The truth about Cecilia

I guess some know this already, but yeah, the whole thing was a lovely, lovely dream...the most realistic one I've had in a while. The name was suggested by my friend, who felt 'Cecilia' suited the character. Interestingly, I bought a flute recently, which says Cecilia on it. I hope that's not all my dream signified...kissing the flute, as I must, to play upon it.

Warangal - A study (Part -2)

No visit to Warangal is complete without a visit to Pakhal (sp?), around 40km away. This is a wildlife sanctuary, comprising a large and beautiful lake surrounded by forest. Our chauffeur to Pakhal could have put champion rally driver Sebastian Loeb to shame, if he could only restrain himself from opening his door while driving at 80km/h, TO SPIT! The hair-raising drive ended with our chauffeur nearly killing a very confused man, who had decided to take shelter in the middle of the road, and then abusing him verbally. (Personally, I think that chap would’ve preferred being run over).

So, the road practically ends at the top of a hill bordering the lake. It’s a pretty wild and desolate place, except when there are laoveyrs, of course. And then there are the ruins…these appear relatively new. What are these ruins, we ask. "Naxalites. They blew up this guesthouse a while ago." Our chauffeur also casually mentions that it would be unwise to walk too far away, as wild animals are bound to be around, as could be Naxals. Really, why didn’t anyone think we needed to know this BEFORE we got to this place? Nevertheless, the hour or so spent at Pakhal was, despite it being hot, very enjoyable. (That’s excluding the time that the monkeys screamed obscenities at us, of course).

I have kept the matter of the menu for last. I have promised not to name the restaurant, as my travel companion would that Warangal retain a modicum of self respect with regard to the printing of menus for restaurants, which otherwise offer incredibly good food.

• Cocktail Anitha (Lucky girl)
• Chef’s special – cashewnuts (Why? What does he do to these cashewnuts? Questions best left unanswered)
• Contenses soup (All I can say is, WHAT???)
• Beazing salad (It is just possible that this could mean Beijing, but then, when was the last time you had a Beijing Salad?)
• Veg/chk dumbling (chicken with low IQ?)
• Spl loose prawns
• Bread butter jaam
• Curd vada – summer only (Clearly they have a vada chef coming in during the summer months…they really didn’t have it in October)
• Fish fry bones (Fancy paying money for this! Makes one wonder if this menu caters to cats, actually)
• Chilly chicken bones
• Yoga fish (The fittest fish in the ocean – very supple)
• Chicken mushroom large wet (I can only assume that this means it’s a gravy)
• American Chaupsy
• Butterscrotch ice cream (I will refrain from getting into details here)
• Hot chocolate Sunday (Bad luck if you get here on any other day)
• Caramel Custurd (Again, the less said the better)
• Water Milan – seasonal (The rains are clearly not sufficient)

Warangal - A study (Part -1)

So then, my recent trip to Warangal has been a learning experience for me. Especially on the language front. Strangely enough, I think my experiences have taught me to tighten my hold on my inability with Hindi. But I digress, so back to Hyderabad, and Warangal.

Anyway, my trip to Warangal started early on a chilly (yes, it was actually chilly in Hyderabad) Sunday morning at the Secunderabad railway station. Lesson #1: When travelling a day before Diwali, it might be a tad difficult getting a ticket on a train; it is, in fact, highly unlikely that you will even get to a decent position on the serpentine que. But thank God for the ‘separate que for ladies’ concept.

After missing the originally intended train, we did manage the subsequent train to Warangal for what was, for the most part, a nice and uneventful journey (except the part where I asked a chap about giving us confirmed seats, only to be asked, with a condescending smile, to check with the ticket examiner. He looked like one, I swear!). During the journey I even saw a tree beautifully decorated with egrets.

Lesson #2: Confirming beforehand whether a train actually stops where you ‘hope’ it will stop is a good idea. We came fairly close to getting off the train a station earlier than we should have, just because we trusted the duration of the journey more than the board which said ‘Kazipet’ in bold. The two days in Warangal went by rather blissfully, and a tad too quickly, I might add. We did a whole gamut of things there, from really old ruins, a fort, a 1000-pillared temple and a cateen (sic).

The one common factor at all these places were the lovers (pronounced laoveyrs), who sit together, oblivious to the roasting sun, oblivious to the multitude, and oblivious to two non-Warangalites, who were very obviously passing sarcastic, and unromantic remarks. We made some scientific observations here…the guy always has his head up. He is obviously looking out for unwanted company. The girl is always looking at the ground. This could be (a) a coy gesture, a trap of sorts, or (b) considering the places that such laoveyrs are to be found, the girl keeps an eye out for creepy crawlies that might perchance decide to travel north, up the guy’s trouser legs.

Too much of a good thing can, and will get to you in the end. For instance, there’s so much to see in these ruins, so many steps to climb up and down, that it fairly got to a chap in a red shirt. We saw him finish with the ruins and start climbing up a water tank next. It really does happen. It was in Warangal that I realised I could, at times, have an incredibly blank look on my face (smart alecks STFU!). Chappie with a camera spoke to me rapidly in Telugu. Of course, he changed the moment he sensed his Telugu bounce right off. Oh he changed alright, to Hindi…yeah, that helped…to quote Borat, “NOT”! While on this topic of not understanding, there’s something I really didn’t get…here was this children’s park, which had a statue of a naked man, seated on the grass, with a rocket between his legs. No really, I swear it, a real rocket. I even have a photo of this sculpture. (Ladies, we’re currently taking orders for copies of this remarkable photo).