Hunterwalla

Shambhu's latest antics have left me with mixed feelings. After being labelled "dumb" and "stupid" by almost everyone, he left us quite zapped by catching a sparrow the other day. We didn't actually see it happen but found the evidence on the carpet in the form of some feathers and spots of blood. I have seen him also frequently pounce on and dismember lizards, which makes me groan because I personally find lizards not only cute but useful to have around as the bigger ones catch the cockroaches.

So on the one hand I find this bloody sport rather difficult to handle but on the other hand when I see Shambhu having such a good time I get confused. It's all in the game I suppose. The lad has now been galivanting like crazy, he is sometimes out for twelve hours in a day. Yesterday he left home at 4 in the afternoon and returned at 3 in the morning, yowling away to tell us he was back again. He is currently stretched out on the sofa, dead to the world. Guess he's had a hard day.

Goa November

What really got me gaping at the Mumbai airport as I sat waiting for the flight to Bangalore two weeks back, was this spiffy floor cleaning machine which just whizzed past me, leaving behind it a spanking clean surface. The new airport at Bombay really is quite nice I must say and pretty well organized.

Landing in Bangalore we were greeted by heavy rain which followed us most of the way to Neredu 2. Venky and George picked me up from the airport and we set off immediately, reaching Neredu 2 by late evening.

We had the meditation at Lallu and Bullu's place this time (I am still waiting for photos from Sharat) and it turned out to be also a very good place for us, especially the balcony outside their bedroom overlooking the green valley and surrounding hills.

The workshop brought us all much closer together and we had some fun times lounging around in Lallu and Bullu's courtyard, with Lallu mostly reclining in the hammock. It rained throughout though and the solar panels were not able to provide any electricity this time so we were quite dependent on the generator for lights and our music as well. The nice thing about the rains was that the weather was wonderfully cool which is something to be grateful for as October can be rather warm in that area.

View from the first guest house I stayed in

Goa was a dream as usual, and this time in Agonda we found a spectacular place by the sea, quite by accident. Sudha and I had driven down from Bangalore on the 26th with Shiv and Indira and Uma L joined us a day later. At first we all stayed in quite a nice guest house which was a five minute walk from the sea but on the third day we saw this place called "Sunset Point" which was right on the beach and it just so happened that that very day one room had got free. So Sudha and I jumped at it and within an hour, had moved our bags over and just didn't regret it. The unfortunate thing is that a lot of other people know about it so it is quite full till almost the end of March. Or so the owner says.

At sunset time

The other people staying there turned out to be a rather nice bunch. There was a French couple, bodies entirely tattooed over, a handsome Portuguese man who took the front most room by the sea, a guy who seemed to be a French Algerian and an Israeli who was surprisingly friendly, who was in the room next to Sudha's and mine, who even made us a cup of filter coffee one morning on his camping stove.


As soon as I get additional pics from Uma L and Sharat I'll post them.

"Ummery" (Humphrey) the friendly old mongrel at Sunset Point