The Connexion

Nirvāna is a central concept in Indian religions - ohh yes I enjoyed a bounty of the phenomenon recently. To free ourselves (me and my wife) from the mundane, we managed an escape to Bekal, a small coastal hamlet located at the tip of Kerala bordering Karnataka. Interestingly, the resort cottage we had booked was a namesake of the phenomenon...not bad.

Some 500 odd kms from Bangalore westwards, the blue Arabian sea makes rough roaring sounds when it hits the giant rocks in the shoreline of Bekal. A sound that proved to be soothing, wiping away the toxis decibels accumulated in a week of travel inside a city - huff, such a relief. Striking differences in the small beaches were noticeable in Bekal as it was hard to find tourists even to click a picture of us together....in a positive way, its heaven for someone looking to relax. Sun played hide and seek throughout the day as heavy monsoon winds hovered above the west coast regularly.

Opposite to the resort was the Bekal Fort, which was noticeable for more than one reason. Apart from being the largest in Kerala, the fort has a Hanuman Temple inside and an ancient Muslim Mosque nearby - bearing testimony of harmony. Googling would yield more information as fort premises has nil information about its history (though its caretaken by Arch. Survey of India).

The West Coastal Railway passing through most of the north Malabar presents a great spectacle. During our journey back to Bangalore, we chose to board a train to Mangalore and it was refreshing matching our expectations. Well, locomotives with their respective shed livery and Indian Railways has always fascinated me.

Small private beach areas and serene surroundings definitely makes up for the sub-standard connectivity to Bangalore and limited fooding and lodging facilities.

Will update about upcoming trips.

Debanjan

While checking out interesting online entries on Tiger census, stumbled upon this blog - save-tiger.blogspot.com. Here is what one of the slogans read on the blog:

No Tigers = No Forests = No clean Air & Water = No You & Me = No Blogging = That sucks man!

For a moment, I was drawing a typical forest food chain in my mind as I had read in my schoolbooks. Ah, no prizes for guessing now....for why a question on food chain was set obligatorily in science exam papers.

Less tigers means > loss of vegetation cover due to rise in the number of herbivores > affecting water cycle (lesser transpiration volume) > lesser rain, more harmful particulate matter in air > threat to human beings > and yes, no human being, no words of wisdom online.

Sometimes a thought of losing such wonderful creatures sends a chill down the spine. The feeling is more and more frequent now. Remembering a Tiger cub in a spot hosted by a mobile carrier. Time to act!

Google users - you all must have noticed the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic themed backdrop of the home page. The image has the torch in place of letter "l" and a small Olympic logo on the left hand side.

As usual, Google marks the games and sports extravaganza by changing its doodle to fit the taste of times. Google had marked Beijing 2008 showing five mascots carrying an Olympic flag.

Original doodler Dennis Hwang says, "I have several favorites. Usually, artists' birthdays are the ones I spend the most effort on, like Monet's birthday."

Looking for more interesting logos post March 2010, as of now Google holiday logos can be seen indexed till March only.

Bon Googling - Google-Doodle-Do!