I wanna hug her once more..

I wish I could hug my mom once more, just once more.

Mom is such a wonderful creation of God. I remember one song from my school days...
God's love is so wonderful.. now I think it should be
mom's love is so wonderful..
so deep u cant get under it
so high u cant get over it
so wide u cant get around it
Oh.. wonderful love!

Losing mom is the worst thing that can happen. Even after nearly one and a half years of losing her, I cry like I have lost her yesterday. I have realised that, this life is going to be a lot tougher without her.

As soon as I lost her, I told myself that I have to be brave and face life. I told myself that I should support my dad more than ever. I thought that, as days and years pass by, I would slowly get over it. Now I know, I can never get over it. Whenever I come home she used to be there to welcome me, when I fell sick she was there to care, when I came home late she would be so worried, when I achieved something she was the first one I would tell, and she would feel proud. She was there for the smallest of my joys and through all my miseries. I am what I am because of my mom.

After she passed away, I have been getting lucky at all materialistic things. All that I had desired for, is coming true, as if my mom is doing it all for me, from up there. But, all I want is my mom, so that I could hug her and tell her how much she means to me and how much I love her.

White water rafting at Sita Nadi

My friends and I started off from Bangalore to Hebri (near Udupi) on a Friday night. Most of us were exited about the travel as we were traveling in a sleeper couch. We played UNO for sometime and then drifted off to sleep forgetting the hectic week and looking forward for the awaiting adventure.

We reached Hebri Forest guest house around 10am. It was raining and everything around looked fresh deep green. What a treat for our eyes! We met our friends who were supposed to join us from Mysore. The guide over there told us that we’ll be rafting only in the afternoon. So we had lots of time on our hands. We freshened up and had the yummy breakfast (Neer dosa, idli and vada). We were then sipping our coffee near the bridge looking at the other team who were all set to go rafting. The nature looked so perfect; the sita river was flowing to its brim, submerging a few trees and shrubs at its banks. The shrubs never seem to mind, swaying along with the flow of water. It was raining and the rain drops made beautiful patterns in the water.

We then trekked to a small shiva temple nearby. We saw a variety of gigantic butterflies. Everything was good except for the leeches. We later went to Hebri to have our lunch at a homely mess. Hmm.. the food was simple but tasty. We came back to the forest guest house and got ready to go rafting. We put on our life jackets and helmets and carried our rafts to the river. The instructor gave us instructions on how to row, how not to panic if we fell out of the raft and how to come back to the raft. We were a bit scared but the enthusiasm overcame the fear factor.

Gets it go.. off on the raft .. flowing along the river! Two rafts and a kayak sailed off together. A nepali person was our instructor. In the beginning he was just testing our rowing skills and gave us some rafting gyaan. He told us how he had lost his front tooth while rafting as if it would encourage us! In five minutes of our rafting, one guy from our raft lost control and fell into the water. We were stunned! Our instructor pulled him back on to our raft. He went on to tell that that this was nothing compared to rafting in rivers in foothills of Himalayas. Rafting went on with few peaceful moments. There was dense forest on both the sides of the river. We spotted a few birds like peacock, kingfisher etc. Then our guide said that there was a snake on a tree branch and we all were eager to see it. In our eagerness we rowed with so much of energy that my guide and few of us next him were right under the snake! It was a blank and white striped viper. Thankfully we rowed away from it with equal force. After that we rowed to a calm area and all of us jumped off the raft to float in water. I do not know swimming and it was a great experience floating in the water, looking towards the sky and rain drops hitting our face. By then a friend of mine who also didn’t know swimming had sailed off very far, he called for help which we never heardL. Finally he got hold of the kayak sailing nearby. He was hanging like a monkey to it until our raft arrived there. We missed our camera to capture this shot J After sometime we were nearing a pillar of a bridge, and to our knowledge we were going to have a head on collision with it. We looked at our instructor questioningly and all he did was to laugh! In seconds our raft collided with the pillar and the front three guys/gals were thrown into the raft! We went on to fall into the raft yet again while passing a strong current. After all the excitement the rafting ended. We wanted more of it I say! Anyway all good things come to an end. We had lot more fun than the guys in the other raft because of our daring instructor. We returned back to the forest guest house and then, back to Namma Bengaluru with a memorable and adventurous rafting experience.

Speaking to an innocent child

I was busy coding on a boring Monday afternoon. Suddenly my phone rings and I pick the call thinking it is one of my colleagues. I say hello in a sleepy voice, and inturn I hear a very sweet child's voice saying "Hello, can I speak to Rohini Aunty?". My voice melted and I started to converse in my sweeted voice possible :). It was my colleague's daughter calling at my desk because she could not reach her dad on phone. I told her that I would ask her dad to call back when he returns to his seat. I asked her if she had any message for her dad. She enthusiastically said that she had become the monitor of her class! I congratulated her and ended the call.

After a minute she calls back and asks "Has my dad gone out to smoke?" For a second I went silent. We as grown ups dont realize what goes on in a child's mind when the elders do things that the child knows are bad. I was really touched by the words from an innocent child. If I were smoking, I really would have quit after speaking to this child.