In search of Flamingoes

I am writing this post as I cruise 35000 feet above sea level flying to Kolkata to see my wife bring in our little bundle of joy to this world. I find it quite an amazing coincidence that yesterday I was on a small country boat powered by a rickety diesel engine, searching for flamingos.
I knew that flamingos come to the marshy lands of Mumbai every year during the winters but in the past four and half years of our stay here, we never felt like exploring this wonderful sight. However, last Sunday, I had a sudden rush of ideas of going to see this wonderful family of avian and try to capture them on my camera. The restless guy that I am, I was planning to go the very next day itself. But luckily things didn’t fall in place!! The logical move was to plan my exploratory visit on Thursday, our weekly off day. The next step was to find out where to go and if possible a companion. The ‘where to go’ was easy with Commander Parijat Sinha, a fantastic Naval Officer, a very close ‘senior’ and adventurous to the core. Parijat Da, I know, used to visit Sewri Mudflats every year when he was in Mumbai and it was logical to give him a call. As usual he was a treasure house of information and gave me rock solid impetus that not only should I visit, I should also do “something worthwhile” with the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS). The next step was to get in touch with BNHS and I was pleasantly surprised to get a reply to my email within 24 hours. The next target was to convince a “good” friend to accompany me. My close cronies and partners in all sundry crime shooed me off from my attempt to cut short their holiday sleep. But the good old mariner ties worked well and Shishir, a marine engineer (rather an ex marine engineer) agreed to come along with me on the trip.

On Thursday morning (11th), we started off at 0545 hrs to catch the train to Sewri, a point of the city on the dockyard stretch. On reaching Sewri, we got into a taxi and confidently asked the cabbie to take us to the Sewri jetty. And wham! The driver told us “iss bar abhi tak koi pakshi aaya hi nahi” (This time no birds have come). My next poser was, “Where are the birds then?” and I was told it is Nhava Sheva, the port south of Mumbai and more than a 3 hr journey away. This was a big downer but we still decided to have a check ourselves. And unfortunately, Doc Murphy ruled the roost. Shishir was fortunately very enterprising and retorted “as we have already embarked on the trip, lets go to where the birds are”. We rushed to Sewri station once again to now catch the train to Panvel, the last rail head on the Harbour line and nearest to Nhava Sheva port. On the way we started discussing how we go about finding the birds as we were clueless. I recollected that the previous night I had come across a website where two enthusiasts had taken a boat from under the Vashi and cruised along the mangrove swamps of Ghatkopar upto Thane. So we decided to get down at Vashi and explore. Reached Vashi creek makeshift jetty and found all the fishing boats floating around on anchor but no boatman. Luckily we got a boatman, Sashikant, whom was quite helpful and finally got a guy who had a motor powered boat and was ready to take us. As usual, the guy asked for a hefty sum and after lot of ‘die-hard’ haggling, the guy settled for a comfortable price and we finally cast off at 0945!! And then on, it was an amazing feast for the eyes. Right from little chicks to fully grown up adults with their wide span wings - what a fantastic experience. I had my SLR camera and a small digital camera (courtesy my good friend, Vidya) clicking away to capture the beauties.

These beauties comes from Siberia during the winter months every year, lays their eggs and once the chicks hatch and grow up enough to fly, go back to their homeland. Some plain snaps are attached. And to watch a clip on youtube click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVisRqeCVD4

Waiting for the boatman

The flock on the bank

Taking flight

Formation Flying

The little one

The Year Gone By

I was thinking of writing this post on the first day of the year 2007. But then decided to write it today (03 Jan).

Its exactly a year today that I had hung up my uniform (or as some say hung up the boots) and ended my Commissioned Officer's role. And the year has been full of uncertainities, apprehensions and expectations about which shore we wash up to in 2007.

When I had taken the decision to quit the Armed Forces in August 2005, most of the people were amazed, some were shocked and a very miniscule percentage was pleased!!! Me and my wife were quite apprehensive where we are going. Gone were the society, the glamour, the 24 hr help and the furnished accomodation. And uncertainities were in abundance. We were leaving a comfortable, secured and glamorous life. The only bright lining on the horizon was my entry into SPJIMR and the support of some very close people who had the faith!! And with this we embarked on our journey into 2006.

2006 started off on a little slower note but took off well with me landing at SPJIMR, meeting fantastic people (from my course as well as other courses) and making some great buddies. But I feel the greatest news to start off was the doctor's call saying that me and my wife were on the way to parenthood. And what better impetus for taking the grind all through. Life at SPJIMR has been a fantastic roller coaster ride with the never ending assignments, PPTs and a lifetime of surprise quizzes. But then again there was small breathers in form of the Gita Shibir at Baroda. Thereafter, it was the Diwali vacation and then the tempo of the placement process which I had written about, in one of the earlier posts. The year ended on a great note with thrill of new jobs and a much pent up, sigh of relief (I bet it was, for many of us)!! And hence 2007 was welcomed with much more fun and relief.

2007 for me is a year of everything new. A new job, a new member in our family (me & my wife are waiting with bated breath for its arrival), a new home to setup and a new life to start. And perhaps start a seperate blog like, "Out of School @ 32"!!! But probably will just keep a simple blog without school and chronological age!!

But let us all have a bang of a year in 2007!!

PS: Below is a snap of the fireworks at the beach party on 31st Dec at INS Hamla

Night at Juhu (02 Jan '07)

Last night (02 Jan), some of us decided to go to Juhu beach. More joined in and we were a small group of 9! And at the beach we decided to wish my dear friend Milind, for his "upcoming" anniversary!! Some shots from the real good time!!