Would have been blogs..........

It took me three months and more to complete those travel blogs about the post module trip. My blog site now looks like a travelogue more than anything else. . The fact that one doesn’t find enough time during office hours to blog is the biggest factor.

So what all did I miss out on these months , or rather what were the things that I would have written about if not for being occupied with writing about the European trip. So here are a list of events/ happenings over the past 3 months that I would have blogged on.

The reds renaissance : This has got noting to with communism , am referring to that amazing , unbelievable night in Istanbul ,when Liverpool came back from three goals down to beat AC Milan in the champions league final. All the thanks to my friend who woke me up during the second half , knowing fully well that id have hit the sack during half time ,disappointed, having seen Liverpool go three goals down. If not for her call, I would have missed witnessing history.

My birthday: Yup, I was after all cutting a birthday cake for the third (or is it second) time in my life. It was a working day and there was a small party planned at a friends place. Just a few of my colleagues, some food and drinks and that would be it. My friends had brought a cake and after ages I was cutting a cake with people singing the happy birthday song. It was perhaps the best birthday that I have had for a long long time. All due to my rocking colleagues... Thanks guys and gals ….

Badminton /football /bowling: The sports bug seems to have bitten me and my friends here. I ve started going to a club to play badminton , a friend convinced me to travel half way across Mumbai on a Sunday morning to play football and going bowling is a regular affair nowadays.

Trekking: Went trekking up the hills of Matheran (about 100 kms from Mumbai) with my colleagues. Starting the trek at about 3 in the night, we reached the top after 4 hours of tiring, back breaking walk. It was such a tiresome exercise that we were left with little energy to further roam around the hills. The early morning view of the monsoon fed sprawling hills would be a long living memory.


The Mumbai Paper Wars: For long the turf of Times of India, the Mumbai newspaper market is seeing a major shakeout. Hindustan Times launched its Mumbai edition a week back and there is DNA – Daily News and Analysis slated for release July 30, Times of India launched the Mumbai Mirror as a direct competitor to Mid-day in the tabloid market.

All the publications let loose so much advertising, that it was almost choking you. One could not travel a few metres on the road without noticing a DNA ad. DNA has flooded every railway station, road junction, flyover and what not with its posters. The teaser campaign began months back, followed by a survey, then came the bookings open phase and finally is launching this month end. HT was also all over the place, even placing an ad about its launch in TOI. HT looks better than the tabloidesque Times, Mumbai mirror is just a replica of Mid- day. Waiting for DNA to see how different it is.

And there a few topics I would not have written on which include Potter mania( I like him), the new Indian cricket coach( I don’t care), the never ending reality shows (I hate them)…..

Europe Trip: Day 8, The last leg.

After the disaster, that was the previous day, we were hoping and praying that we don’t face anymore hurdles on our way to Paris.

We had spent the night in Milan airport, we couldn’t get to sleep much, since the seats were not comfortable enough for a supine posture and also with the luggage and bags that we had, one couldn’t afford to sleep like a log. We woke up early, since we had to catch the 5.30 am shuttle bus to the Railway station, from where we had to take the 7.10 am train to Paris.

We reached the station and promptly went to the ticket counter. Our hearts sank when the lady at the counter said that the train was full and no reservations were available. It was like an action replay of the previous day. She further said that being some holiday season and the weekend all trains were full. But then she said that we could get into the train, speak to the ticket collector and try our luck. We did not have much choice, and even if the lady had not given this suggestion, this is what we would probably have done.

We got into a compartment, loitered around the door for some time and then spoke to the ticket collector. He asked us to sit on any of the free seats that we could get. We would have to pay for reservations and we could sit as long as the valid reservation holder didn’t come. We managed to find seats for all of us, albeit in different parts of the same compartment. We hadn’t slept well the previous night and were hoping that no one turns up staking a claim for the seat.

Thankfully through out the whole journey we were not troubled. Actually the reservation holders of a couple of our seats did come, but when they saw us sitting, they just went away and sat on another empty seat. In fact one person on whose seat I was sitting was seen standing by the door instead of asking me to vacate. Either he did not understand me, when I said that I would vacate the seat for him, or he is a gentleman of the first order or a total fool.

We reached Paris Gare du Nord station around 3 in the evening. We had a full evening and night ahead of us before our flight the next day morning. But after the ordeal, no one was in the mood to go out into the city again, all that we wanted to get to the airport. We had food at a Turkish restaurant – the spiciest food of the whole trip- and then got into a metro to the airport. I have to mention about the nice American couple we met in the metro. They were a delight to talk to and very very friendly, which perhaps reinforced my belief that Americans are one among the friendliest people around.

We reached the airport, got our tickets confirmed for the next day and proceeded towards the terminal where our flight would be scheduled the next day. We had another night to kill, this time in a different airport. This night also turned out to be as uncomfortable and sleepless as the previous night. We hardly slept for an hour or so and also were getting very tired. Plus we had not had a bath for 2 days now and we had another day before we could reach home and change. Not a pretty feeling I would say.

After 2 days of missed buses /trains and flights, and spending 2 nights in airports, finally on the 25th morning, we boarded our flight for Mumbai. We were hungry / tired/ sleepy / broke and dirty. The aim was to gobble up as much food as possible initially and sleep for the entire trip. But this didn’t happen. We did gobble up food, but the in-flight movies were simply too good to be missed. I watched Ray, Finding Neverland and Meet the fockers , in effect giving up some precious sleep but feeling highly satisfied having watched them.

We touched down at Mumbai around 10 pm. It was the end of a long trip .23 days including the module and the Europe trip. It was a highly satisfying and exciting experience. Something which all of us had never been through before... I consider myself immensely lucky to have visited all those beautiful cities, to have been in a company of such great friends who made the trip even more enjoyable and memorable ….

At the same time towards the end with all those troubles we were desperate to get back home. It was hot, humid and we were sweating at 11 in the night, but it was feeling good.

Europe Trip Day 7 : The race against Time.

23 April 2005

Since for most of the day we were racing against time, I am putting up this day s events in a different format. Things were not hectic in the beginning, as I said, we had to catch the 10 am train from Roma termini (which was the only train from Rome to Paris), for us to reach Paris in time to catch the flight to Mumbai the next day.

8 am: the first Shuttle bus from hostel to the Prima Porta station, we miss it, since a few of us were late to get ready and reach the gate. Set back by half an hour. Perhaps, an ominous sign of things to come.

8.30 am: Catch the shuttle bus to station. Reach Prima porta and are on our way to Rome.

9.20 am: Reach Roma Termini. About 40 minutes left for train to depart.

9.25 am: Reach reservations counter, only to find long queue which clearly would not clear in the half hour that we had.

9.45 am: Debate on whether to risk boarding the train without reservation or give the train a miss and somehow reach Milan by 4.15 pm – which is when the same train would depart to Rome, after an hour’s stoppage in Milan. Using that one hour buffer we had to some how reach Milan.

10am: The Eurostar train to Paris chugs out and we are stranded in Rome with the Option B of getting to Milan.

10.25am: Intercity express to Venice. We board it, the plan was to get down at Florence and from there get the next avail train to Milan which as per the timetable would reach at 4pm, giving us 15 minutes for the Paris train.

10.30 am: We get out of the intercity seconds before it departs since there is no place to even stand in it.

10.50 am: Board a Eurostar train to Venice, with the same plan as above, but our hopes of catching the 4.15 train are fast diminishing. This train also required reservation, but we didn’t take it, since Florence was the next station after Rome and even if they throw us out they could do that only in Florence.

11 to 12.30: The Eurostar is also full and we don’t get seats. We travel alternatively standing and sitting by the door, looking more like refugees than tourists. (The pic shows our plight , true, shubada was slightly overacting ,but that was to sum up our feelings)The Ticket collector is kind enough to understand our plight and doesn’t charge us for the non reservation travel.

12.45 pm: Alight at Florence station. We have already used up the one hour buffer and there was no hope that we would catch the 4.15 train from Milan. The next task was to somehow get to Paris by next day morning before 10 am to catch the flight.

12.45 To 1.15 pm: Roam around the vicinity of the station looking for Eurolines buses which could take us to Milan / Paris. Search ends in vain as we do not find any with convenient timings. The buses leave in the evening and won’t reach Paris in time. We also looked out for Ryan air / Easy jet options, but do not get any lead.

1.30 pm: Get back to the station and decide to take the Intercity to Milan, which would reach by 6.30 pm. The Paris flight was looking increasingly far away.

6.30 pm: Reach Milan central. The next train to Paris is at midnight, which was ruled out. We once again looked for buses / cheap airlines. We made enquiries at the station, but of no avail. Get a contact of a nearby Eurolines bus station.

7pm: Take the Milan metro train and go to the Eurolines bus stop. The bus to Paris had left at 4 pm.

7.30 pm: Reach back to Milan central. It was decision making time. The flight was as good as gone, but we still were booked on it. Have to cancel it and rebook it for the next day. And for that we need to call them.

7.30 to 7.45pm: All efforts of trying to call Air France go in vain. Only option left to us was to go to the Milan airport and hope that it had an Air France booking office. The trouble was that Milan had 2 airports, located in diametrically opposite ends of the city and we had no idea Air France served which airport.

8pm: Board the shuttle bus from Milan station to Malpensa airport. A blind and costly gamble since the trip costs a good 20 euros and if Air France did not have an office we would be wasting time and money. People were getting increasingly frustrated and nervous. Luckily no one had broken down so far.

8 to 9 pm: The bus takes what looks like an eternity to reach Malpensa. Obviously the airport is located very far away from the city and if the airport did not have the air France office we were positively screwed. We were also running low on money and a few of us had already exhausted their wallets.

9pm: reach malpensa airport, the terminal is mostly deserted. Thankfully we find an Air France office which was to close in 15 minutes time. This was the first lucky break for us the whole day, where otherwise every plan of ours had been thwarted.

9.45 pm: After weighing a few options, including insane ones like flying to Paris by paying 200 euros or taking a cab to Paris for 1100 euros, we decide to cancel our next day tickets and rebook ourselves for the Monday morning flight.

10pm: Decide to spend the night at the airport itself. We were short on money and had no clue where to get ourselves a place for the night. It didn’t seem wise to go out so late in the night and then search. There would a shuttle bus leaving next day morning to Milan station.

10.30 pm: the end of an extraordinary and physically and mentally exhausting day. What began as a normal day ended as one of the most unforgettable days of ours lives. Constantly racing against time, we were defeated time and again and ended up giving up hope of catching our flight. Here we were in Milan airport, going to spend a night, hoping that we do not miss any trains or buses the next day. We did not have a flight to catch from Milan, nor did we alight from a flight at Milan, but we were spending a night there. A strange end to a strange day.