Kanha Forest

These are some of the watering holes, where animals come to have a drink during the cool hours of the morn or eve.










This picture is of a Tiger's claw marks on a a tree when he sharpens it.
( 12 ft in height while standing and stretched up !! )







Thse next two are the legendary "machans" used for animal viewing at a safe height where even leopards cant climb.






This next picture was a tributary of the Narmada river, the banks of on which the locals were farming these slim green cucumbers, which we bought a kilo of and relished right then and there. Juicy, fresh and tender.
Meanwhile in the political backdrop of our trip, M/s Medha Patkar ( of the Narmada Bachao Andolan ) and Narendra Modi ( of the Godhra riots fame ) were doing a fast to see who blinks first.
And SONY Television has launched a programme aptly called "Aisa Des Hamara."



The blue House.
It appears to me that with NO EXCEPTION, every village in Madhya Pradesh that i drove thru had painted the exterior blue. It was like driving thru smurf land.





This here below is the house of the range officer who lives at what are called "check points" . There are houses like this at various points deep in the jungle, and are so desolate and far removed from others, its really scary. ( And thats me saying that ) *note* the fencing aropund the house, which most villages and their houses have.




When its dusk and the animals begin their cries its chilling to hear, as you realise that you are now on their turf and not in a zoo.




This is a Jungle loo, which Alisha was most happy to check out ( and donate a sample to ) as part of her loo expedition in life.

All Saints Shoot

"Some might say they don't believe in heaven

Go and tell it to the man who lives in hell."

( Some Might Say - Oasis )

ALL SAINTS CHURCH 01 [ 2nd April 2006 ]

ALL SAINTS CHURCH 02

HEAVEN'S DOOR 01

HEAVEN'S DOOR 02

LIFE Magazine Cover

Picture Contest 2

Identify the mammal in the picture :

Alisha Asks - 001

This has the potential to be a completely new spin-off blog site of its own. But for now, I'll skip the earlier questions shes already asked, and start afresh.

The conversation went like this other day :

Alisha : Papa why does the Sun go to sleep so early ?
Self : What do you mean ?

Alisha : I mean the Sun goes to sleep as soon as it becomes dark, I'm still playing when it goes to sleep.

( What she means is that after night-fall she is still awake and playing while the Sun is allegedly asleep )

Self : Uhh...mmmm *thinks for 2 minutes* Thats because Nature made it this way.

Alisha : What is nature ?
Self : Nature is all the things around us, the trees, animals, birds, fish, moon, stars and sun.

Alisha : * thinks for a few seconds *..... The Sun is part of nature and so it made itself like that ?
Self : Uh..mm I guess so

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Each time she asks me these tough questions, it makes me realise how some concepts we take for granted as adults, and when you question some basic assumptions it produces some very interesting possiblities.

Eg if there we accept that the world we see around us is the Divine force manifested, the question is why would it manifest itself ? To what ultimate purpose ?

And in the same train of thought, yesterday while watching some movie where there was a villainous character who was behaving badly, and Alisha asked me : "Papa, God made that naughty man also ?"

To which i muttered some vague response and tried to change the subject.

What would be a good idea is if all the parents in the world got together and kept adding to a mass respository of tough questions from their kids, as well as with what could be suitable responses to them.

Now theres an idea for a path-breaking intiative on the net.
Something on the lines of http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

Only with some kind of Q&A