Mahabalipuram Tour

I wrote about my journey to Kalpakkam in my last post. In Kalpakkam, I stayed at my friend’s house. There, we all planned to visit Mahabalipuram the next day evening. We started off at 4 pm in Rahul’s cars from his house. We were 4 (me, rahul, Chandra and srinu) in number, all in our three-fourths(bermudas). Finally we left Anupuram and headed towards Mahabalipuram. Here I should mention about Rahul’s driving which was really good or rather better than what I expected. We went through the road called ECR. I earlier read somewhere on the internet that this specific road is best for nature buffs. Well as we went through the road, it proved itself. Again prior to my Mahabalipuram trip it rained heavily in Anupuram at around 3pm. So the weather was nice with slight sunlight. “This had to be an ultimate visit” I mumbled to myself. The cool breeze made my creative self to come out and started finding words to describe the nature. This is the essence of nature.
We reached Mahabalipuram. I could hear the roars of the waves at the beach. Mahabalipuram was famous for its Shore temple. If we go a bit factual this place is listed on the world heritage sites being famous for monolithic stone temples. We walked into the Shore temple premises. I was amazed to see such a historic temple standing just beside the sea. It is said that there were 7 temples like the one standing now but all got submerged into the sea some centuries back. . I would like to bring to your notice that this place was also one of the places seriously affected during the Tsunami which hit Tamil Nadu. Tsunami caused the dislocation of some of the temple parts which were later brought into their places when found. The temple was completely carved out of only one stone and so is called ‘Monolithic’. Such a standing beauty beside the sea mesmerized me. We went into the temple and found that it was under renovation and anyways our purpose of visit was served. I did some photography of the temple and then went to the beach. There was a huge rush of the people there. The beauty of the beach was so ravishing that it could spellbind anyone. We walked along the shore with waves hitting our feet only. We enjoyed that. Now we moved back to our car while on the way I saw some shops which sold bangles, bags, wrist bands...Our next destination was Arjuna’s Penace and the Lighthouse. By the time we reached there, we found that the gate was closed. On enquiry with the local people, we got to know that we could jump over the fence and go inside. We tried and went inside. Here, I saw a stone…no…no, a boulder which was standing still on a slippery rock and I was told that many body-builders from across the country were called to destabilize the rock but none could do that. Even the mighty Tsunami couldn’t do any harm to that. That was the history of that ‘Boulder’. Now we went to the lighthouse where we saw how the lighthouse in olden days used to be with a contrasting modern one beside it only. All along the path I could see caves and ‘Mantralayas’ which were used in the olden days. Then we headed to a Venkateswara temple nearby as it was Saturday. We visited the temple and went back to our den by 8.30pm.

Now that was a truly memorable evening. The most unforgettable part was the beach which has always been the most satisfying spot of enjoyment for me. This place specially the beach and the caves gave me an idea of writing a book on my tour to Tamil Nadu but then it sparkled to me that people may misinterpret that book as a tourist guide and would only abuse me if they find this kind of description. So, I immediately dropped that idea and thought of writing this post on my blog. I would like to thank Rahul, his bro and his friend Srinu for such a wonderful evening.

My Journey from Ranipet to Kalpakkam

Friday is a day (in a 5-day-a-week work) when our mind is busy thinking of the weekend to come next and so was mine. After my office work-time was over I was very excited about the trip to Kalpakkam and quickly boarded the bus to my guest house and then I packed all the necessary items into the bag and started off. I had to go through Kanchipuram then Chengalpattu and then to Kalpakkam.
I took the bus from my guest house (ESI) to Muthu Kadi (the nearest bus stand from where I can board buses for long distances). I asked the nearby people about the bus to Kanchipuram in Tamil (P.S. I don’t know to speak Tamil but tried to). “Kanchipuram bus enga?” This I tried to learn which I still don’t know whether it is correct or not but it worked. My job was done. A lady who understood that I didn’t know Tamil asked if I knew Hindi and then advised me to go to the other side of the bus stand and ask a person who would be shouting the names of the places to go. Here I saw a short person who was constantly doing the same thing as indicated by the lady. I thought of asking this person about the bus. Well, he answered with his sign language to wait and was speaking – “Vellore, Katpadi…Vellore,Katpadi”. I understood. The bus that was standing was bound to vellore and katpadi but my bus was still to come. Now I asked a person in my broken accent of Tamil and swallowing the last words of the sentence as which number bus would go to Kanchipuram. He answered me 156 in ‘English’. Then, came the bus to Kanchipuram. I quickly boarded the bus along with the heavy rush. I luckily got a seat and then enquired a person sitting beside me, “what time it would take to reach Kanchipuram?” He said “This bus would take one and half-an-hour.” Then I understood why people were rushing into the bus. The bus conductor came and I took the tickets for Kanchipuram which costedme around Rs.13. Well, now the journey went well as I had to sit for 1.5 hours without any job but to look out of the window. A point to be noted that the weather was truly awesome as rain had fallen that evening. So I was literally happy at my heart enjoying the nature’s blessings. Then I reached Kanchipuram.
I was told by my friend Rahul to board the bus for Chengalpattu or direct bus to Kalpakkam that meant the bus no 157. Now I was pretty confident that I wouldn’t get the direct bus and so happened. I boarded the bus for Chengalpattu and did the same thing again. But this time the answer was forty to fifty minutes and I didn’t get a window seat also. This person whom I had asked about the time was also going to Kalpakkam, so he said that he would help me to reach Kalpakkam.
Forty minutes past we got down the bus at Chengalpattu and waited for bus number 108 which goes to Kalpakkam. Now this was to be the last bus (the last segment) I had to board to reach Kalpakkam. I took a seat which I luckily got though and called up Rahul who asked me to call when I would reach Thirukulakundram (sorry if the name is spelt wrong, I interpreted it so). Now the problem was how would I know if that specified place had come. Again my mind started working and it recollected all the Tamil words it had in its memory and sent me a status message of “No proper words for the situation”. Now my creative mind started working on sign language and successfully it conveyed to the person sitting next to me who specified clearly that “Only Tamil!” He also answered in his signs that he would get down at Thirukulakundram. I was happy and I started listening to my mp3 player. In the mean time I forgot that I hadn’t taken any ticket and suddenly the bus stopped. The person beside me got down. I realized that it was time for me to call Rahul. I did so as the bus headed to Anupuram (one of the township of Kalpakkam Nuclear plant) . Then as a very decent and responsible citizen of India, I raised my hand and said that I didn’t have a ticket. The bus conductor started to blabber something in Tamil. I said – “ennaku tamil teriyadu…” Now again he started to say something in Tamil which I felt had some aggression in it. Everyone in the bus started to glare or rather look at me as if I was any culprit who killed the driver and the bus has stopped. To confirm I looked diagonally to the outside of the window and I found that the bus was running which meant the driver was safe. Now the conductor gave me the ticket and asked me to pay the money on the ticket. Well, the good news was that he didn’t fine me for that. I tried to decode what the bus conductor said and understood that he said “This guy doesn’t know Tamil but knows how to say I don’t know Tamil in the same language” I couldn’t react but learnt a lesson that never say you don’t know the language in the same language. It can be really very dangerous.
Finally Anupuram came and got down and I saw Rahul waiting for me in his Hyundai Santro. Aah…!!! I reached Kalpakkam and Rahul took me to his home. This was about my journey from Ranipet to Kalpakkam. This journey was only for 3.5 hours but was one of the interesting journeys I ever had.