Dear Dreambox,
Well.. first things first..I missed you a lot.. and I m sorry for not telling you anything about the place where I live now, about the work I do, the people I live with, the life I m living.. about all the happy times n the weeping times.. (ofcourse I do have weeping times.. well who else better than you knows it??) so.. a final sorry... but I promise you that from now onwards I ll regularly keep updating you about myself.. happy?? Hmmm.. I know.. look at you.. you are smiling.. anyways..
So where do I start from??
- Hmmm…Now I m in Bhuvaneshwar.. actually people here call it ‘Bhubaneswar’.. It’s the effect of pronouncing all ‘Vs’ as ‘Bs’ ans all ‘SHs’ as ‘SSs’. As an effect of that all ‘Shankars’ become ‘sankars’ and all ‘shruthis’ become ‘srutis’. When I came here with my father, I was asked my name at our family friends place.. I said “Niveditha” n they called “Nibeditha”.. he he he.. funny I know.. but not to them. Bhubaneswar is the capital of Orissa state. And its in the east part of India.
- Oh God!! how can I forget this.. you know what.. here at 5:30pm its dark like 7:00 pm in the evening.. and in the morning by 5:30 its all bright like 6:30 or so.. It literally took me some days to accept the fact.. I used to come out of the room in the office just to realize its dark n the time is just 5:30pm.. It was really strange for me.. If you happen to come here some time I m sure you’ll also realize that. This is because Bhubaneswar is at the east of India(he he he I m telling you this as if you don’t know!!)
- Btw I m very much in love with the city. City is very well planned, built and maintained. You know.. those compound walls at the sides of the roads are all so beautifully painted. They are painted of the pics of the tradition, culture, lifestyle, cuisine, art work of Orissa. What impressed me a lot is the mirror work at ‘Jaydeb bihar’(Its Jaydev Vihar, one of the imp spots of Bhubaneswar) . I m like.. I get fascinated by its beauty.. Everytime I look at it, I get mesmerized.. I keep starring at it. God!! They r so beautiful.. you should have a look at it. Everytime we(me n my frns) pass by the place.. I keep peeping out of the rickshaw till it gets off my sight. So my friends tease me “ hey Nivi nivi.. ur mirror work ,ur mirror work” J ahh…they r simply fantastic(mirror work). This is one of the best cities I have ever seen… well to be very honest with you, I haven’t seen much of these ‘big cities’ except for ‘namma Bengalooru’ ;-).
- One more thing that impressed me is the market. Its really nice. They have 2 bulidings and they call it ‘market building’. Here the shops are organized depending on the item they sell.. confused?? I ll explain.. All the cloth shops are together, then there are bags shops and then all the bangle n bindi shops.. like this.. understood?? There are street shops too.. there you can bargain to high extent.. I bought a bag for 175 bucks where he said it was of some 500bucks, Its really nice bargaining.. I love doing it..(bargaining of course). And people here are also good. Now don’t ask me how much I have interacted with the local people.. I haven’t much though.. but whatever I have interacted.. they have been good n nice.
- I think people here are very much fond of potatoes n cauliflower. They use potatoes by default in all the curries they make. And paneer is one thing you can find in any ‘sabzi’. But they say bhubaneswar is famous for crab n fishes( I mean dishes). Ah!! I now regret for not being a non-veggi..
- Well if I told you this.. I m sure you wud not believe it.. THERE ARE NO CITY BUSES here.. surprised?? Same was my reaction to it. But that’s THE FACT. But rickshaw rates are really cheap. Actually the rickshaw system here come in 2 categories
· Shared: In this system the rickshaw acts like tempo. The driver can pick up any no. of ppl on the way. But you should pay very less money like 10rs or so depending on the distance of course. This is much cheaper.. like one can go around some 30 KM just in 20Rs.. Cheap rite??
· Reserved: In this system you hire a auto all to urself.. much like all other cities. This will cost a lot. Like you ll have to pay 200 something for some 30KMs.. even then comparative to Belgaum the rickshaw rates here are really cheap.
The rickshaw ride in local bhubaneswar has made a lot of memories in my mind.. you know y?? we are 6 of us in our group, 3 girls me, harini n kavita, and 3 boys guru, kishore and mahesh. everytime we hire a rickshaw.. the seating arrangement is very funny. harini and kavita sit at the back and I sit on one of thems lap, and one of the guys sits behind with us and the rest share the dirvers space..(he he he) the driver is often seen falling out of his seat.. thats a real ride.. I m always made to sit on somebodys lap like a baby, but its little troublesome to the other person(I think so,, but I dont think they feel the same.. they always say i m very much light weighted). and there are many things abt this rickshaw ride.. as you can infer, the reserved rickshaw system is costlier than shared.. so we 6 of us take a single rickshaw and act as if we are different ppl and the rickshaw is shared(no wonder y I m saving so much on money). Funny it is.. rite?? and btw at the traffic signals usually one of the guys infront gets down, crosses the signal and then joins us so that we are not caught by the police there.. there are many incidents with the autorickshaw.. i ll tell you again.. - After coming to bhubaneswar one of my childhood dreams came true.. I know wait.. I ll tell you.. don’t gimme that ‘tell me fast’ kind of look.. have patience dear.. ya.. when I was a kid.. every time I read or heard about the Konark sun temple, I don’t know why.. I used to get fascinated.. I was fascinated everytime. And now I have visited it. Yupiee!! First time when I saw it I couldn’t believe that I was actually in konark. I felt proud to see the architecture.. it is beautiful. I loved it. I can tell you all about konark but I not now.. some other time. Then in Jagannath Puri I touched the bay of Bengal for the first time.. I always wondered how bay of Bengal would be.. but then I know it now..btw you wont believe I have visited to Puri n Konark 3 times.. once with my appaji when he had come to leave me, n then with amma, savitakka, kaka, ajja n aayee.. and recently with my friends.. it was tttooottttaaaalll fun with friends.. I ll tell about that trip again some time later.. I have lots to tell you about that… like the way me n kavitha flirted with Guru(btw I must say this.. don’t take me wrong.. it was all for fun as even he flirted back ), the way I played cards with Guru and Kishore, our running race with Mahesh on that hot sand, the way we enjoyed in the Puri beach… the cycle rickshaw ride.. the bargaining, those shoping.. god!! There is sooo much.. I guess I can write a post on that trip.. surely I will.
Hey…I have to tell you abt my professional life, my office and its work culture etc,and many many things to tell you about this place n life here.. ok I understand.. don’t yawn now.. I m stopping rite?? fine someother time.. but promise me you ll listen to me again.. ok?? promise?? fine.. chal then.. bye..
and take care and v.v.v.v imp thing... I ll miss you. Bye.!!!
