muniya re muniya

[ #1 : NOTES FROM DALHOUSIE ] A clear day is all I wait for after rains. And a few rays of the sun at such a time at Dalhousie would pull you out of your coop. Once they arrive, the monsoons! Misty evenings, white sky, new insects arrive by default. And no wonder why we find all the nearby Punjabis travelling to here during scorching summers. Its a cold charm. "The Pouring Sun...Blazing Summers...All Despite...Dalhousie is respite!" A shower in the early morning with sun peeping by the noon, a white sky follows in the evening for a pleasant walk into the misty road where everything wet succumbs to the dark silent night as if no sign of life till the death of the moon. I walk. Out at 6:45 evening. Or perhaps 7. Its the time of the day I wait for and pray it doesn't rain. Mostly it rains near and about the time if it does so I am almost saved. Call it a near miss, my evening walk and the unpredictable rains. Its the gush of people at the Subhash Chowk on the ...

On A Random Day HILL ARCHITECTURE Revolving around the quiet reserve of the hills, it is the architecture that resiliently responds to the climate on the hills where the structures are allowed to rest in the lap of mountains and buildings cling to the terraces creating a setup befitting a picturesque frame. The vernacular architecture in the hills effectively survives on the fundamental materials locally available letting the architecture not overlook but surrender beautifully to the nature. Though merging, it still emerges. Swinging in architecture :  " This piece is based on a random architectural observation and how a simple façade could be thought provoking drawing the lines on hilly realms." A s I sit swinging under the partial shades of the Deodars, I am caught by a carved design on .   the wall parallel to the level of ventilating windows. Ventilating windows, high enough as I see them for a single storied residence. This floral attempt as I percei...

" And thereafter the Genie granted Ali's wish. He ran into the ground to catch miraculous and extremely tiny white candies. The moment he caught them, they melted. It was a game. A game he had never played before.  Genie watched the evolving happiness on Ali's face. Now the Genie's account had turned empty. There were no more wishes to be granted. He had fulfilled his term on this earth. It was his last to grant somebody happiness. He would then move back to 'Parilok'.  Ali looked up and opened up his mouth wide. He could feel the cold porous candies into his mouth. Soon after, by the evening, the ground transformed into the view of an unbroken sheet of white. Ali made sure he does not slip on this grand mat which he had just put his foot on.                 'Slow and steady, Ali.'       Genie asserted. Ali felt a mild hit on his shoulder, of something, that split into pieces the moment it hit him. He glitte...

And Ruskin Bond in his every second chapter spoke about Barbets. Rain in the Mountains. A Barbet. What was that? Something I had never heard of. I googled and found a bird I had never seen in my life. And as Sir Ruskin spoke about it again and again, I began to look here and there thinking if it can be found in Uttarakhand then Himachal Pradesh can be no less. One fine day, sitting under the partial shades of Deodars once again in Dalhousie, I was swinging to and fro. Quiet and all by myself, I glanced at a bird flying from the top of a Deodar to the other. It was far enough for my eyes to recognize what flew but I could ensure it was green. And felt overjoyed assuming I spotted a Barbet. I began to look for it daily but to my disappointment I never spotted another. I shifted to Mandi with my friends for two months due to the purpose of training. A ten minutes walk to the office from home, that is how it went. Once we were walking along the road and just one turn ahead of my home...

19-07-16 Today was the fourth day. I hoped to see him because I did not find him past three days. But I had no clue how to get to see him. I had to leave tomorrow. Today was the last day. I thought he would come to play with my brother but my brother went to the school grounds in the evening. And this way I lost the chances there as well. He being the last thought and the consistent note in my mind, I moved towards the front car seat. The car moved with continuous patches of breaks being applied because so many school children were moving on the curvy slim road. Yes of course! It was 3:30 p.m. There was flood from the gates of The Sacred Hearts'. And coming towards, I found Imraan with a group of his friends. He kept on looking at me till the car moved past him maybe in an attempt to recognize me. I gave back a smile so continuous while my eyes were scanning his friends in order to find him somewhere. He was not there. I felt disappointed. It dawned upon me that maybe this time...

Sitting under the partial shades of the Deodars, I can hear some caws little apart. Can see a pair of white butterflies frisking over the green roof. I am swinging. I can sense the wild breezes, mild but enough to mingle with my hair. Girls from Sacred Heart's are singing - their voices diminishing and blurring from behind the thick growth of the 'green'. To everyone's pleasure, Dalhousie doesn't seem to have yet got strangled in the chains of extremities in climate. We still do not possess fans in our residence. The residence is so designed by the good old Britishers that we don't feel much hot but yes cold during the peak winters. That has a solution though - fireplaces.  Some insects crinkle over and over I haven't been able to trace. Monkeys, grasshoppers are a frequent guests but these insects seem to sing much wider part of the daily chorus, latently.  No one to talk with, I am all by myself reading and writing under the  blue sky with patches of ...

Resting in the rush of the gifted settlements by the river 'Ravi', the Lakshmi Narayan Temple Complex has been radiating sanctity over the 'Chambyals' since heaps of centuries. The Nagara style in which the temple has been achieved dates to the good old Indo-Aryan style of Orissa. While many of the attributed components of a typical Nagara style temple such as Ardhamandapa (Entrance Hall), Mandapa (Hall), Mahamandapa (Great Hall), Antarala (Vestibule) are observed to have been omitted, the Adhisthana (Base Platform), Urushringa (Secondary Tower), Garbhagriha (Inner Sanctum), Shikhara (Central Tower) are the constants. The wooden umbrella roof itself marks distinction holding the Amalaka (a stone disk) crowned with the Kalasha (Finial) on its top and responds to the local climatic behaviour. Floor communicates by adding kinds of ascends in the movement and likewise, the temples appear in a progression. LAKSHMI NARAYAN TEMPLE COMPLEX, CHAMBA What seize away the bli...