It's been long week!

NOTE: None of the beach pictures have been photoshopped or edited in any way (apart from being resized). The others have only been edited to adjust the contrast and lighting. That is it. They are REAL pictures. The beach pictures are straight from the cam! Enjoy!


I am back, folks! I am back! Okay, calm down, take a deep breath. Hmm. Yes. Better.

The trip was great and the reunion was pure fun. Whenever I was in the middle of something exciting, I would keep thinking- “I just HAVE to blog about this. This is crazy fun!”. Now, however, I am almost at a loss of words. I don’t quite know what all to say. There’s just so much that it would be unfair to say some and leave some. Saying it ALL isn’t feasible, considering the condition of my fingers after eating 75 billion hot-hot-fried-in-ghee-samosas and playing 11342 carrom matches and infinite rounds of Bluff and Rummy and eating cotton candy at the beach after eons and what not. So I’ll just post some pictures and say something about them. Fair enough or what?

Panchlingeshwar

Credit: Me and only me :)

This is 'Panchlingeshwar' which is about 1.5 hours from Balasore. This temple-type-thing is up on the rocks of a certain hill. We lost our way while driving to this spot and spent about 45 minutes going round and round in some tiny villages. That was.. erm... some experience. The walk up the hill was enjoyable though. It felt a lot like Manali. Dad and I were quite fit (hey! I do pilates, okay?) and could walk up without getting very worn out, but S and Mom were, *ahem* a little slow and resembled zombies by the time we reached the actual spot.

Credit: S, edited by me

This is a shot of the hillside taken by S while we were on our way down. Pretty, isn't it?

Khi Ching

Credit: S (or Dad.. don't remember!), edited by me

This is the Khi Ching Temple which is about 5 hours from Balasore. So that day, we travelled for about 11 hours (including breaks) by car and spent about 40 minutes at the actual place. It was worth it though. We did see some interesting sites.



Credit: S, edited by me

This is the top most part of a buried temple. Why aren't they excavating and digging this place up?! Ridiculous! A temple is buried right there and no one bothers to unearth it. Shame on the Archaelogy Department.

There was a heavy metal (no, this isn't the 'heavy metal' effect. heh) rod out there. Folklore has it that it belonged to Bhima and has been there since ages and if you pick it up and take 3 rounds around the temple-top then your wishes are fulfilled. Dad and I did that together and gosh that was fun! It was back-breakingly heavy (if at all there is such an expression), but then again, I had my pilates techniques of pulling belly button to spine and activating the power-house working for me!


Credit: S, edited by me

There was this little museum at there where we saw this very fascinating statue. Prosthetic legs are nice :) Khi Ching was built in 940 A.D. out of pure granite rock (I suppose).
Why were our ancestors so fascinated by busty ladies? I saw them in every carving I saw on every temple! Our culture... sigh! (srcoll down and check the Updates for more!)




Credit: S, edited by me

Another one. All very pretty and intricate work, but even more intewesting poses.

Chandipur



Credit: S

Sunrise. Shot taken from our room. Absolutely NO photoshopping. It was really this wonderful.



Credit: Dad

The blue sky and the waters. This is a gem of a picture. One rarely finds such clean, blue water in India.

Puri Beach- My favourite beach in India.



Credit: S

Fishermen! We saw many interesting sights at 6 in the morning at our very own beach. The beach, the Jagannath temple and the swing in the second floor of my grandma's place are the regulars where all of us hung out when we were little.



Credit: S



Credit: Cousin

Isn't this place just awesome? (did you notice how clean the water is?)

My ipod(s)!!!



Credit: Me and me!!

Yes! I now have not one, not two, but THREE ipods (2 gifted by my aunt(mami))!! Isn't that just the ultimate? Well, i listened to a lot of music on my trip and even found a topic to talk about with my younger cousin (bro)- Floyd and psychedelic rock in general :) He plays the guitar, the sitar and what not. AND he's got this awesome hair which fascinated all the other cousins :) Yea, we cousins and uncles and aunts had truckloads of fun this time.



Credit: Me

I just could NOT leave out the lovely sarees that my aunt(masi) got for S and me. They have special Lucknowi work done and the colours are the most beautiful ones!


We even went to the Sun Temple, Konark. I thought everyone must already be knowing about it and would've seen pictures and blah blah, so didn't post anything on that.

Well, anyway, that was MY holiday. One helluva week. Loved every bit of it.


UPDATE!!!!

So yes, on being asked by S, I am doing this update.

1) The statue up there has 'prosthetic legs' because this legendary person called 'Kala Pahad' (which literally means black mountain) had gone all over Orissa destroying the famous heritage sites. So the 'legs' have been put to support the statue.

2) So, okay I WILL after all this fuss post some pictures from Konark since S believes her photography at it's best has been manifested perfectly in those pictures. Right-ho.
So here they are.



Credit: Dear old S

(FYI, none of them out there are family)



Credit: The Missy (S)

This is a shot of the marvellous carvings on the temple. These carvings depict the various poses in some Indian Dance. I am not sure if it was Odissi or Bharatnatyam... er.. but yea it's one of the two!



Credit: The Sag. S.

This is a shot of one of the wheels of the chariot which is also a sundial. It was very interesting to watch the guide tell us the exact time using this sundial. There are little beads which tell you the EXACT minute. How cool is that?