Versive

I am actually going to have to produce a wobbly Egret to justify the title today aren't I?
Let's see what we can do.

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And so, we find ourselves at Bangalore. This city is one of the two I.T. hubs of the nation and is responsible for a good part of the country's recent years of financial growth and success. Of course, as even the Lonely Planet can correctly note there is a bit of a problem with this new-found wealth filtering down to anyone, say, below the level of Vice Chairman of a multi-national company already pulling in 6 or 7 figures a year, but hey, that's business!!

Actually it's not, not always, at least. Except in this case it probably is - not that we saw much of the city (a taxi ride, a bus station, a train station, small chunk of an inner-city dual carriageway) but it didn't look strikingly prosperous as compared to anywhere else.
Well it was quite clean.
But they weren't distributing free iPod Nanos on the street corners or anything.

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OKay, as I said we didn't se much, so, your insight into this famous, important and powerful Indian metropolis is limited to the train station and anything muggins here was able to snap along the way.
Speaking of which I got my camera back from the repair shop today - lens works but the shutter button doesn't, so I can't actually take pictures, although I can look at them on a miniature LCD screen instead of going to the bother of lifting my gaze and peering at the real article. I will be wearing my best angry-but-still-civil hat down the same said repair shop tomorrow...

Bangalore train station from the footbridge; it all looks pretty familiar:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture018-1.jpg

The somewhat idiosyncratic/blunt/discriminatory/benevolent (delete as per your own interpratation and cynicism levels) nature of the railway carriage sub-division:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture016-1.jpg

This is only there to prove where I actually was - all I wanted was a picture of the platform sign and a 20-foot platform to stand on to take some nice shots of the station as a whole (and the massed ranks of autorickshaws out the front, must have been over a hundred) but no, I couldn't remember that much. So I settled for a purposeless photograph that I will now, purposelessly, share with you:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture015-1.jpg

You can see things are pretty damned informal despite the guys in the photograph below; if you fancy it you can drive your little 3-wheeler right onto the platform to make unloading easier and everyone croses the tracks at one end of the station by wandering carefree over the rails:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture014-1.jpg

This is very typical of urban houses I've seen in cities, even if it was just a passing shot of a random house. If you can't squeeze the mansion into the city, squueze all the features of a mansion into the space you have got:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture012-1.jpg

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Hampi group photo!

There was a very interesting guy called Dave at Hampi, staying in the same guesthouse. A Yorkshireman who lives half a year over there climbing, and visits his highly adaptive, highly adapted mate who live here pretty much all year round in a cave some miles away!!
That's Dave int he thoroughly ridiculous hat next to Maria, and the two guys on the edges were some of the ever-helfpul staff - I cannot bloody remember their names. The guy on the Left had one you'd think you might remember - Maria, can ye help mae oot, lass?? :

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(Bangalore again)
He he he - this is cool. I suppose with the recent assassinations and stuff I shouldn't have been taking photos of armed security personnel; not that it ocurred to me, mind you, but Maria (seen here harassing them for all their worth) was just about to duck or start running:

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Back in Hampi just briefly...

Another unlikely balanced rock - if anyone knows that they have seen these exact pictures before do let me know please :

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture005-1.jpg

Rocks, mountains, bloody rocks and mountains...

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/Picture003.jpg

Sodding carvings:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/rory155-1.jpg

F*%†#!± temples! :

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%20things/rory148-1.jpg

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And now we must break for some video. It seems I have an absolute shedload of videos - almost the whole last 2 pages of this album - so I'll stick some here and another load more in a video post afterwards to clear them all up, as it were.

Course, we gotta hope I actually still possess the things......

Ahhh. It seems that we don't

I'm not going to swear, but I will tell you that now none of us will ever get to see a full wraparound shot of Mysore Palace and Gardens; the Waterfalls near Madikeri *fume*; the uber-bumpy bus rides; the - I can't help myself, the fucking bastard fucking shits - Indian traffic dodging films which are worth small lumps of pure gold; the eagles circling the city skyline in Mangalore, from the hotel roof, no less; the waves crashing and throwing up clouds of spray and streaming in rivers over rocks on Mangalore beach; the cats and crows from the same area walking around each other without concern; and of the videos of the huge birds, bats and crocodiles flying at the bird sanctuary near Mysore; the coconut rop spinning from the backwater trip here in Kerala; the view of the valley - it was SOME view believe me - on the ridge of a mountain on the last day of the Madikeri trek (we'd only spent 72 hours getting there, of course I'm not bitter); the local cigarette roller who was making the Indian cigarettes, bedes, at a rate of knots; etc. etc. ad infuriatum.

In lieu of this I'm gonna let Kevin Kline say it for me. Just the first two scenes sum up perfectly how I feel:

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I feel better for that. Gonna have to get A Fish Called Wanda when I get that laptop... right, okay, moving on; the only video that seems to work at all is this tiny, 2-second `film` where you can at least see a croc moving. About 6 inches. Still, better than a slap in the face with a wet disembodied limb:

Soooo... Woohoo!! First dedicated travelling album finished! That's one and a bit albums down, one more to go. many duplications so hopefully I'll be able to clear through them in the 3 days I have left in this country not dedicated to transport and running away (booked my flight to Thailand this afternoon, see).

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And, we have achieved the wildlife sanctuary, at last. This place was called Ranganatthittu.. Ranganananathituu... Rangang...Rananga... *checks* .. Ranganathittu Wildlife Sanctuary (come one now, I was pretty close) and it was wonderful.
Wonderful beyond measure, the guide took us out in a little boat and rowed as almost silently out across a large lake studded with heavily-wooded islets, and, well, the sheer volume and variety of life was incredible.

Night herons, painted storks, cormorants, cranes, egrets, Ibis', spoonbills, even pelicans Kingfishers go without saying, of course, but you lose them in there - you lose anything smaller than a bloody heron in there - because of the size of the biggest birds. There were, among the painted storks (and the colours! Ohhhh!) were another kind of stork even larger and almost as big as the pelicans which were, frankly, almost implausibly large.

There were also, of course, absolutely loads of Marsh Crocodiles as well, they may not be Saltwater or Nile crocs, but they were big enough and thorougly magnificent.
Anyway, enough of that, have a look at some of the stuff:

Night herons:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture187.jpg

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture188.jpg

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture186.jpg

Painted storks nesting en masse:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture182.jpg

I have to say here that I was too excited to get proper photos; we were in the middle of these guy's flight paths and right next to hudreds of each species nesting, flying in, flying out, repairing nests etc. and it was pretty overwhelming, plus my camera isn't a proper one so I apologise for the fect many photos are quite distant and possibly not very well focused

Just a bit of lake scenery:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture176.jpg

Nesting Pelicans!! Not easy to see I'm afraiod; they were hard enough to spot as they nested in the very highest of the trees, almost above us by the time they were pointed out (we'd never have spotted them ourselves):

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture169.jpg

Lake scenery with nice glassy water effect:

Nesting birdies:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture178.jpg

A nice chunk of rock, it seems:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture177.jpg

This, I believe, is a painted stork in its lonesome:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture174.jpg

This definitely is an Egret - the fine feathers in the tail fan out over the eggs in the nest, as seen here. This one was doing so with its back conveneintly to us, right at the edge of the island where we passed:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture173.jpg

That other kind of Stork - not gonna wina ny beauty pagents but my, are they impressive nonetheless (needs a little rotate from ya):

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture172.jpg

This look a lot like another kind of Heron... not sure. Not a stork I don't think, but then, there are anothyer dozen species living there that I couldn't identify for a cash prize! :

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture171.jpg

The subtley ominous signs of a crocodile in the water, but at least you can see 'em. It is when you can't that you are in trouble, as any Australian will apparently tell you:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture170.jpg

More storks up in the trees:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture168.jpg

A little culvet that ran through one of the islands, not sure if I got it but the foliage is lovely anyway :

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture167.jpg

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture164.jpg

Storks in both flavours:

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture165.jpg

And in neopolitan only :

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b312/evilhippy/Worldwide%202/Picture155.jpg

- And.. *drum roll* no, it's not a plastic prop (I though one on a rock in the middle of the lake, silent, unmoving, was a model to entice the tourists at first!) but is in fact the first proper glimpse of the Marsh Crocodile, or for those not trusting Wikipedia, the Marsh Crocodile

Plenty more of these guys later, too. Toodle-pip!

This isn’t for anyone else’s benefit, but is for my own undastardly (for once) purposes. It’s highly personal and not especially interesting, so, unless you have 10 minutes of your life you feel like sparing for no good reason, or you know me personally and want to sympathise/taunt me, then there’s not much here to interest ya.

I hope you’re not waiting for a punchline or anything really, this is just something I have to say for my own benefit, sort of thing.

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Is it Monday today? Yes, good. Okay so I had a few beers 2 says ago. On Saturday night, no less!!
Hardly shocking you might think, let alone worth two whole exclamation marks of its very own, but I am looking at this sort of thing a little differently than I used to, and from how most people probably view the ritual of the Saturday Night Beer or indeed any booze, at any time.

I am an alcoholic. Okay that seems a bit of an exaggeration considering the very serious kinds of alcoholics that spring to mind after hearing that phrase, and I haven’t developed the shakes from not getting a drink every day yet (I had the shakes anyway :lol: ) but I have felt like a bloody alcoholic in almost every way for the last couple of years.
There are of course the `classic` signs to watch out for which I’ve displayed in `admirable` quantities:

Drinking every day for months and months on end – that would be 30-40 months consecutively now for me, practically;

Drinking on my own far more than with people,

Not even enjoying the sensation of being drunk, and certainly not getting the happy thrill - just a sense of ease with the world after too long a time sober.

Drinking to stop having to think about anything much (apart from how to get the next drink).

Hideous quantities consumed and weekly unit counts (when you can remember to note them down all the time) that reach triple figures with ease.

This doesn’t make me quite as bad as the guy from Leaving Las Vegas, but makes me a lot worse than most people because I could happily plough through a lot of the sauce each and every day, and I did.
And then it got a lot better, I arrived in Kochi and went out the first night, had a drunken yet rotten time (see here: http://versive.blog.co.uk/2008/03/17/needs-new-ttlte-3893218 ) and after the debacle that was that first night, I stopped, pretty much dead in my tracks. Maybe `rut` is a better word here though

And that was it; I didn’t even feel like drinking. I went about a week without wanting a drink and being very happy writing all day instead.

I have tried this before of course – quitting - and on the first day I would usually be gently challenged by it, and be a noticeable but tolerable distance out of my comfort zone though pleased with myself. Maybe I’d feel the same even on the second day, too.
But three days in and simply thinking about a cold beer would completely change me – and I would go vast distances out of my way, would spend all the money I had available, and be utterly miserable, until, I had had something to drink.

Really, just thinking about it would make me happy and excited (I could literally feel the surge of warmth and happiness rise in my chest and up to my head and engulf me) and then that was it: I wanted to drop everything and go get some, and, usually, that’s what I did.
I flaked out from meeting people, avoided phone calls, even totally shut myself off for a day or two every now and then because all I wanted to do was get steaming, and not have to speak to anyone or have any responsibilities or any thoughts other than those that floated up through a haze of muzzy numbness: just having films to watch and cigarettes to smoke took care of everything, I didn’t need anything – or anyone - else.

In fact the only thing to be said for it is for when you are watching movies: you don’t have to think about picking anything out or being discriminating or choosy in any way, because no matter how shite a picture is when you are too pissed to focus on very much of the screen, `magically` it all becomes brilliant!!

So having had 3 occasions now when I have drunk in the last 17 days means my ambition to cut it out like a snap of the fingers isn’t working out, you could say – but this is not, in truth, a suitable phrase.

It really is working out very well. Out of seventeen days I have only drunk three times – I am getting the urges to do so more often now but that’s to be expected, not least because I’m thinking and writing about it this very minute, but considering that I went from a full-on state of drinking stupidity to this, having a few beers on just 3/17ths of the days I’ve been here, I know that this is a huge improvement.

And I did have good reason to drink this Saturday as well as sheer desire, would you believe.
I’m not rationalising it, I am being totally truthful here.
Number one was of course that I wanted a drink, obviously. If that wasn’t the case none of this would matter.
Also worth bearing in mind though iare the body’s need for some sense of stability and the mind’s need for some sense of reward. A little drink every week or so to ease what remains of my organs and functioning systems from a state of near total insobriety to a safe – and low, for that - level of drinking is a good idea.
Few people can cut it straight out, and toning it all down rather than cutting it straight out is usually the best way to make it stick as a habit – this is endorsed by healthcare professionals, by the way I’m not trying to sneak around the rules.

The other is that after being so good for a while and doing things that justify some kind of reward, it is only healthy and reinforcing to chuck a carrot to the donkey.
On this occasion (Saturday) I had just written up the post `Daily Haze and Film Geek` which was rather long, and took a little effort, and I was very pleased with it (even though it really needs editing for typos and one lost clause ) so I genuinely had in mind not that I deserved a reward so much, but that giving myself one would make me feel better, if you follow me. I wanted the drink because I want a drin, default state, but giving myself that reward would, I suspected, make me more inclined to treat drink AS a reward rather than just another form of breathable air as I did before. Plus with treats in mind I am even more likely to work harder, so the theory goes.

I was playing amateur psychologist with myself, and also even more so in that I wanted to see just how I felt about drinking after giving it this sort of mediated break.

Come Saturday eveing time, I didn’t enjoy it much – but then I was both being overly greedy, and drinking the wrong stuff. That 8% beer they call Haywards 5000 is a killer, and I had three of those after sauntering into one of the proper licensed places on Marine Drive, then on to the nicest Chinese this side of the bridges for an overly expensive meal (delicious, mind you) and a regular 5% beer that I couldn’t bring myself to say no to because the staff and food are great, and my automatic binge-O-meter swung the needle firmly yet exasperatingly to the “Oooh yes please!” side of things when the manager asked. I think it was one of those under-the-counter places because my beer arrived, and stayed, wrapped in a hefty amount of tissue paper

I never finished it. The last of the three strong beers made me feel a little bit sick, then the rickshaw ride over bumpy, potholed streets didn’t make it much better so finally, even after wolfing some Chinese food down, I couldn’t face the last 3rd of the weaker dram.

Overall it wasn’t very enjoyable at all because I had too much too quickly and I hardly felt even positive (just that predictable relief of self-made pressures and stresses that are oh-so indicative of the addict), so the next time I have a drink – hopefully not even in this country but wait until well over a week for me to get to Laos first – I will have only 2 slowly-absorbed beers, just like I did on the other two occasions since getting to Kochi.

I went to sleep more easily Saturday night, but any goodness in this respect was negated by the severe feelings of evil towards god, man and beast when waking as I had a stinking hangover yesterday that only abated after hideous quantities of paracetamol. I haven’t even had more than 4 paracetamol in the last 17 days, and those were only against illness not hangover symptoms! Drinking brings out the worst excesses of everything.

So that’s my confession, as it were, and as I said at the start this is for my benefit and not for entertainment purposes. I am just telling the truth about what happened and what I was thinking because I need to do that, semi-piblically even, in order to get along with my current plan.
I never made it to AA meetings (I was about to last year) but I can see just how they help, so this is nothing more than my version of that process.

If you have read this, then think of yourselves all as assistants in my therapy or something if you like It actually does help a lot, so, thank you.