Spain with his friend. They try to cross the said straight with a tyre tube and two brooms. One of which drowns in the effort, the other manages to survive. In the second story the boys from a small town also try to go to the other side in search of his father. In the effort their boat sink in the water but a mysterious lady save one and other manages to swim back.

The movie points out countless children growing without their fathers who fell for lures in Spain. It underlines several deaths in effort of going to “the other side”, problem of illegal trafficking from poor countries and glimpses of humanity existing within perverts.

Saddle up your imagination. This is a unit to measure distance traveled per unit of fuel. You might ask what the hell is relevance of rods and hogsheads with distance and units.

Well, a hogshead is designed to hold volumes equal to two barrel worth of wine or gasoline (petrol as we Indians call it). Two barrels is exactly equal to 63 US gallons (1 US gallon = 3.7854118 liters) or about 52.5 imperial gallons. So a hogshead is exactly equals to 63 US gallons.

Rods: A rod is a traditional unit of distance which equals to 5.5 yards (16 feet 6 inches or exactly 5.0292 meters). This has nothing to do with ‘khamba’ as we call it in slang Hindi ;-).

The Parliamentary Statute of 1592 defined a mile to be 320 rods.

So to calculate rods to hogsheads from miles/gallon we use this..

Miles/Gallon * Gallons/Hogshead * Rods/Mile = Rods to the Hogshead

If your car runs 44 MPG then you would convert it like this..

44/1 * 63/1 * 320/1 = 887040 rods to the hogshead

Rod: Historic background

Before the Norman conquest of 1066 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Conquest) the rod and furlong were the basic distance units used by the Anglo-Saxon residents of England. The Anglo-Saxons called it the gyrd, the name which is derived from other unit, the yard. The word rod means pole or a perch in Saxon. The Norman preferred to call the gyrd a pole or a perch (a word of French origin, meaning a pole; see perche).The length of the rod was well established at about 5 meters at least as early as the eighth century. Scholars are not sure how it was related to shorter units. It may have been considered equal to 20 “natural” feet (actual foot lengths; see foot), or it may have been measured “by hand” as 30 shaftments. In any case, when the modern foot became established in the twelfth century, the royal government did not want to change the length of the rod, since that length was the basis of land measurement, land records, and taxes. Therefore, the rod was redefined to equal 16.5 of the new feet. This length was called the “king’s perch” at least as early as the time of King Richard the Lionheart (1198). Although rods and perches of other lengths were used locally in Britain, the king’s perch eventually prevailed. The relationship between the rod and the other English distance units was confirmed again by the Parliamentary statute of 1592, which defined the statute mile to be either 320 rods or 1760 yards, thus forcing the rod to equal exactly 5.5 yards or 16.5 feet.

furlong: A furlong equals 40 rods, which is exactly 10 chains, 220 yards, 660 feet, or 1/8 mile. One furlong is exactly 201.168 meters, so a 200-meter dash covers a distance very close to a furlong. The length of horse races is often stated in furlongs.

perche or perch: a traditional unit of distance in French North America. The perche equals 18 pieds or 3 toises. By legal definition in Canada this equals 19.1835 English feet or 5.847 13 meters.

shaftment: an old English unit of distance equal to 2 palms. A shaftment is the distance from the tip of the outstretched thumb to the opposite side of the palm of the hand. The ending “-ment” is from the old English word mund, hand. The shaftment was an important unit in Saxon England, where it was equal to about 16.5 centimeters (6.5 inches). After the modern foot came into use in the twelfth century, the shaftment was reinterpreted as exactly 1/2 foot or 6 inches (15.24 centimeters).