India - My Life within and without

I couldn't sleep very well a night before but I had to wake up as per Arun's order so when he tried to wake everyone up..no one got up but me and I told Meha to wake up and she said something in Gibberish, which sounded like 'I am not waking up this early'...and I went back to sleep..with a weird headache. Two hours later we were all doing some thing or other, yelling, screaming, talking in our ways and getting ready to go..Meha talking on phone, Sohyun putting up make-up, Samir is in shower, Smita fixing things and Arun on laptop and I was just being lazy and thinking about my weird headache roots...oh well!!!!

So finally we left the motel and reached to a place called South end of the park. Samir took separate way than we did so he reached straight to the south entrance gate and we were sent from other entry as parking lot over there was full. We again took the shuttle, it was crowded..obviously lots of people were out for July 4th weekend. Meha & I got seats and we started talking to Indian family standing next to us and came to know they are from Pakistan and they are like most of Indians and Pakistanis (Desis in American style) wants to visit each others countries and see the other side...(will write some other time about it)

After reaching to the place, where tram tickets are available and where you get in to trams to start a visit in to the giants, yes the giant trees..those are known as Sequoia. We had to wait a little before we get in touch with Samir and Smita but eventually we were one group together and got into the same tram. While checking the trees and the whole walk I was kept thinking about walking through those big trees and going and touching them rather just listen to the story about it and seeing from far, but that's the disadvantage we have to live with, when we are in group. Anyhow we reached to the museum and saw the beautiful trees and lovely surroundings..I planned to go walking all the way back which was around 2 miles but......at the second stop I decided that its just 0.8 miles and I DO want to walk back, surprisingly the whole group was ready...we gave our headphones etc back to the tram driver and went to see the tunnel in the tree...
Yes!!! this was a tunnel in the tree and it is beautiful, we all took different, weird, fun pictures at that small place and suddenly noticed a deer...ya ya ya its a National park and animals are part of it etc etc etc...Deer was beautiful and we were just staring at it..took few pics and few more and few more...and started walking/hiking. I was feeling relaxed and easy by now as I was able to make a connections with trees and place..I went to touch few trees and took pics of tons of giants...laughing out loud, singing, eating and teasing each other we reached to the entrance of the giant tour..

Now we had some thoughts and some plans for the rest of the day but we missed our shuttle so we did the Indian thing - we 6 people sat in one car, a two door ford..and reached back to the south entrance. By this time it was around 4. We were not tired but hungry, really hungry but...got no place to eat. After digging in our bags we found nothing but snacks in our backpacks..so holding our real appetite and dreams to make the trip a success, we started our journey to the most spectacular view of the world, Glacier point....but before that...few pics...

Continuing.....


After experiencing waterfall and climbing rocks, we started our walk...ate a little, had one more beer and took the shuttle...all of us were giggling and joking in the shuttle and singing Hindi songs with full masti and fun...and a comment from another fellow Indian American (?) arre yahan to live sa re ga ma chalu hai...saale...**giggle**

while we were in the shuttle I noticed a beautiful lake, a lovely scenery and I insisted on getting down the shuttle so we can go and enjoy a little over there...Arun was a bit pissed but he finally liked it (I guess) I loved that peaceful and lovely place. It was nice and beautiful...enjoyed a bit took few pics, walked on small bridge...went back to shuttle stand, took the shuttle to next stop. We were supposed to see some bridge but I am not sure which one was that cos we never went to any bridge afterwords but we did some hiking, some masti, some singing and some more photography.

At the end of the day when everyone was pretty much dead tired we took shuttle to Curry Village...managed to get seats and ate whatever was available...and by this time we all had enough of walking, singing, photography and masti...although I was not done with photography but my camera SD card was full and I had no ability to click more :(((

Taking a shuttle was easy but the driver told us to shut the loud music we were playing from our phone :(( actually good cos we were seriously live singing team by then...

As it was a National Park it was dark..and I mean it DARK is not just a little dark, it was deep, unknown, unseen dark all over and weird feeling...cell phone light was the shinny light...there was no light but a man in trolley kind of vehicle with light on his head was driving here to there to no where...We managed to locate our cars and the moment we Sat in it, we were sure, tonight is going to be a long night...we were really tired and irritated with tiredness.

We reached to 'Patel Motel' safely and first thing we did was checking emails and changing and go to sleep...I took longer as I wanted to transfer my pictures to laptop and then charge the battery of my camera. While we were doing that we had another beer and in an hour we all were deep a sleep to wake up only in at 6.30 in the morning..or at least that's what we thought...

V

I went to Yosemite with few friends on July 4th weekend. It was my first holiday with friends in almost 7 years...All these years I was going for holiday with HIM..but as he is not in life, I finally planned to take a vacation and arranged everything...We left on July 3rd 2008 at around 7.30. Arun, one of team mate was driving and he really scared the hell out of all...He was driving fast and a bit rough...anyways we reached Yosemite inn safely and met with Samir and Smita, who joined us from Fremont...we were kept chatting until it was 3 AM. Meha yelled at all of us to go to sleep so we can actually go to Yosemite national park next day instead of sleeping in our rooms.

Next day we woke up and got ready and left for national Park...OMG!!!! the moment we went half a mile away from hotel, it was all beautiful rocks and lovely skoa trees...we could not take out eyes off and camera shutters were kept clicking one after another. We didn't stop on the way even after we wanted to cos we planned to reach the destination was more beautiful plan for us. We reached to the national park inside at around 2.30 and took a shuttle and went to visitor center. Took all the info and bought some sandwiches and beer and went hiking for Yosemite waterfall...we stopped far from waterfall thinking this is the real view and went crazy with pictures and poses. Anyhow we finished some sandwiched and few beers and started the hike again...we were kept walking and suddenly I noticed the place which is THE REAL WATERFALL...we couldnt take our eyes off that beautiful place and serene calm water flowing through the mountains. I took my shoes off and threw away my backpack and just jumped into the water and while crossing all rocks I managed to climb half the way when I looked back and saw Samir was in the water...yes he fell down..oh well, poor chap lost his cell, camera and few bucks in the water. He found the camera and cell but both were not working...:(((
I was pretty far at this point, I easily could have gone down, but the beauty of waterfall pulled me and I kept climbing up...I stopped after reaching write next to the fall, water was soaking me and I was lying on the big rock..this was the time when I felt really really serene...calm and peaceful. I thought even if I wont go to any other sight of national park, I will be fine with it cos its worth the money and fun to be here right now.
At water fall I noticed one funny thing, weird too I guess...all those people who reached at the top were mostly Indians, mostly means around 80%. It was funny for me but another truth was they were mostly Gujjus...ha ha
Oh well, This was the first step...we got to experience much more than this beautiful fall....
To be continued..

पतंग कट गई
उड़ गई डोरी अकेले
साथ देने का वायदा जो किया था
वो डोरी आज है कहीं
पतंग है कहीं और

इस पतंग के संग रही डोरी
इस डोरी ने उड़ना तो सिखा ही
संग दिया उड़ने का भरोसा भी
सिखा डोरी ने जीना
तो सिखाया जीना भी
सहना ढेर सा
सह पाना उस से ज़्यादा
उस सहने की हिम्मत गई जब थम
उड़ गए वो अकेले अकेले
अपनी दिशा की ओर...
पतंग और पतंग की डोरी...

© Vim

July 03 2008
4.33 AM