River Rafting

WHITE WATER RAFTING – Dec 07
I had heard about white water rafting a lot. Sometimes I saw the adventure sports in ESPN and wondered how these guys do it? And then I got a chance to experience it so I pounced on that chance like an eagle pouncing on its prey and next thing I knew that I was going as white water rafting hike 2 i/c. Finally, a batch passed out and the roar of excited cadets dancing and singing madly over their achievement was reaching my ears from far away. I must tell you it’s the most emotional moment in cadet’s life, I undoubtedly remembered mine, moist eyes, lump in the throat, the mixed feeling of being happy and sad as you climb the quarter deck, the screeching noise of fighter aircrafts doing a low level fly past to give a final touch to the ceremony and a perfectly orchestrated symphony of “ All Liang Sang” at the background leaves a permanent imprint in our heart and our mind. I checked my watch and my back side fired up like a fighter aircraft putting on reheat...I rushed to my room and packed up my stuff coz I had to catch NDA special. The group consisted of 20 cadets and 02 officers’. One was me and the other my great pal Lt Aswini Trichal...well I must tell you that it will be unjustified and blasphemous if I don’t write anything about this individual. My dear friend is blessed with an ability to find a humour in every situation of life...he is a very good actor...imitates almost everyone...laughs out loud...really loud... and as far as driving is concerned, he would probably be able to replace Michael Schumacher if ever required. His only passion is to drive a Volvo bus someday in his life and he has great taste buds...he eats almost everything that moves, crawls, fly. He calls himself North American Brown bear owing to the thick dense hairy forest on his body. Sometimes when he swims you can only see a black mass moving in the water. But nothing matches his spirit, his will and definitely his heart. He’s a great guy...There had been so many occasions wherein me and sir had gone for night trekking to Karpa and Raleras (names of hillocks at NDA) to capture the glow of city in our cameras...we sat there watching stars and tried figuring out some constellations that we learned during our astro navigation classes. We did sometimes sat in silence of dark and stared at the endless skies and directed majority of our thoughts towards the second innings that we were playing at NDA.......errr!!! I think it’s almost impossible not to get swept away when u are pouring your good moments...Well, we had a warm welcome by Snow Leopard Adventure Group, they were the host for river rafting expedition...The river sand is very soft and finer than the coastal sand...as I tried to get a grip of this fine sand in my fist, I realised that it just slips no matter how hard to try...And as I write this line, I would like to mention a few lines from this beautiful spiritual fiction called “ Krishna”...and I quote “Rukmini was overwhelmed when she saw the mighty ocean as she arrived at Dwarka along with the man of her dreams, Krishna. She saw the white waves breaking over the coast and the noise they produced was like a welcome note for the divine couple, she stooped and took some sand in her fist and looked at Krishna with eyes full of Love, her eyes were so full that her love would probably spill out of her eyes as a tear. Krishna smiled as he looked at Rukmini, his beloved wife, whom he had abducted from the clichés of her father and brother. He smiled at her as she stood there looking at the sand that slipped through her fist...Krishna knew it’s not the sand she was holding, it was the time which was slipping out of her fist...the time is the ruler of all our human lives” unquote. We got trained for next two days in an absolute freezing water of Ganges and that too during the month of December. Third day we started rafting from rudraprayag, which also happens to be the place of sangam of two rivers viz mandakini and alaknanda...As we lowered our rafts we saw the first rapid, it was the meeting point of two rivers...I finally understood why it’s called as white water rafting...the water was white at the rapid and was spilling in all directions violently...my throat dried ...who doesn’t love himself man!!!!!And I was neither married nor did I had a girl friend...damn I said to myself....all good things in life are either “Illegal, Fattening or Married to others”. As our raft picked up speed and banged into the rapid, me and trichal sir got the first splash of water as we were seated right at the front...It was fun!!!! Out of the world experience...thereafter it was series of rapids small and big after every 200 to 300 meters and we had a great time shouting over as we crossed without being toppled anywhere...so far so good! The first day came to an end and we pitched our tents at a river beach at Vyas ghat...spent a night and started next morning looking forward for a great bumpy ride...we all really loved it...the better part of rafting in December was the level of water was considerably low in the river and therefore better rapids...Second day was great...we did encounter a few good rapids and a few easier ones. We stopped at Dhara Devi, that’s a temple on a hillock, for our lunch, followed by a good fresh water spring bath just few miles away...it was nice to take bath after three days...Now came the doomsday...as briefed we were to encounter difficult rapids on the penultimate day of our expedition. We had successfully reached Raiwala without a raft being toppled in any of the rapids. The rafters were appreciating our JOSH. Then came the mai baap of all the rapids named “The Wall”...You must have heard that perspective is very important, well I can swear to god who so ever said that is true. We just had a Glimpse of ‘The Wall’ from downstream, it looked difficult and scary but we thought we can pull this one. Our instructor decided to stop and take a look, he told us to accompany...Ah! Here comes the perspective thing...as we walked some 300 to 400 meters on the beach to have a side view of the rapid...we felt our stomach roaring and all sorts of adjectives were heard from everyone standing there. The rapid started with a fall of about 3.5 meters followed by two holes ( A hole is an area where one can see a splash as the water gushes through the rock...thats where you see the white water splashing like a fountain) So finally we decided to run through it...My dear friend trichal...who always found great deal of humour in every situation of life was very serious...and trust me I could not stop laughing coz he looked tremendously funny with the expression of shitting bricks on his face at that moment...well don’t ask how I felt...I am not supposed to write that...ours was the last raft...We saw the first raft entering the rapid...suddenly it disappeared as the fall came and next thing I saw was the black belly of the raft and some human figures dispersed in the air like someone has just blown a grenade...the first raft toppled...and as the second raft approached the fall I was getting goose bumps...I could see the desperate fight to save the raft and guess what !! They succeeded. Now I knew it’s inevitable to turn around the raft and even if eight of us would have done that with all our strength we could have probably gained nothing more than two to three meters against the strong flow of Ganga. Our guide shouted “ Hard Forward”...trust me you guys all of us pulled the hardest stroke ever...and then we could feel the straight drop of 3 to 4 meters followed by two strong waves of water against our raft as we hit the holes...the raft banked to the right as we were thrown by the splash, our guide shouted “ Over left” and all of us sitting on the right side jumped on to the left side to balance the raft...our reflexes saved us that day....we recovered our friends who were scattered downstream..We really had a good laugh later! Phew!!!...After that we entered the plains of Srinagar where the flow slowed down. We had to pull to get some speed. Another halt at one of the beaches for the night and we were all set next day early morning for finale of our expedition. We rafted another 35 km and reached our destination. On the final rapid our instructor told us to jump out of the raft...we thought he’s joking...he wanted us to go through a rapid floating...Its called body surfing, cadets were as usual more than excited and they jumped in the water the very next moment. Me and Trichal sir were looking at each other, I said “Sir, Izzat ka sawal hai, cadets dekh rahe hain”... we jumped. The water was freezing, but we had a rocking time and we shouted on top of our voices as we were thrown up and down in the rapid...it was really fun. We had a nice hot lunch served at the river beach. Took a nap, really needed it. We went to the temple in the evening to thank god to have helped us through this without any eventualities. It was an amazing experience that would live in my heart like blue print and at some point of time I will look back and say “Been there, Done that.”

Second Innings !

My First Day at NDA as a Divo: It’s Different

Well, today is 24 Nov 09 and it’s just another day in my life which happens to go on slow and steady like the calm seas and fair weather awaits the arrival of storm. Mind you, looks are always deceptive.....I sometimes think who so ever came out with this idea was a true genius or had been a guy who had been kicked around at every possible juncture like a football in European league. To my parents my life seems to be a steady flowing river with small bends and to my friends it seems like a calm stagnant lake...By stagnant I intend to put across the idea of a life like a ‘Dull’ lake with no ripples unless disturbed. I wish to write a lot, whatever comes to my mind bcoz I wrote this thought “You should express yourself to know yourself”. It has been about good two and half years that I have completed as Divisional Officer at National Defence Academy, well a chance that every ex NDA prays for, to go back to the institution where you were born. National Defence Academy has a glorious past and a past which is full of selflessness, sacrifice, glory, victory, camaraderie, brotherhood, unity and the spirit so unshakable. It’s indeed a privilege to have been a graduate of this fine institution and then go back to play second innings and to make up for whatever you left behind. So I landed up at the portals of NDA. As I stepped inside and took a deep breath, the smell of land and ofcourse the stables right next to the glider dome brought back some of the most horrifying situations that I had ever been through. The sinking feeling gripped me...I saw the vast extent of glider dome ...I could hear some voices behind me “Come on you sati!!Run harder! I want you to catch up with that alpha guy”. I pulled myself out of those sinking thoughts and looked at the serene view of green valley, open land, fresh air, and the liveliness of cadets on basketball courts. Everything was same nothing had changed. I looked up at the blue sky and tried very hard to have a glimpse of god to thank him for such a wonderful posting although I couldn’t see him but I thanked him anyway and as my sight got back to mother earth, my eyes strained to recognise a well built structure walking towards me in green uniform and beret with red and black hackle on it. The recognition came like reflex to me and I wanted to turn around and run out of the very portals I just entered. The figure came right in front and stamped, saluted and shouted “Jai Hind Saab”. He was my drill instructor, Subedar Shinde, I tried really hard to give a reaction but somehow was astonished by the fact that instead of MOT (Maal on Trishul – A term that describes a sizzling hot girl i.e any female species for cadets) my eyes got a warm welcome which was miraculously unexpected. I saw myself running in KD’s round the parade ground, doing flat foot, running ET’s and doing academy whiskey. My drill instructor had not changed a bit except for a mature look on his face...mature means deadly and khunkhar. Well god definitely was laughing rather he was definitely bursting into laughter coz he had again put me in a catch 22 situation. I must share that god is more biased towards drill instructors. He keeps them in shape so that they can sort out people like me and many more like me in the academy. I thought he’s going to say “I slip out” but instead it was nice to hear from him “Kaise Ho Saab”. I must tell you it’s an out of the world feeling to meet your instructors’ who have trained you at the academy...the bond shared is very special though you go on and ship in your stripes but they remain your instructors all your life. We exchanged pleasantries’ and I moved on towards officers’ mess. While driving I was gripped by nostalgia, it was like a python grips his prey, just waiting for prey to breath so that he can tighten the grip. I stopped at my squadron, my home for three best years of my life. I slowly walked across to my room in CQ flank where I once ruled. Everything was same, untouched, preserved like a mummy in the pyramids. It’s very strange sometimes that apart from humans we do make bonds with stones, concrete and iron. I felt bonded to that building, for a common visitor it’s just like a hostel where cadets’ live but for a cadet it’s his world within a world, where he is born, groomed , grilled and finally carved into a soldier. We as Ex NDA’s are in debt of this concrete and iron and bricks, this is what defines us, this is our existence, and the name of this concrete structure is the name by which we call proudly call ourselves for rest of our lives. We fight tooth and nail for all three years for the colours of this brick and iron to find ourselves and our existence in the midst of a long lasting saga. We invest sweat and blood to find a name and a place in this building...a soldier may not be taught how to invest in his earnings but he is definitely taught how to invest in his faith....it’s the faith that keeps him alive in the face of annihilation. I started my bike, and drove very slowly, as slow as I have never driven before coz I wanted to capture every moment, it was like a chance to capture panorama which you know will never be available. Immediately knew it was time to finish some things that I had left behind as a cadet and the only words that I could think of were “Life’s Beautiful”...

Eureka !!

The Beginning
The man was born a gift called “Power of expression”. We “The Humans” are the special child of god and have been blessed with ability to speak, to write and definitely to express ourselves with our five basic senses. Out of all five senses, ‘The ability to see’ is most important. Before we begin a task we do visualise in our mind, whether it’s a dish you are cooking or the way u intend to propose the love of your life, all we do is give our thoughts a strong frame to hang on. The power of expression is something which is potent enough to ignite the minds, heart and soul of human beings. After all it’s about emotions. Some people are god gifted when it comes to articulation of thoughts into speech and others’ like me have to work towards it by trying to write whatever lights up in their mind. As I expressed my musings, a thought struck me like a lightning followed by a roar that said “You should express yourself to know yourself”. As I write this page I have definitely taken a step towards what I had thought. Lest I forget, special thanks to my great pal Buzu for introducing me to the free world of writing...Thanks Dude!!!