Stuff geniuses* are made of

(*Where you decide what/ who genius stands for. :P)

So, it seems that even though I have A LOT of things to say, I might not yet be ready to blog again.

Therefore, all I will tell you is that I've had a lot of time on my hands in the last few months and one of the things I've done in that lot of time is cook. A lot. (This is where you feel jealous of me/ not being able to live with me.)

Chocolate Overdose: Chocolate cake with chocolate sauce, chocolate sprinkles and Cadbury Dairy Milk shots. - For Hoppy's B'day

Vegetable Thai Green Curry with steam rice - One of the tastiest and healthiest dishes ever! :D

Pear and Caramel cake

Jalebi...errr...Jaleba bhai

Creamy White Sauce Pasta - was *so* good!

Achaari Bhindi (Tangy Okra) - So crisp, it felt like a healthier version of chips! :D

Samosas with sweet Date chutney

Wheat Samosas - basically, a healthier version of regular samosas :D

Amla Khichdi - recipe from Food Food's Health Maange More show - if you like khichdi, you'll like this. :)

Freshly baked Cheese Garlic Bread - So droolworthy! The BEST of all these dishes. 

Ginger-Carrot cupcake - Was lovely and moist! :)

Ricotta-Mushroom Risotto

Strawberry Cake with Fresh Cream Icing 

Orange Cake with Fresh Cream and Kiwi icing - For Moon's very, long overdue b'day cake! 

Fresh chocolate chip cookies for a Christmas gift

There are many more dishes (like one Mexican rice which was so easy and delicious, I suggest you go and find a recipe right now!) that I made but didn't click pictures of/ can't find pictures now. But I think these were enough to prove a point. ;)

Okay, you may now beg me to invite you over for food. OR, if you live in Mumbai and won't interfere with my cooking, (and preferably buy me all the ingredients and pay me to cook) you may also invite me over to use your kitchen from time to time. :P

Weekend Getaway

I went to a beach called Titthal near Valsad (Gujrat) last weekend with some cousins and their friends and their friends' friends etc. (Yes, I do realise that this was the third time I've been to Gujrat in 2011 but at least, this time it wasn't with annoying relatives asking me when I'm planning to get married and all. *phew*) And it was quite a lot of fun. :) On Saturday, the weather went a bit crazy and there was so much sand everywhere - in our eyes, hair, noses, ears, mouths, food, bags, clothes etc - that we didn't dare to take our cameras out of their relative safety inside the bags. But I've never seen a more violent or a more beautiful sea than when I saw it that day. On Sunday though, everything had calmed down and we all played many games and had fun on the beach. :)

Early morning walk on the beach :)

Cloudy Sunday Morning

Garden in the premises of a Jain Temple

A tiny flower growing amongst the weeds - looks like a Chinese Rose to me.

Pomegranate flowers

Any idea what flower is this?

Yellow flowers, I guess? :P

Portrait photography skills, à la Star! ;)

Hanging out in the Wild!

So, finally I got pictures of Girnar and Junagad in Gujrat from my cousins. And so, I intend to make everyone jealous by putting up gorgeous pictures of the wildlife in Gujrat. :D

Spotted Deer

Papa deer and 2 baby deer! :D The baby in the front looks oh-so-innocent!! 

Forest Lizard

The first day itself, we went to Sashan Gir - the only national park in Asia where one can find lions. And of course, along with lions, we spotted a lot of other animals and birds too. And it was all damn cool. :P

Do I even need any words? 

Nilgai

The King :D

And the Queen ;)

Vulture

Drying it's wings after a bath ;)

 

A piece of meat left on the tree by a leopard and now feasted upon by the crows

More vultures

Something that sounded like "Laplings"

Leopard Pug Marks

Great Horned Owls

So, that's all about the National Park and wildlife. :)

Irish Tales

About time I post about my Irish adventures, no?

Well, considering we didn't have any real adventures, I guess this would be another gushing-about-beautiful-places and photo-diaries kind of entry. I'll just let the pictures speak about the beauty of Northern Ireland.

S and I mostly drove along the East-coast of the Northern Ireland: along the "Coastal Route" and trust me, it is the most beautiful and picturesque place I've been to in all my trips to various places in the UK. No doubt I loved the English, Scottish and Welsh countryside, the ancient and haunted-looking English abbeys and the randomness of English cities. But Northern Ireland was different.  The Irish country had a different look to it, more rugged and edgy. Like in the picture above, all along, you can see such tiny rock Isles dotting the Irish sea. The fields looked almost the same as the fields on this island. But still if anyone ever put two pictures in front of me, I think I'd recognise Irish fields apart from the others. They have a different, more untouched, wild, unkempt look to them than English and Welsh fields.

We saw a few castles as well. Only, the Irish are funny that way. :P Some of the "castles" were nothing more than 3 pillars on a cliff. One Dunsverick Castle was like that. But it was a beautiful shot, with the grey, gloomy day, the sea and the sky just blending into one mass of grey, the rock isle and the cliff: very atmospheric! :P

I thought two places were the most beautiful though: The Giant's Causeway in the north and Newcastle (yes, there is a Newcastle in Ireland as well! :P) about 45 minutes south-east of Belfast. The Giant's Causeway has got some of the most beautiful rocks I've ever seen. And they were all hexagon shaped and formed patterns. It is a short walk from the parking lot to the Giant's Causeway and there, we came across a bare hillock, which, curiously, had both red and black soil and you could make out a distinct border where the two different tectonic wonders met. Amazing how rocks that are not Tifanny square cut can be so fascinating. (Sorry for the cheesy, cheesy attempt at really sad humour. I've been reading way too much chick-lit for my proposal. :P) Anyhoo, several pictures for the Giant's Causeway:

This last one is of a pile of rocks, barely as high as a one-storey building. But I saw it in a brochure before actually seeing it and these people had posed like that. So, I expected it to be never-ending coz that's probably the illusion they wanted to give. S and I gave our best shots and even though it's no brochure material, I think we did pretty well, no? :P

And the second beautiful place I talked about is Newcastle, near the Mountains of Mourne. There are several hiking routes for the hikers up there when the weather's nice. But we were comfortable and cosy in our car. And I think I've had enough "hiking" to last me for quite a while. :P Anyhow, Newcastle is a quaint, little  beach town but you can also see beautiful, beautiful views of the Mountains of Mourne from the beach. We found a "Mourne Coastal Path" and came across a secluded place on the rocks next to the sea with a tiny stream flowing into the sea. It was so quiet, calming and soothing, we both spent about half an hour, just sitting there, lost with both our individual thoughts. I sat facing the sea, which reminds me of my home and S sat facing the other side, which was essentially, a stream and woods and reminds her of her home. (She grew up on a farm in upstate New York.) And we picked and ate countless blackberries. Sigh. What bliss that hour was. Lots of pictures from Newcastle and Mountains of Mourne. :P

Pretty, no? The second one is the Mourne Coastal Path and this last one is of the Mountains of Mourne as seen from the Newcastle beach. So, basically, I saw everything short of a nice little Irish holiday romance. (Damn.) And I think everyone should visit Northern Ireland at least once if they are in the UK! I can go on and on with pretty pictures if you are not yet convinced. But I swear, I'll just give you my last one: the street lights at Newcastle Beach, which I found very interesting and which is actually a good piece of photography.

I rest my case.

Guess who's back?!!! :D

Miss. I-can-do-it-oh-wait-not-really-can-you-carry-my-bag-please? That's who's back. Hmph.

Note to self: If you think the uphill road from the previous residence to the uni is just about what you can manage and if you can't carry the weekly groceries home from Morrisons without taking a bus or cursing yourself for not taking one, then hiking is not for you.

So, you get the picture of what happened on my "hiking" trip, right? I was so excited about North Wales, countryside, pretty places that I forgot that the last time I hiked was over 2 years ago. And the last time I exercised must have been about that time as well. Living in the past is not a good idea. When Igor (one of the house-mates with whom I went) asked me if I've done this before, I told him, yea! I've hiked up the Himalayas! This should be fine! I should have realised one hiking trip about 9 years ago and one about 2 years ago do not mean that I'm proficient at hiking. And fortunately or unfortunately, I don't know. But, the first 3 kilometres of our trip were a steep uphill climb. Less than 2 kms later, I told Igor that I won't be able to do it and that I should go back now when I can. But Igor and Cheng kept encouraging me and telling me not to give up. Igor took my bag from me and told me that I should come unto the top of the hill and then if I feel the same, I may go back. Except when we reached the top, both of them said, the worst is over and now, its only downhill! And anyway, it's too late to turn back. So, on we went. Most of the route later was through the fields. So, it was fine. But soon as uphill paths came or if we had been walking for more than an hour, even on pretty much straight paths, I would fizzle out like an old, damp fire-cracker. So there goes all my hiking glory! :(

Btw, did I tell you I hate it when my parents are right against my wishes. Hmph. Hmph. Hmph. :/ My dad didn't want me to go on this hiking trip because he was sure I wouldn't be able to do it. (Actually, he didn't want me to go because I was going "alone with 2 boys" he doesn't know. But I refuse to give that silly claim any importance by talking about it or justifying it. My house-mates, I trust. My judgement, he doesn't trust. His problem.) So, obviously, he doesn't get the satisfaction of knowing that I couldn't do it. :P

But anyway, it was so pretty pretty pretty!! :D British countryside is so beautiful, every time I visit some place, I want to live there for the rest of my life! :P I was only feeling guilty about inconveniencing Igor and Cheng. But they were great encouragement! After the first day, we were all so tired, even they decided to take a break the next day and just walk to some nearby town or something, which btw, was 5 miles away. So, we ended up walking 10 miles anyway. But, at least this time, the bag wan't involved. So, we were all ok. :D Then, I decided not to torture myself and them any more and took a bus to Chester a day earlier, stayed at a lovely Bed and Breakfast there and just explored the city for 2 days. They joined me on the last day and we all took a train back home. So, all's well that ends well! :D Only one problem: my phone got wet and refuses to work now. Oh ho.

Oooh, pictures! :D

Our start point of the hike: Prestatyn Beach. We started our hike with a rainbow - good sign! :D

View from the top of (one of) the hill(s). We could see the Irish sea from Bodfari as well, the place where we camped for the first two nights - 20 kms away from Prestatyn. How cool, no?!! :D

We just walked through all of this and more like this! It was a treat to the sore eyes. Not to mention, all that fresh air and oxygen might have almost cured my lung cancer that I have probably contracted due to the pollution in cities! :P

This is the view from atop Denbigh castle (called Dinbych in Welsh).Yes, we even saw a Welsh castle! Awesome, no?!! :D And there was a woman playing harp and singing a local legend about a skirmish between the English and the Welsh. Oh, and I bought a mood ring with a design of Celtic knot on it! Cool, no?! :D A Celtic knot represents the eternity of soul. Btw, I know mood rings only react to body temperature and have nothing to do with moods but mine is almost always dark blue, which signifies love and passion. So, I would like to believe that it does really reflect the mood. :P 

This one is clicked in Chester from a bridge of the busy Eastgate Street. Chester is a very pretty town and you all should visit whenever you are in Britain! :D

Ok, finally, as a parting shot, I give you a Rhino!!! :P Well, these funkily painted Rhinos were there all over Chester. It's Chester's answer to Liverpool's Superlambanana! :P