Day - 1: Departing from Mumbai

14th March 2006

I had got up early in the morning. To be honest, I had hardly slept. My adrenalin was running high, thinking about the trek and my visit to my bade papa. My flight to Mangalore was at 1.10 P. M. So I decided to pop in to the office and then leave. It was hard for my heart to leave my office. I dropped in the office and then hitched a ride on a bike to the airport. Dodging the traffic I reached the airport just in time! It was another story that Bhushan (the biker) was frisked by the police at the airport while I shamelessly took off. Armed with a haversack and the book of Tokyo cancelled, I waited for the flight to take off. Though the stories in the book were gripping, it hardly kept its grip on my mind, the enthusiasm constantly wearing the grip off. So I decided to pack it up and have a look around and take some time off to see what the world was up to.

The flight landed at Mangalore as scheduled at 2.30. I walked out of the airport, that reminded me of the old railway station in my village buzzing with little activities and cab owners shouting out in a heavily kannada-accented tone of English. With private taxis parked all around, I made my way through the hustle bustle outside the confines of the airport to find a cheaper way of transport. (Being from Bombay, I would not trust the taxi drivers, about their rates and their intentions) But alas, the place was in the middle of nowhere. I had to take a taxi. There are prepaid taxis available all the time, but when I heard their charges, I was zapped. Rs. 340 to Mulkhi which was a place 32 kms away from the airport. Mulkhi is a place that borders on the National Highway NH17. From here there was a bus every 5 minutes to Udupi and Brahmavar. I wandered around, checking the place. A man stood lonely in a corner, with his eyes pinned on his mobile. He would dial a number and keep the phone next to his ear and then out of disgust, disconnect it and redial again. I struck a conversation with him. Not very friendly, he tried to avoid. If not anything else, I could atleast talk to him about understanding the basic way to reach Barkur and the costs associated. He said he had to go to Udupi, but the taxi fare was Rs. 680.

“Why not share the taxi fare? We can both get to udupi at the cost of reaching Mulkhi!”

He was apprehensive of the offer. He looked away and then towards me.

“Okay, but I will sit behind and you will sit with the driver” he said.

Worked for me. God knows what he had in mind. Neverthless, the drive was another hour long and we were at Udupi by 4 o’clock. Rajan, badepapa’s son called up on the mobile. He had arranged for a pickup at Brahmavar bus stand. I was a little disappointed. There was once a bridge that used to connect the town of Brahmavar with Barkur, which had collapsed. So, to reach Barkur, I would have had to take a ferry that took me across a river and then a bus ride to badepapa’s home. With an arrangement to pick me up, I would be going by a 45 km ride missing the ferry ride.

In another 30 minutes, I was at Brahmavar bus stand and there was no body around. So I strolled across the road to a small little shop and asked for chai. The shop was a peculiar one. It looked as if it was built around a hand cart. The hand cart lay in its full glory, decorated with little miniature paintings, and a stove and some utensils and racks of eggs. I picked up a packet of chakli and looked around. In a T-shirt and cargo’s and a haversack hugging me tight, I stuck out in the immediate landscape like a sore thumb. People were looking at me as if I was in a zoo. I dug out Tokyo Cancelled and tried to avoid the stares being thrown at me.

The story was interesting. A story about a millionaire in Delhi who himself separates his kids… The phone rang. Rajan was standing at the bus stand. I spotted him and then hopped on to the car and my journey continued.

Before I reach badepapa’s house, here is a word of caution. He loves dogs. There are four of them. Four dogs who bite. I knew he loved dogs. He loved ME too! As the car entered the verandah of the house, I realized nothing had changed in the last two decades. The place was untouched by pollution of the human mind. Except for the pump house near the well and the solar panels attached on the mangalore tiled roof everything was the same. The living area had a huge cloth with a painted tiger on it, while on the other end, there were two posters of tiger cubs, guarding the way into a internal room. The dogs barked, marking my arrival. Thankfully they were all chained. It was already dusk. He had gone to his dispensary and would be back by 7.30, Rajan said. I sat there saying a few hellos to my bua and her servant, who appeared to have known me since I was two years old. According to her I just looked the same. (Was I 6 feet tall when I was two years old?) Later as they got back to their chores, I buried myself into the story of the billionaire with a gifted child locked in a tall tower.

At precisely 7.30, badepapa arrived. After that we spoke for hours. I told him and Rajan that I intended to climb up Kutachadri. Rajan replied an immediate profound no. There are naxalites in these places, he said. There was an attempt to bomb the Mookambika temple which was foiled and these naxalites are hidden at Kudachadri. My bua also got paranoid. She told me not to go there. Rajan was ready to accompany me to Mookambika and back so as to ensure that I would not climb the mountain ‘alone’. Good thing that he had work of preparing a botanical garden in the name of my grandfather at Barkur railway station, he could not accompany me. I assured them that I would spend the night at Kollur itself and wont trek up.