Kutch Highlights - Day 2 - Anjar, Mata No Madh

Day 2 in Kutch started out with shopping and sight-seeing in Anjar - the sword & knife capital of Gujarat. As soon as we got there, we went straight to the market as we were going to hangout with one of our acquaintances, JS, there. After spending some time with Mr. JS, we went around shopping for some quality knives, and sudi. Anjar is famous for the metal handicrafts such as swords, knives and all other kinds of metal items. We shopped at this place called Palan Sarota Works.

Store selling knives


While shopping there, these two Kutchi women stopped by for some shopping and I got to shoot them. :) It was nice to see the details of their clothes and jewelry from so up close. They were shy at first but then smiled and posed for their photos eventually.

Kutchi women in traditional Kutchi attire


More shopping needed to be done but first thing was first. That was to visit the Samaadhi of Jesal Jadeja and Sati Toral as they close in the afternoon so we headed straight to this place. It was interesting to visit this historical landmark and hear about the story of Jesal-Toral and how he (a dacoit) went to steal the Tori ghoDi (horse) at the home of Saansatiyaaji - husband of Jesal and ended up kidnapping Jesal. They spent the latter part of their lives here.

Main entrance to Jesal-Toral Samadhi

Right across from the samaadhi are little shops selling all kinds of things such as swords/knives, music, books and other collective items.

Knife & sword store

Next stop was at the temple of Ajepal (Ajay Pal) dada. City of Anjar is named after him and there's huge class of his devotees in and around Anjar.

Entrance of temple

Once we were done with roaming around Anjar for sight-seeing, it was time for shopping! First stop was at Ahemad's Handicrafts. Oh my goodness! this place has some of the most fantastic bedsheets and dress materials I've ever seen. Even the lungis were so beautiful, I couldn't help but buy three of them for myself. Now what I'm going to do with a lungi is something I still need to find an answer for. May be I'll get a top made or use it as a table-cloth or open it up and use it as a bedsheet. If you are in Anjar, don't forget to stop by here


Ahemad Handicrafts

and also at the garment shop of Katri Ismail Haji Abdul Latif. This place is THE PLACE for ready-made clothes, baandhani dress materials/saaris, purses, wall pieces, other handicrafts along with tops and many other similar things. Their gaji silk saari are totally drool-worthy and you wouldn't want to get out of there without some for yourself/your loved ones. :D

Garment store of Katri Ismail Haji Abdul Latif

After spending relatively less amount of time than what I wished, we were off to Mata No Madh. This is where they have Maa Ashapura temple. While driving to Mata Na Madh, we got to see the TV tower, which reminded me of the Space Needle tower of Seattle,

TV tower near Mankuwa

and the Lignite project plant of Gujarat Khanij Vikas Nigam Limited and a very beautiful sunset.

Sunset

Once at Mata No Madh, we got some flowers and prasaad for the temple and headed inside the temple for darshan. As like most temples, this one doesn't allow photography inside also so I couldn't take photos of the outstanding intricate work on the inside of the temple. The visitor center personnel did let me take some photos from outside after I requested him numerous times.

Temple at Mata no Madh

If you're visiting this temple, make sure you are there to be part of the evening aarti at the temple. OH MY GOD! It is out of this world experience to be part of that event. I guarantee that it will be an experience that you have never had before. After the aarti, I just wish I had an opportunity to record even the audio of it but it practically transported me to this divine world and all I could feel was that every single hair on my body was standing up with happiness and feelings I can't describe. I'd go to this place just to be able to attend that aarti of Mataji. With the sounds of bells and nagara playing during the aarti, it was one of a kind experiences! It is said that when the district of Kutch had severe drought, this place was the only one where water remained and people came from faraway distances to drink water around here.

By nightfall, we arrived at Narayan Sarovar and had really nice, simple dinner of khichadi-kadhi at Shri Kutch Narayan Sarovar Annakshetra and Bhojanalay and spent the night at the dharmashala there.

More photos of Anjar & Mata Na Madh.

Kutch Highlights - Day 1 - Gandhidham

Imagine that you've never seen this ad of Amitabh Bachchan or never heard him say all the things he says in the video about Kutch, including "aapne Kutch nahin dekha to kuchh nahin dekha.. kuchh din to gujaaro, Gujarat mein! hai! AYE KAKA!!" and moreover, you've never really heard of things to see/do in Kutch. The only thing you remember of Kutch is that Lagaan was shot there and read the horror news about a massive earthquake. Then you find out that you're getting to go there just the day before you are supposed to leave for Kutch.

This is exactly how I was the day before I left for my first visit to this magnificent land called Kutch. The original plan was to visit Rajasthan, possibly Jaipur, Udaipur, Ambaji and whatnot, but work took higher priority so I didn't have enough days left for the planned roadtrip. That's when plan B came to rescue - everyone else suggested we go to Kutch instead and my only requirement was that we pick a place none of us have seen before. This worked out pretty well because none of us had been to Kutch before, except for my youngest cousin. He said that he didn't mind visiting it again and got super excited about it so we were all set to go.

We started out from Bhavnagar after lunch on Monday and arrived at Gandhidham by night. For dinner we stopped by at this all vegetarian dhaba-like place called Shri Chamundakrupa Restaurant in Samkhiyali, Kutch. This is on highway and serves really nice all-you-can-eat thaali.

Shri Chamundakrupa Restaurant, Samkhiyali, Kutch

In Gandhidham, we stayed at this really nice place called Hotel Gokul. We had a booking at another hotel near by but that one got more people than they expected and gave away our rooms to other tourists before we got there. So instead of getting upset and nervous, we roamed around a little bit on the Gandhidham highway and found this really nice place called Hotel Gokul! It was better than the place we were supposed to stay at and had a wonderful time because we got two rooms connected from inside so all seven of us could stay together. I definitely recommend this place.

Hotel Gokul, Gandhidham

Next day, we had super delicious South Indian breakfast at Chawla Cafe in Gandhidham downtown and started driving towards Anjar by 10 AM.

Chawla Cafe, Downtown Gandhidham

Would you do this when you travel?

I would love to. :D

Check out this fun travel video of Matt Harding.

How to Make Mumbai Airports Nicer?

Here's my free advice to the Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport officials to whom it may concern:

1. Please put the baggage carrying carts in a vending machine where people pay money to get a cart. Have those vending machines on every block of the airport.



2. Either merge the two airports or don't give passengers flights that arrive at one and depart at the other within 5 hours or less.



3. Fire those employees who have invented the modern panchaayat at the airport to chat for hours at like 2 AM in the morning when passengers are frantically asking around for crucial information affecting their flight schedules.



4. Educate the information booth employees to know what the flight schedules are, even better is to fire them and put self help LCD screens instead of those time wasters who are good for nothing and will wave their hand in some random direction saying "I don't know" when passengers ask them for small information such as where is the counter for a certain airline.



5. There's construction all over the place, which I'm really happy about because things can only get better from here. High hopes? I dunno. Any how, while you're at it, put some of those LCD screens at every gate so that passengers know where their next flight departs from.



6. A piece of 2x2 sq ft paper stuck on a counter by scotch-tape/cello-tape with airlines name hand written on there does not count as an airline counter. Please, spend some money to get the airlines' names up so that people who walk from 15-20 ft away can see the counter they're looking for. Sheesh!



7. Either merge Jet airways and Air India or merge their flights going from Mumbai to Ahmedabad. What's with the ridiculous flight schedule that says all the Jet airways and all the Air India flights between these two cities would depart from the domestic airport except for the very first flight of the day by Air India - the one in early morning departs from International airport. I do understand that Air India guys are trying to be more considerate to the passengers by having them not change the airports but those id10ts at the door send everyone to domestic airport without looking at the airlines they've tickets for. And if you don't plan to do anything about this, at least put up those LCD screens I mentioned that say what airport and terminal the flights depart from. God!



8. Please please please start fining heavily to the passengers that remove any baggage that does not belong to them from the baggage claim area and put it aside in a corner. If you didn't realize, this wastes very valuable time of the affected passengers and thus in turn making them miss their next flight.



9. What's with the labelling and stamping of each security scanned baggage? I mean come on, where did you get that from? Sounds very lame practice and to be honest, no one even checks that except for the guys who put it on. FYI, this is a big time waster.



10. Control your hyper employees who start acting like high-class coolies for the passengers who just got off their flights. Some passengers prefer to spend a little extra money to buy their spinner baggage and don't really need your help to push their baggage; you guys are not realizing how miserable you're making the already tired and thoroughly annoyed passengers for some lousy amount of money. Did I already say this? Yeah, putting the carts in vending machine will solve this as the airport will make the much needed money and the passengers won't have to deal with the stalker airport coolies.

Thanks for reading. Hope this list would help make better plans for your future projects. Hopefully, I will be able to break my promise to avoid these airports at any cost in future.

Road Adventures in India

January 25, 2008

As I look forward to my next India trip, I couldn't help remember my last one of early 2006 and the roadside adventures that I got to experience back then. And on top of that, after I read Aspi's The great Indian license trick, I just had to write this up!


Plane close up
Originally uploaded by kananj

It started from the airport. Fortunately, the custom folks didn't even look at me or my baggage more than a glimpse so I was very pleasantly surprised and still thank God for none of those hassles that I have heard horrid stories about.

Now since we had to switch the airports at Mumbai from international to domestic, we had to take the shuttle bus. So this driver or the shuttle bus helper guy shows up, and even before I say anything and without asking me, he starts picking up my baggage from carts and starts loading it on the bus baggage storage area, so I just thought he was being nice (yeah right!). After he loads up all the baggage, he gives me a begging face look and asks me for some money. I said I don't have anything and that since I didn't ask him for any help in the first place, I didn't owe him anything. He kept going on about it... and to be honest, I didn't keep anything but a twenty dollar bill with me, which I didn't want to give for some guy who volunteers to act like a coolie. So I told him looking into his eyes that I did not have anything for him and that he stop asking for the money. Finally, I ended up giving him some chocolates and candies that I had in my purse, as that was the only thing I could give but that experience taught me one thing - as soon as these guys see it is female passengers from the US, they try to act smart and make money off of us. I don't like people who cheat like that to make money off of innocent travelers. Beware of these *nice* guys.


Traffic at Tran darwaja
Originally uploaded by kananj

Another one was driving around with my uncle in Ahmedabad. So his car is an early 90s make; some of them don't have the seat belts and the drivers are supposed to carry around this proof of what year the model is in car so they can prove that their car is excused from having no belts. That evening we were getting late to reach for a dinner and this cop pulls us over. My uncle doesn't have the little piece of paper that this police officer needs, so he starts talking about a Rs. 100 ticket for him, but my uncle who is a professor in a reputed school in the city, starts apologizing and telling him where he teaches and what, etc. And then the officer sees rest of us in the car and thinks over and finally lets uncle go with a warning. I was pleasantly surprised we didn't even bribe him and he let us go. Key to not get a ticket, have a whole bunch of innocent looking passengers in car, tell them how big your workplace is and finally... apologize. Tada! no ticket for you.

Yet another incident happened in Ahmedabad, it was a friend of mine who was driving me around and we almost ran a red light at a big intersection at rush hour. And how can a cop miss that who's standing like right in our faces? He came right up to us and pulled us over. My friend admitted she hadn't seen the red light and apologized and promised it won't happen again. He warned and let us go without the ticket. :) yoo hoo! more money for shopping. ;)

Btw, did you know, the seat-belt requirement is only for the driver, not the front seat passenger! :D I still wonder why... if you know the answer, do let me know.

This one takes the cake. It happened in Rajkot. So my cousin, who also happens to be a professor in a reputed college in the city, was driving us to a book store which is quite far from home. And since mom and I had to go shopping afterwards, he said he will give us both a ride on his scooter. In hurry, he forgot to remove his hat and wear a helmet instead. So right in middle of an extremely crowded intersection, a cop comes running in the middle where we are trying to balance the two-wheeler with three of us adults' weight and such slow speed, or rather no speed at all. The cop removes the scooter keys and runs back to the curbside in corner. So we have come to a complete stop in middle of jam packed intersection. Imagine the scene... traffic is already bad and there is a scooter with three adults on and not moving at all. Hahahaha! For a moment, I didn't even realize what had happened as I was too busy watching the traffic. I mean come on, it's so much fun to watch that kind of traffic - that too from being in middle of it - when the only kind of traffic you get to see on daily basis is bumper to bumper cars on a five-lane freeway. In any case, eventually I realized we had come to complete stop because my cousin started getting very upset at what had just happened. It's humiliating to have been stopped by a cop in middle of cross roads, that too if you're a professor! I was feeling bad and funny at the same time. Finally, another cop, who wasn't blowing his top, came back with the keys realizing that there was no way we could pull over on the side without the key. And we moved on the side. My cousin was too busy getting upset with the polite officer about what the other officer just did (that is to remove the keys like that). He said they do this because a lot of people don't even stop and run away from such crowded intersections so they started this new tradition of removing the keys to keep crazy drivers from running away! LOL I like that idea... wish they tried it some time here in the US. I think the cop will get a ticket for doing that. ;) The most fun part now - so the nicer cop says he must write a ticket as we were riding three adults, which for some reasons is illegal? (not sure whether that's true at all as I saw four adults on a motorbike in Ahmedabad just a couple of days back before this happened) and that the driver isn't wearing a helmet. So we had to pay the fine for a ticket. Then he asks us whether we were going to be driving around like that for more time and when we said yes, he told us he will write us a paper ticket so that next time around when a cop stops us, we can just show that to them and they won't give us another ticket. Hahahaha! Apparently, the paper ticket costs Rs. 100 and non-paper ticket is Rs. 50. We took the paper ticket paid off the fine and went about our shopping trip. When I told this story to a friend of mine in US, she told me about how another friend of hers got two tickets within less than a few minutes for not stopping at two consecutive stop signs in a residential area.

And a couple of more photos to add to the series!

In India, pedestrians are not the only ones who have a right of way.

Cows crossing the road
Originally uploaded by kananj

Traffic goes which way again?

Driving from Paravadi to Damnagar
Originally uploaded by kananj

Were these adventures enjoyable? You bet!

Space Bags

Traveling today has become more challenging than it ever was, specially if we wish to carry more things in baggage than allowed. The extravagant charges on extra baggage are growing by the minute because of the higher gas prices and whatnot. So here's little tip to make the whole experience a little more pleasant and bring a smile on your face. Finally you can buy a few t-shirts that say "someone who loves me went to timbaktu and got me this t-shirt" for your loved ones instead of those silly looking key chains for souvenirs.

Use the space bag! No, they're not only used when you travel into space, but they also save a lot of space in your baggage.

Here's how they work:

• Put all the clothing items in the bag.


• Firmly close the zipper bag shut.


• Use a small hand-vacuum to suck out the excess air from the valve on one side of the bag.


• Close the valve cap to secure the bag from getting more air inside.


• Ta-da! your space bag is ready for travel.

Personal experience tells me these are the best things that I ever traveled with. One thing to be careful, don't put food/perishable/liquid items in the bags and stay away from putting any sharp objects in the bags.

The only drawback of using these bags is that you'll need an access to a portable vacuum cleaner to suck out the air.

You can buy these at stores like Target, Walmart, etc.

Happy traveling!

SF Bay Area Bike to Work Day

Thursday, May 15, 2008, is the 14th annual Bike to Work Day!

On Thursday May 15, 2008, tens of thousands of residents from all corners of the Bay Area will put aside their car keys, don their helmets and bike to work. They will be seen on two wheels, big wheels, tandems and hybrids.

Ride your bike to work, to class, to errands or to play. Pedaling can take you there! Throughout the Bay Area, dozens of local events taking place during the month of May will get people excited about bicycling and the benefits it provides for public health, traffic reduction and our environment.

Join the thousands from all around the Bay Area on Thursday, May 15! Hop on your bike and bike to work! Stop by one of the over 190 Energizer Stations strategically located throughout the Bay Area where you will be greeted and cheered by volunteers handing out complimentary treats and tote bags and bicycle commute-related information.

In fact, the entire month of May is National Bike Month! Celebrate throughout the month by participating in fun-filled events such as the Team Bike Challenge, a friendly competition that challenges folks to ride for the entire month of May to earn points and win prizes! Nominate someone you know who epitomizes the spirit of Bike to Work Day 2008 for the Bike Commuter of the Year Award. Visit your local bike coalition or bicycle advocacy website for local events hosted in your community so you can join in on the fun and win prizes!

Why Bike to Work?

It’s Healthy! Did you know that on average, a person weighing 175lb, burns 1160 calories pedaling 20 miles at a speed of 15 mph? Check out our Bike Calculator to find out you can improve your health, burning calories biking!

It’s Economical! Did you know that if you drove an SUV and lived 5 miles from work, you would save $346.32 a year by biking to work one day a week? Check out our Bike Calculator to find out how much you can save by biking to work!

It’s Environmentally Friendly! Did you know that if you drove a Toyota Camry and lived 9 miles from work, you would reduce emissions pollutants by 908 lbs year by biking one day a week? Check out our Bike Calculator to find out how much you can save the environment by riding your bike to work!

See photos of exciting Bike to Work Day activities from 2007 here.

Source: http://www.bayareabikes.org/btwd/index.php