Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 - The end of a Saga

On Saturday, saw the final episode of the Harry Potter. There was no high expectations from this movie, atleast from my side. But again, for me, watching a Harry Potter movie is more like being with your family and friends on a outing. And this was no different. I have watched them grow from kids to young people now. Its sort of sad to not see them anymore in this series. I felt like giving them all a big bear hug at the end. This must have been the most emotional movie of the whole series....it shud be isnt..It is never easy when a relationship ends. If it ends on a bitter note, you might not miss it. But if not, then you sure do feel the pinch, even if you are hard hearted.

Well, now to the movie. There have been a few changes from the book and as everyone had said, this is a extended climax of the part 1. It was ok. Not a great one, even though there were a few nice moments. It was very ... what to say.. touchy when Snape died. And honestly I believed that the way Voldermort died was portrayed better than the book. In the book, I felt that it ended too soon. Of course if you havent seen the part 1, this movie would make no sense to you, but again that depends on each person. Professor Mcgonagall was very cute in a few places. Hagrid had very less to do. Lupin & Tonks died uneventfully. Poor Fred was gone in a second. Ginny was totally wasted. These are some of the complaints.

But otherwise, the role of Nevile was done well. Lot of details which would add more value were said in a line (good screenplay..but I prefer the lengthier version in this case)

I know that I have always complained that the HP movies have never been in par with the book, but I was no fan of the last book either. But I should say that part 1 was very surprising for me with respect to the visual representations. And part 2 was not so disappointing even though I mentioned so many complaints. It was funny to watch these kids in the epilogue. Ron had a tummy even :D Make up was very good. One other actor whom I liked was Draco. Growing up suits him. He was very convincing. Harry too.

My friend was mentioning how all good Brit actors have been with this franchise for so long...That is really a good sign. It was good to see all of them in all these movies. Acting wise, among the kids, I would say Harry, Draco, Nevile, Hermione, Ron will come a long way. Especially Draco. I read today that he stars in "The Rise of the Planet of the Apes". That is really good. He will make quite a bad guy :D and he is good looking too for his age.

Finally, the HP series got over in the movies too. Oh! one thing I forgot to mention. I hate to see these movies in 3D ,that too with that heavy glass they gave in PVR. I had to constantly hold it so that it doesnt hurt my nose. I would have loved to watch it in 2 D.... the way people make money out of loyalty.. its disgusting.

I miss you all my Wizards and Witches. But we will all be friends forever.... Ciao.

Travel well planned -- or was it ?

This years trip has been memorable in so many ways... Good ones are the one where I have made visits to unimaginable places , seen unforeseen events and have been thrilled immensely (and you know all about that from my previous posts already) Now skip to the bad ones, well I should not say they are bad.. but they are either stupid or I was over confident or at times ripple effect of other events or a combination of all

a. My pre ponement of return trip.
My biggest mistake of life has already taken away quite a few years from me (I ain't complaining because I have got quite a lot in return in different ways) the effect of it was, that I had to return early to Bangalore with the hope that it will start the end of an unfinished process. I wasnt sad about coming back early , but coming back for this reason was very irritating. It inturn resulted in more hatred than anything. Thats ok.. my mistake so my responsibility to get this over with. Now the only issue was that I had to return before a particular date and to get tickets by that date was a herculean task. I was on the call with the travel guy for almost 1 hr and finally got it preponed on the same airlines. But the more the dates were nearing , the more happier I was this time, because of the kids. Thinking about them made me feel very warm and happy :)
I got my suitcases packed to the exact Kg that was allowed (most of them were for the kids this time) and was all set. I even saw Cars 2 over the weekend and completed my remaining purchases of the chocolates the previous day and all was well. I can rarely sleep before my travel (anywhere) because I always wonder if I packed everything or not. Next day woke up early, checked out on time and got to the airport. The flight was scheduled for 1.20

b. Return journey
I saw that the airlines queue for check in was empty so went ahead. The guy checked my passport and asked for my itinerary (I was puzzled...coz generally when they get the passport they wont bother getting the itinerary) and then he said "Ma'am, this flight was for 1.20 AM and the current flight is for 1.40 PM. You have missed your flight". WHAT!!! I was like, I dont know.. I was puzzled. I wanted to shout loudly but there was no voice. How can I ? Am I dreaming ? I was like "Sorry.. I didnt get you" .. .then he started explaining the AM/PM thing...Holy Christ..!!!! Whats happening to me.... I wasnt sure what to do. I had 2$ cash and phone balance of 4$. I cannot even call anyone for long time. Then I came back to my senses and asked him "Do you have tickets in the current flight to the same destination?" He said he has, but that was only till Singapore, and after Singapore there wasnt any ticket available in any of its allied partners airlines to Blr or Coimbatore for another 2 days.. Murugaaaaa... enna nadakudhu.. Immediately I called my manager in U.S and told him that I missed the flight because of a silly AM/PM thing.. Is this excusable ? How can I even miss something so trivial... I was so confident that my flight was for afternoon, coz while rescheduling it I was looking @ that flight and the travel agent booked in the only available flight for me. This was so ridiculous. And the first thing my manager asked was "So you can now watch Harry Potter here and then go is it ?" I was like "What is happening to everyone around me including me" I have to be in Blr by this date and I have missed my flight and even if I go to Singapore I dont have the connecting flight. I dont have a Singapore Visa to stay there .. what was I going to do. He then said that he will call the Travel guys and check.. And later he conferenced me in. Thankfully for a amount of 100$ these people will give me the current flight to Singapore using the old ticket. But I would have to take care of Singapore to Blr/Cjb. Now after checking and rechecking and everything, finally the travel people asked me to go ahead with the current flight and then booked another airlines from Singapore to Cjb (I chose CJB instead of BLR coz I have the weekend and I can be with the kids) But the problem was I didnt have the connecting flight details by the time I got checked in so the luggage was tagged only till Singapore. Whatever.. I will manage somehow later.. Paavam my manager was on the call and he was of the greatest help one can be. After that I was checking my mails to see if I could get the details of the next ticket and seems like my email id was given wrongly. Again I had emailed my manager and he got the details and forwarded me the flight details. And I boarded the flight to Singapore via Seoul. I got things settled down much sooner than I thought and also sent an email to my dad and brother (they were about to come to blr to pick me up) about the miss and asked them to stay put until further notice. Informed my friend to call them up and tell them what happened just in case they were worried. Landed in Singapore after the brief stop over in Seoul where I got to talk to them online and gave them the necessary updates. When I landed in Singapore, they asked me to get the luggages after crossing the immigration and here came the trouble. I had no document of my travel to India ( need to get a printout first ) and no Singapore Visa. So should I really land in trouble after all this!!! Actually the guy ,  I asked , in the immigration counter gave a hint. He said, if in case you are not able to cross immigrations its ok. Dont bother come back and we can put your luggage in lost & found and you can ask the other airline to get it from us. They do that. Ok cool. So why would I bother and trouble the immigration in Singapore now. I just kept quite and went to find a room and to my bad luck none was available. So managed to get the ticket printout from the lounge. And sat here, sat there, tried closing my eyes , but in vain. Then came to get my boarding pass @ 4.30 am. But seems like they will open only @ 7 for the 9 am flight.. Oh my God.. I have to wait again. Well after all that wait finally boarded the flight (after a long discussion with the airlines for my baggage, and hoping it will reach me) and landed in Chennai @ 11 am IST and after a short wait again in Chennai landed in Cbe @ 3.30 pm.

Well after all this last minute changes and confusions, with the help of my friends, I landed up on time in Coimbatore, with my niece waiting for me. I was so happy that tiredness out of 24 hrs of non sleep travel was gone in a sec. And when I reached home, my nephew was there and gladly he smiled at me (rather than his usual frown on seeing new people other than his mom) and I realized how much I missed them.

Whenever I plan things well ahead it always gets into a mess, may be I am holding the sand too tight in my palm. But this was , what to say, too much even for me. I never thought in my life that I would miss an international flight due to the time confusion. What an idiot.. But well now that I have seen this too, I know how to work around this kind of problem too. Life is all about learning your lessons :D

Lesson 1: Check your time correctly for any travel. If in doubt, consult your friends
Lesson 2: Remember there is always a way if you stay calm. Panic, but only for a few mins, after that start thinking on how to handle the situation. Do not give in to your emotions.
Lesson 3: Always make new mistakes :D so that you can learn more lessons

Walk in the Woods & Lighthouse Point

Continuing with my short trips...

On Sunday, we had to drop our friend to the airport (It was sort of important for me to prove that I could drive well...and also to see if I can do the trip to the airport myself and how difficult it is..) and after that we just went to Milpitas Mall for some shopping. Avlodhaan.. time mudinjiruchu.. Its such a huge one and I got only two dresses for the kids....

The next day we decided to go to Muir Woods and Point Reyes, so we came back and sorted out the plan (now we were only 3 of us) and it was like Belmont->Muir Woods around 8.30 am -> tour in Muir woods -> Point Reyes Light house after 12 or so -> Return back to hotel by 6 pm

All was set and we took our friend's car this time. I drove the stretch to Muir Woods. It was a nice weather (slightly cool breeze..and thankfully I had both of my jackets with me). To our amazement, Muir Woods hadnt opened by 8.30 or so.. Konjam over enthu la seekirame vandhutoam. There were only 2 cars before us so we decided to take a detour to the Muir Beach in the mean time and come back in 0.5 hrs.

Beach e ivlodhaan.. Rombha kutty beach and since we were there early it was all quite and calm and serene. Rombha nalla irundhadhu... As usual I went to play with the water , it was so so cold. The other girl started shivering and she had no jacket for herself. She took one of mine and still she was shivering.. There were the dogs (mostly retrievers) playing with hardly 3-4 people out there. It was very very nice. I love Beaches. Can I settle down in a place which has beaches ? I would love to go to the beach every evening, sit there, hear the splash of the waves on the shore, the way the waves come to touch your feet even though you try to get away from it, watch the sun go down, oh!!!! I would really love it.

We were there for some time, and then headed back through the other route (it is a sort of a circle you make when you go there.. ) to the Muir woods and what do we see here. We see that the parking lots are already full and we had to go slightly ahead in the route to find a parking lot. Whatever !!!! Earlier we had thought of taking a guided tour. We were there by 9.30 or so. And the guided tour was only @ 11. So, had our coffee and breakfast (honey dipped corn bread - dont try it.. unless you like the taste of honey with salt) and then took the map , asked for the trails and headed ourselves. If it was a little less crowded, it would have been a walk in the woods , literally, konjam creepy effect kooda irundhirukum. Coz you hardly get sunlight down there. Such big trees, size and height both ways.

See the size of them. There are a lot of photos, but one two here for you :). It was a good walk, slowly reading about the trees and their varieties. We went till the 4th bridge after which it was blocked because of slide and so we had to come back and take the same route on the other side of the stream.

We started around 10 am (approx) and then came back by 12 am, headed to the cafe , had some more coffee and started on our way to Point Reyes Light house.

Before moving on the Point Reyes trip, the road to Muir woods was very nice to drive. It had the usual curves and turns but not that steep as in Yosemite. It is a very good drive and Muir Beach is good too. So if you want a good walk in the woods and a nice walk by the beach in the same place , go to Muir woods without fail. 

Next we started to Point Reyes Light house which was further 1.5 hrs of travel from there. Little did we know that being a Sunday, the Stinson Beach on the way would be overcrowded and that it will lead to a huge traffic delay in the moutains. There was a very good view of the Stinson Beach on the way

 Idhukapparam, 7 malai thaandi poara maadhiri oru route. Basically you will go up the hill-down the hill-up the hill-down the hill indha maadhiri for almost 1 hr or so , if I am not wrong. But andha up and down la traffic, so inch inchaa move pannitu irundhoam. Eppadi irukum. Paavam, my friend would have literally felt very irritated. Why so much crowd ? because of the Stinson beach. Got it was a good weather. Slight breeze, Sun shining high, so people wanted to get Tan. After we crossed the Stinson beach it was all rosy :), but we could see where we were headed, coz we were going in lonely roads again up and down the hill and we were becoming hungry too. When we saw that we had only 10 mins near to the light house and there was a fork , left led us to Drake beach and right to Light house. We took the Drake beach route to have some food. Little did we know that this was another beautiful secluded beach. The problem was most of the route was filled with fog. Going uphill with fog and coming down to a beach. You should have seen the landscape. It was AMAZING. Pure delight to watch.

 This is Drakes beach.

There was a small restaurant there and we had our sandwiches and played in the beach for some time. It was very grainy white sand and there was so much of fog and mist that it was freezing. After that it was my turn to drive and we kept going on and on. Engeyume Light house kannula padara madhiriye theriyala. After some place, I couldnt see what is there on the road (if I have to go down the hill or straight.. ) not a soul seen. We kept driving for almost 15-20 mins I think (as usual my speed decreased) and then we saw the parking lot with no view of any light house or any beach of any sort near by..except fog and mist and no roads ahead. Thankfully, there was a good amount of human beings there. That felt nice. When we got down we realized how damn cold it was out there. There were supposed to be some view points which were blocked by fog.

Kept going on and on and then we see the path winding down and there came the light house :) It was written clearly that going down the path to the light house is not the hard task but climbing back is. It is equivalent to climbing 30 storeys. We decided to go. Adhukudhaane vandhadhu.. idhukellam bayandhaa aagumaa..

This is how it looked like on the sides when the fogs started clearing when we were descending. There was a small path which leads you to the light house. It was scary, but I kept my focus on the light house and not on the deep sea underneath :D (focus on the target ...) It was such a amazing view. Really.. it was. 

After enjoying the light house, the big one was not in use actually, they have a smaller one near by which was currently used and it was giving these fog horns (kaadhu yearkanave kekaadhu... idhula andha fog horn vera.. gwaiiiiinnnu.. oru saththam).. Naanum light house paathutean.. :D super paa.. rombha nalla irundhadhu. It is necessary because of the kind of rocks that are there in that place, which is really very dangerous for the ships/boats. Ellam mudinju mela paathaa..

This is how it looked like. Now comes the task of going up. It really was very strenous. My breathing problem got increased. I had to use my inhaler to control it. And then after enjoying the beauty of the sea and the light house, we headed back to the hotel by around 4.30 pm. By that time, the fog was clearing and we could see the view points near the parking lot.

Point Reyes Light house is a  must watch if you like driving and a beautiful view of the sea and the light house. Worth all the effort we had put. On the way back, we stopped near Stinson beach for a coffee break and again got into the traffic which was heading back home. We also hit a car while taking our car from the parking lot from the road (luckily no big damage because of the huge traffic, it was a slight touch and the lady brushed it off as nothing..little did we expect the dent on my friends car :D)

All in all, it was a good trip and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Dont miss these places when you are here. We ended up reaching home by around 8 pm I think.

Black Chasm Caves

Reached US and after two days of work it was a long weekend. I was in no mood for a longer trip and wanted to do some short trips to nearby uncovered places ;)

So on Saturday we (5 of us) decided to go to Black Chasm caves (finally after a long discussion on where to go)  as no one had been there till then. It was quite a long drive than what he had expected. But we also started very late I should say. Reached Volcano (its the name of the place) at around 2 or so. It was like a very small town. And the address we had was a little misguiding (or should I blame it on the GPS !!!) and we ended up in the road which had a car show going on.. All were walking on the roads watching the cars displayed (most of them vintage) and we were driving on the road.. I was sure that we will be scolded by some old fella, but lucky we go through that .. they looked @ us as if we were from another planet..and went past by... and then after this small hitch we finally found out the place. It does look like a place which has caves in it. The Gift shop sells the tickets too. We got our tickets and were waiting for our 3.20 pm tour.

Outside they have a gem mining activity for the kids going on. Just for fun. We relaxed for a while and then got on to our tour (50 min Walk tour). You can read more about the caves here. 

The cave was small but deep (not too deep too) and there was a small pond deep down (we couldnt reach there yet). It was a little scary for me, coz the stairs were too small and right side was the cave down. And it was cold so I was shivering most of the time.

The stalagmites and helictite crystals are nice..The formations , the different layers, the various forms they take.. they do make a breathtaking view. But unless you are very fond of these things or you are ready to see some unseen hidden treasures of the earth, dont go here. You might feel disappointed. They are so many opening everywhere and they say that these are connected to other caves around and have found place of room size inside them. They are not yet opened for public.

When you actually come out of it, the hot air outside hits you on the face like you are just entering a factory..
Nice visit though. The other two people who came with us, left for a small trek (of 1 hr) in that place. They said it was very hot and humid but it was good.

While returning back we had a funny incident. While on our way back, my friend was driving and we were almost nearing (max of say 40 mins left) and in the highway, we saw this police patrol car going from left end to right end and all the cars on that lane were lagging behind. We were in the car pool lane and we were wondering what the patrol guy was doing and we just zoomed past him (in our recommended speed i.e. 65 mph). After a few secs, we heard the siren and to our horror it was for us. Because there was no other car in sight. Now this guy announced us to take a nearing exit and then asked us to halt. When we did so, he was like "Gentleman, what were you doing ? Why did you go past me ? " Thathakaa puthakaananu edho olarinoam. That guy was really unhappy.. Seems like if the police patrol car is going from right-left-right , all the cars should follow him because he has been informed of some incident which might harm anyone coming at the usual fast speed. Yaaruku indha rule theriyum.. naanga edho andha uncle comedy panraarunu ninachukittu visukunu cross panninpoam. kadaisiyaa naanga comedy piece aayitoam.. He then saw the drivers licence and then warned us and left.

Sema koothu.. But after that konjam usharaave dhaan oatinoam. That too my friend who was driving was supposed to leave back to India the next day. Atleast it did not get worse. That way it went on well, I should say.

My trip to Mexico

Back to US after a month long stint in Guadalajara(wa-dala-hara),Jalisco(ha-lisco) state,Mexico(me-hi-co). Didn't do much on the last weekend in Guadalajara because wasn't feeling well and needed some bad rest. Trip to Tequila was dropped becoz of that. But no regrets, got my tequila anyways. I have spent my time well here and yo soy encantador esta yo soy aqui ;). It was muy bien. I did my work well enough to achieve the purpose of my trip too and all were happy about my visit and the outcome. Given a chance I would like to come again after learning some spanish. That will go a long way for me here. People here always keep asking me one question: what did u like here in Mexico. Almost every one I knew asked this question because not many come by choice here I guess, inspite of having quite a lot of companies here. But for me the surprise element was, how common these people were with the Asians, culture wise, ideologywise, belief wise, growth wise and food wise :) 


They are growing and they are doing a better job of it too. E.g. the way they are expanding this city even though it wasn't meant for such expansion. Resembles Bangalore in lot many ways even in weather.  If u know spanish well u will not feel the difference at all. They have the US traits in road and traffic wise and in sports etc. They have to have people get ready to accept global companies and learn english as part of their studies and they can come up very fast. Heard that not many colleges and univ offer or better their comp sci courses. And people prefer other types of engg. That's good but since IT is coming up there better to invest in that too to become a better economy. Now they are losing people to US for better prospects. That shud reduce. It will happen just like India but will take another couple of yrs I think. I am no expert in these issues though,not even a novice , so I might be wrong too. Anyways it was a trip worth remembering and am happy abt it.


Oh and one thing I forgot to mention is, these people here do not have any proper transportation between states. I did not see any trains for shorter travels. Most of them use flights. And buses were there but few, just like U.S. Nothing can beat the Railways of India man!! I wanted to go to places like Acapulco and Mexico City or even Chihuahua if I had the proper transport. 


But next time I am coming here to Mexico I am taking a rental and driving on my own. It isnt hard.. except that you can do more honking and yelling @ people like in India but stick to the lanes as much as possible as you might get caught easily like in U.S :D


So long Mexico, hasta pronto :D