Kerala Trip

We went to a weeklong trip to Kerala - The God's own country. We started at 5 am and reached Wayanad at 12 pm. We first headed towards Edakkal caves which are located 25 kms from Kalpetta in Wayanad. As we go up, there were steep narrow roads and at last we gave up as our poor car could not handle the steep roads teamed with heavy traffic. We hired a jeep for 70 bucks and went up and were horrified to see tonnes of people queuing up to have look at those caves. We decided that it was not worth to waste hours and stress out in the very hot climate just in the starting of our trip, so we returned back disappointed.

On our way up to Calicut there were lots of beautiful tea estates, we could see greenery everywhere. It’s difficult to explain that feeling but it was soothing and calming for my eyes to see a land so lush with greens everywhere you can lay your eyes on. Just picture perfect. We then went to Pookat lake on the way which actually is very beautiful but we were again disappointed to see huge crowds taking away the joy of watching the otherwise placid lake. Turns out that the day before was ramzan and so all the muslims came out to celebrate and it was October 2nd too.

On the journey back to Calicut, we came across the ghat section with 9 hairpin bends, not a big deal one will say, but I was surprised to see huge traffic one usually come across on busy monday mornings in Bangalore. At one point the roads were actually jammed and we waited for half an hour for it to get cleared. But nevertheless the journey was beautiful.
We reached Calicut (or Kozhikode) at night and checked into a hotel called East Avenue Suites which was very good and comfortable. Next morning we drove to Kappad beach which is a short drive from Calicut. This is the land where the famous Portuguese sailor, Vasco da Gama set his feet in the year 1498 along with 170 men. This was a lovely beach with hardly any crowd thank god, but has deep waters so had to be careful not to go far.

Suhas got so scared by the force of the waves and water slipping away sand under his feet that he decided that he wont put his feet down in any beach from now on. We then went on to Guruvayur which is a nice place with good temple which houses small and sweet Krishna. Though we could only catch a short glimpse of Lord Krishna because of crowd, it was worth. The deity has so much glow around him that our hearts were filled with contentment and happiness. Till now we dint find any pure veg hotel in Kerala but here one can find only those so much for the satisfaction for my MIL.

The highway in most of the Kerala doesn’t look like it at all with houses, shops and trees everywhere with not a single piece of land without any vegetation. You can see people everywhere as if half of the India's population is here, even the highway is never deserted and the roads are fab. We landed in hotel hariprasadam not a big hotel but ok to spend a night. Everywhere here in restaurants we found some ayurvedic water with pink color.
On the way to Kochi, we went to cherai beach, spent an hour there which was good time spent. Rocks had been arranged there for seating in the shore and we sat there under a bamboo umbrella shaped shade.

From there we headed to Vipin island. There was jetty service from there to Fort Kochi in which we can transport our cars too. Fort Kochi is famous for its huge chinese fishing nets.

There are a number of home stays available in Kochi, very neat and comfortable but we opted for hotel room instead as for a night or 2 they are very expensive. We were not able to find a single decent hotel which has pure veg restaurant. At last we booked an udipi hotel which was not very comfortable and neat. Next day was peacefully spent in a backwater trip. It was a pretty good experience with three hours on a houseboat with yummy lunch served and two hours spent in a small country boat which took us to small villages to get a glimpse of their lifestyles.

Next day we were off to Kanyakumari early in the morning at 5 so that we can catch the sunset there. I could not believe there was so much traffic towards kanyakumari that we thought we might be in for a disappointment. Bad luck that though we reached there just in time, hurried up the watch tower, the sun hid behind a cloud just before setting. There was such a heavy breeze there on the shore that if I had kept Suhas down he would have swept away by the force. The ocean was roaring as if in anger.

We checked into a good hotel this time and next morning were up by 5 to watch the sunrise, but bad luck again as the sun again hid under heavy clouds. Nevertheless it was a beautiful sight with clouds and the water changing its colors to bright orange.

Loved the sight of ocean covering everywhere around the piece of land we were in and with three oceans merging giving the water different colors of green and blue. Kanyakumari beach was truly breathtaking and awesome.
We went off to Madurai from there and as we left Kerala, highway had become highway again with plain land on either side and with all that magical greenery gone.

A developing personality

My sis-in-law's kids came over few weeks back. That's when I came to know little bit more of suhas's budding personality. She has a son, S of almost same age as suhas. He kept playing with suhas's toys and as suhas is not very possessive, he happily let him do that and silently watched from a distance. Now, the trouble started when S started to snatch things from him. First few times my sweet little boy was patient and let him do that. When he kept repeating this behaviour he got totally pissed off and started yelling and when it crossed his patience level completely, he came to me in the kitchen, prompted me to accompany him and gave a punch on S's face. He did that so quickly that I was not able to stop him. Initially I was not very happy and tried to lesson him, but then as time passed I was amused that he was clever to take me as his security blanket and did his thing. I was also glad that atleast he didn't inherit my 'forgive and forget' kind of attitude and know how to save himself from others stamping on him. Now I'm a little relieved that he will not let anyone bully him when he starts school.

Precious Memories

Few days back, as always, me and suhas had a face wash in the evening. I wiped his face with his towel, he too lifted his towel and tried to wipe my face lovingly. Amused, I told him tht this is his towel and pointed to my towel and told him tht I would wipe my face with my towel. Next day onwards whenever I wipe his face, he points me to my towel and sometimes runs to bring me my towel.
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Words added to his vocabulary: ammamma, hot (whenever I feed him something and if its not cold he'll say hot), cat, cak(for car), nini(for nillu-water), chuaach(for suhas), apeech(office), papa(for baby). Whenever he disagrees on something he says "no no" and uses a loooott of it these days, lot would be an understatement. It had been a few weeks since this post was in my draft, since then he has picked up many new words.

He can point to the parts of his body when asked like head, hands, eyes etc. He used to point those long time back when asked in telugu but doing it nowadays in english.

If asked to give a kissie, he'll give on both the cheeks and forehead very lovingly. He dances to his favourite tunes, his best being kabhi kabhi aditi, missing sunday, hare ram(bhoolbhulaya), and recently aye paapi(kismet konnection) and anything which is catchy. Its so amazing tht we show our preferences so early in life.

Auto mania....

......has gripped Suhas these days and making him crazy. This guy is very fond of autos and has been chanting it like mantra. As soon as he sees an auto he'll go "auto auto". Even a distant sound of it make him recognise it and make me realise that an auto is nearby. Crazy guy!!

Love for books

For quite sometime now I wanted to document suhas' love for books. Today is the day. He took to books rather easily. His first books were fruits and vegetable and animals. He enjoyed those for quite some time, then came Baby's First Library ABC which though we had bought earlier, we introduced it to him recently. He's enjoying it immensly. He opens the book whenever he lays his eyes on it and starts asking me to pronounce the words given in it. He's more interested in the yummy icecream pic printed on it and smiles whenever he sees it. Then came the set of 12 Noddy books which were gifted to him by his naveen mama. I have given him access to only book 1 till now (Noddy looses his bell). I plan to give him the rest when he starts understanding and reading. He's fascinated by the pic where Noddy cleans his car. It has a story of its own for him and then noddy picks up bert monkey and looses his bell in the journey which gets picked up by bumpy dog. This part of the story is what he understood and also points to the bell he lost. The next series of books are Disney's My Five Senses which deals with the same and was bought my his pranav mama . Suhas dint understand much of it, so I plan to introduce it to him later. Next in his collection of books comes Disney's lift the flap books, which he is slowly started to take interest in. That's it for now.

I plan to enlarge his collection bit by bit with each passing phase of his and make earnest attempt to kindle a reading habit in him which I think would be the greatest gift I can give to him. I dont believe in forcing my wishes on him, but just trying to germinate a seed which is already there.

First bicycle

Suhas got his first cycle on May 24th 08. I know this post is tad too late but I got too busy with life, so I had to set my mind to blog this weekend. For one Suhas is sprouting teeth again, this time upper and lower "first molar", two sets at a time. He's understandably very uncomfortable with lower gums swelled up at that area and is refusing food for past many days. Feeding him is becoming a struggle everyday. Hope this phase ends soon. As if it was not enough, he was down with fever, cold and cough. Imagine these things attacking a baby all at a time. Ok end of digression.

So he got a big cycle which he cant ride to his hearts content as his feet doesnt reach the lower pedal *sigh*. It was bought to him keeping in mind the longevity of the said cycle. So as of now, he pedals halfway and then pushes the other pedal down to bring the first pedal up again. Grow up soon little boy!!

Favourite people of Suhas

Suhas tends to befriend and like anyone after a few meetings, but there are a few favourites with whom he truly enjoys spending his time (ofcourse apart from his mom and dad). This coveted title goes to his pranav mama, naveen mama and sanjeev(a boy next door).

This is pranav mama with suhas in his engagement. While we were in Delhi, suhas used to wait for pranav to come back home from office and laugh hysterically playing peekaboo with him.

This is him with naveen mama spending time away happily. Suhas likes to play with his nose and bite it making it all red in the process and his mama actually allows him to do that. Wonder why he chose that particular nose.

Suhas smiles from ear to ear when he sees this guy and jumps eagerly to play with him. These days sanjeev spends his evenings with suhas and tries to teach him ride a bicycle. They both settle down to watch tv after some time with suhas shifting to his books inbetween.