Ruins of Vijayanagara Empire at Hampi

Elephant Stables at Hampi, Karnataka

One of the richest empires that ruled the Southern India, the Vijayanagara Empire, had its capital around present day Hampi. What remains today of the once glorious state is the UNESCO world heritage sites, ruins of the empire. Virupaksha temple, Elephant Stables, Lotus Mahal, Vittala Temple, Stone Chariot, the musical pillars and few other monuments amidst the Thungabadra river and the rocky arid terrain give fantastic opportunity for photography.

Neelima, one of India’s best travel and landscape photographer, accompanied me and Dilip for a weekend escapade to Hampi. The best option to reach Hampi from Bangalore is through train to Hospet, and taking a cab from Hospet to Hampi. Given Hampi’s popularity and unavailability of train tickets left us with no choice but taking an overnight bus from Bangalore. The bumpy roads for latter part of the journey left me with little sleep and we arrived at 5am. There are many options for accommodation available, on either side of the river Tungabadra. We decided to stay at a shack on ‘the other side’ of the river. This meant taking a boat across the river every time we set out. Each of the historical sites are anywhere between 2 to 10 miles (or ~3 to 15km). It is possible to visit most of the prominent monuments in 2 days. Hiring a cab, renting a bike or a moped are the different options. We rented a moped.

Stone Chariot at Vittala Temple, Hampi

The temple complexes and the rocky landscape provide one the picturesque places for photography. Despite our outing in June, at the end of summer and onset of Monsoon, we were lucky to have splendidly beautiful blue skies. Started out with breakfast at the popular Mango Tree restaurant – cuisine is predominantly western. Our first day stops included Virupaksha temple and few unrecognized ruins at first. Returning to the Mango Tree for lunch.

In the evening, we visited the Vittala Temple. This is one of the most interesting monuments at Hampi. I still had the memories of visiting this place decades ago. The stone pillars carved on the mantapa of the temple produces 7 notes of music. It is simply fascinating to see and hear music from gently tapping the stone pillar. However, we were not let to tap the pillars on the main complex. The deterioration caused by millions of tourists visiting had already waned down the thickness of the pillars from what I had seen a decade earlier. There is only one pillar that is allowed for demo. Our guide showed us that and it was equally impressive.

Stone pillars at the Vittala temple complex produce musical notes on tapping it gently

Second day plan was to visit the Lotus Mahal and the Elephant stables at the Zenana Enclosure. The image you see at the top is the elephant stable. To get the size reference, see the man walking at the center. After lunch, I insisted on visiting Daroji for watching Sloth Bears. We had to ride ~30km. Through the hilly terrain, we reached the Daroji Bear Sanctuary. Birding in the late afternoon was average at best. Sloth bears visit for the jaggery lick on the rocks. We settled at a watch tower at 4pm. However, the bears were not expected until dusk depending on our luck. After waiting for close to an hour and half, we decided to return since we needed to catch the last boat across the river at 6:30pm. I was not fortunate to photograph sloth bears at Daroji and gives me reason to return.

Lakshmi Narshima Statue close to Virupaksha Temple

Krishnadevaraya was one of the prominent rulers of Vijayanagara empire. There are legends of gold and diamond ornaments being sold on streets by hawkers during his reign, signifying the wealth during the period. After the Sultans of Bijapur defeated the last emperor of the dynasty, they looted the wealth in the capital and destroyed the hindu temples, monuments and structures. Today, this stands in ruins and as popular destination for travelers.

Ruins are reconstructed, restored and preserved by ASI (Archaeological Society of India)

Check out the landscape images from Hampi here.

Wonder

The zeal to write about a new place I visit and publish the photograph has tempered down, if not dead, since I started at the business school. However, the list of fantastic places I visited during this calendar year has been nothing short of incredible and unexpected. Though some of the places I visited was on my mind for quite sometime, few others were not. Visiting a place that you have not even heard of doesn’t happen that often, especially to someone like me that had made a list of places to travel around the world in a year.

In January 2012, I was in Bangalore. Starting from there, I have covered over 56,000 miles in 8 months and set foot on 4 continents in one year. Though most of my travel happened over the summer and mostly for work, it exposed me to a variety of cultures, economic diversity, languages, architectures, lifestyles and much more.

Travel on work also provided some opportunity to visit some spectacular places. While in Peru, I took time off to visit Machu Picchu and while in China, I visited the Great Wall. During my visit to Delhi on work in 2010, I visited Taj Mahal. That completes 3 of 7 wonders of the world as per New7Wonders list. These unexpected visits has spurred motivation for me to visit all the 7 wonders of the world. Wonder when that would happen!

Why Google tablet is important?

Google+, Google voice, Chrome Webstore, Chrome OS, Google Music, Google TV, Google Shopping, Android, Google Fiber network; And most recently, Google Play.

Where do all these products culminate?

The answer is a tablet!

What Apple and Amazon understand and few other tablet makers such as Sony and RIM don’t is that tablet is not a device in itself. You need to give consumers an ecosystem to nurture the usage of the tablet and other devices.  Tablets are no longer a device that has a space between smartphone and computer as Steve Jobs introduced. It is inching closer to replace computers. There is a keyboard dock for iPad!

Google understands this as well as Apple or Amazon do. They also understands how people communicate and hence is striving to build a good social network, despite the early struggle.

There is need for a completely integrated ecosystem where a user can listen/buy music or movies, communicate with friends/family and share thoughts/news.

High speed Internet connectivity is also a big hindrance to ubiquitous usage of content accessible through these devices. Google has been setting up fiber optics and hopes to provide broadband 10 times faster than existing US average. The gamble by Google to create a complete end-to-end ecosystem from Apps and OS to hardware and internet infrastructure is as ambitious as it could possibly be. Pulling it off could be as revolutionary as Google search was for internet.

There are two important hurdles:

First, monetization could be a challenge: would Google try to put Ads on their devices and sell them at affordable prices (and hence go Amazon way?) or Make fully controlled premium devices (and go Apple way?). Hybrid option may seem the best alternative, but the trade off is not clear. Monetizing access to Google Play answers some part of this.

Second, Creating a seamless experience for user across multiple Android devices could be a challenge. Can Google make access to content purchased from ‘Play’ (and everything else) on Samsung SmartTV/GoogleTV, HTC Android Phone and Sony tablet seamlessly? It is a tough task, and an area where closed-system approach of Apple and its array of devices are scoring over Android. It becomes even more important in future.

Google seems to have or building (and integrating) all components of making a seamless entertainment experience on multiple devices. It would be interesting to see how Amazon and Apple play out. I think the first casualty could be Amazon if Google does well, before threatening Apple.

P.S.: Started writing ‘why Google tablet is important’ more than a month back, but only completing now. There is so much more I want to write about this, but got to run.

Kabini summer

This is the pattern in mind when I think of Kabini. Undoubtedly the elusive Leopard. The best place in the world to photograph this beautiful cat is around the backwaters of Kabini reservoir at Nagarhole National Park. I have never returned from Kabini without sighting this spotted cat (including my last month’s visit).

Having visited Kabini many a times, I had missed visiting this magical place in summer for long time. Arun, Selva and Sudhir agreed to join me, and I made a booking more than a month in advance for 2 night stay at the Kabini river lodge. Ooty was an obvious and easy choice for the weekend prior to Kabini visit from April 11 to 13th. Check out the Ooty trip report and few images here.

Started from Ooty after photographing few birds, briefs stops for sightings of Black Eagle, Chestnut headed bee eaters and Elephants near Bandipur, we were sightly late to reach Kabini.

Route: Ooty->Masinagudi->Bandipur->Gundlupet->Begur->Sargur->HD Kote handpost->Kabini

The expectation was high and Kabini didn’t disappoint. Soon into the evening safari, we saw this huge leopard. It paused for a moment to check us and all our cameras hit non-stop for 3-4 seconds. Combined, we must have captured about 40 frames in 3-4 seconds.

Leopard – watching left before crossing the track

The search for the bigger striped cat was on on almost all safaris. We missed an opportunity on 2nd day morning safari when a tiger arrived at the backwaters to quench thirst. But we did get to sight the big bird, Spot-bellied Eagle owl.

Back at the camp, each of us spent time to shoot macros of spiders and other insects. Fearing a nasty sting, I got close to this wasp for only one shot.

Moves like a butterfly, stings like a bee

Evening safari again yielded many elephants. A herd of spotted deer gave fantastic opportunity to capture some silhouette images on the backwaters in the golden light of fading sun.

Now, what’s Kabini without elephants. The best part about Kabini in Summer is the congregation of Asiatic elephants. You will find them pretty much everywhere – in the forest, on the backwaters, in the water. There were tons of them. It was a beautiful sight to watch mother with calf, huge tuskers young bulls, on the back waters – bathing, feeding, wrestling.

Eye of a Matriarch

Congregation of Asiatic Elephants at Kabini Backwaters

The final morning safari started with a beautiful sight of two peacocks trying to woo a mate. The spectacle was full on right on the jeep track. If not disturbed by the jeep ahead on trying to reach the sunset point from where a tiger was sighted, we would have seen more display of romance of peafowls.

Peacocks wooing Peahen

Even our jeep was rushed to the sunset point only to hear from the few jeeps that were already there that tiger went back into the thickets. Few jeeps decided to stay back, and our jeep driver decided to get to other part in hope of tracking the big cat. Soon, they get a call saying tiger is seen again near the sun set point. What followed that was something that I had only heard happens  (and subtly experienced) in Central Indian forests.

All the jeeps that got the info on tiger rushed at inexplicable speed to the spot. It was utter madness as I just sat disappointed, covering my eyes from the huge dust storm the convoy of jeeps had created.

Again as we reached, we were told the tiger just left the banks. Within a minute or two wait, our driver wanted to get back to track the big cat else where. I was furious. I told him I want to wait at a place long enough if we were to have any chance. There was no point in driving around. He suggested me we wait at another place and not here

Just as we were getting out, a couple of Dholes were sighted. Again, all the jeeps rushed as the were moving slightly ahead. The thunderous noise of the jeeps scared the Dholes and they got inside the bushes. If only we had turned off jeeps and waited, instead of rushing towards them they would have got comfortable and taken the jeep track as they were to do. It was disappointing to see people who know jungle better than us and drive everyday not understand the Dholes’ behavior.

We waited for nearly an hour at another spot facing the back waters. Few alarm calls heard, but no sighting of any big predator. We were to wind up the safari and just then got a call from another jeep about the tiger sighting, again at Sun set point. By the time we got there, the tiger again had gone inside the bamboo thickets. But we could see it through binoculars and record some strips of a sleeping cat on our cameras.

We waited for few minutes in the false hope that this tiger would get up and provide better views. I was capturing some images of an elephant and calf grazing on the backwaters. Just then one guy in a jeep started yelling ‘Tiger, tiger!’ All thought he was kidding. But he was proved right as all of us pointed our cameras and binocs towards a distant patch of backwaters.

Tiger on prowl

A tiger was walking down the path, from the bamboo thickets towards the water. Two tigers in ten minutes! The lighting was perfect and the tiger majestically walked towards water albeit a little wary of more dangerous animals, humans. She was really far for any portrait-esq image. However, the sighting was heartening and marked a good end to a wonderful summer trip.

P.S.: Have more frames that I wanted to publish but unfortunately haven’t found time to process. This was from April 2011 visit. Had luck to visit again in December 2011. Images from that trip will have to wait for a few years. :)

End of an year – 2011

Though I have lost the consistency of blogging this year, it’s been one hell of an year. This year has been more agonizing in many ways albeit new and exciting experiences. The year mostly was in two chunks. Continuing the ‘trend’ of the last four years, a cryptic recap.

Ended the last year’s post with hint on turbulence. The beginning continued that way. It was, though subtly expected, very painful. The blurr of Jan has somewhat caused me to even forget the passage of following few months. Missed the race, but hit the usual haunts a few times.

More distress and anxiety amidst good news (?).

The glorious  birthday trip to the montagnes of the west. Eventful few days and then the time for decisions. Monthly unwillingness in rituals, but it worked.

The running around. Going crazy, almost. May it end. The dreaded place with quarter hour drive was indeed awesome. Thirty 30. Really? Sure? Yes and No. No and Yes. Yes. More running around. The stamp, the frolic or the lack of it.

The shift. Displacement. A few initial good days leading up to the carnage. The super awesome exponential upward curve. New, not necessarily needed. Fear, numbness, glitter and hope – all at the same time. The time whirred past. It seems like a chunk of time rather than separate months, weeks or days.

return temp; //lol

The inconsistent gearing up. But the war is eventual. Hope is the only constant and is perpetual.

P.S.: The BA flight, how many would believe!

.

Almost forgot about future me!!

An entrepreneur I admire

“You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.”

 

I realized the impact of lacking the knowledge of what customer wants when a product that I was working on was shelved for lack of market. An entrepreneur needs to know what customers want, be it in service or in product, in advance.

 

“It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.”

Vision is almost everything for an entrepreneur. It not only steers the company in the right direction, but also motivates people who work for you. A good product is not a result of how much money you spend in developing it or how much you pay for hiring the best talent. I believe all that someone needs to be happy is something to be enthusiastic about. A good entrepreneur understands this, and leads the people with his vision and extracts the best out of them.

 

“I’m not afraid to start from the beginning.”

To me a real entrepreneur is one who can say this at any point in time. For these reasons, the entrepreneur I admire the most is Steve Jobs.

 

–

 

This was one of the the essays I wrote while applying to the Marshall School of Business last year. I am preparing for my first final exam (Strategy) of business school. We have a case on Apple Inc., and I can’t help but wonder the void Steve Jobs has left behind in consumer electronics industry.

Have a look at this article which captures this void beautifully:

feeds.harvardbusiness.org/~r/harvardbusi…

 

 

P.S.: Some portion of the essay has been edited for not-so-obvious reasons, but 95% is unchanged.

First few days at USC Marshall

It has just been 3 weeks since I have been in Los Angeles, but it seems like a long time. Business school is a lot of fun and hard work at the same time. It doesn’t take much time to realize that. One week of International orientation, followed by a week of MBA orientation and one week of classes exposed us to multitude of activities that reduced the sleeping hours to bare minimum required – create-a-country, career services, guest speakers, outdoor activities, Trojan marching band, parties, barbecue, baseball game, student clubs, case competition, and assignments.

International orientation steadily prepared 50 odd international students to the onslaught that was upon us in the following week. It created a smooth transition to the american education system, culture and its nuances. It didn’t take long to know each other and were thrilled to learn the different blend of cultures we bring together. Though dominated by students from China and India, there are few from Spain, Bulgaria, Australia, Russia, South Korea, Lithuania – total of 20 different countries.

MBA orientation made a bigger impact and seemed intimidating when walking into the lobby with 220+ people. I was meeting most of them for the fist time. The schedule of the orientation week was hectic to say the least, from 8am to 8pm on most days. Wonderfully crafted orientation gave us enough time to mingle with each other and learn more about fellow classmates. There are people from diverse backgrounds – film makers, producers, professional gamblers, professional tennis players, wildlife photographers (ya, that’s me) amongst many bankers and consultants. Provided breakfast, lunch and dinner on most days saved me a lot of trouble as I was just settling down in the new apartment. The last two days of the orientation was the most enjoyable and trying at the same time. 3 cores with 39 teams were to compete in a series of outdoor activities on penultimate day, and a case competition on the last day. Executives from Nestle, trojan alumni, were on the judging panel for the case competition and the finalist teams had a great opportunity to showcase their analysis skills to them. Winners were from core C, but everyone had a great learning experience. Parties followed the end of orientation.

Starting August 1st, we had our regular classes with a case and few other reading before the first class. Interspersed with academics is various community activities, one of which is a plane pulling event to raise funds for special olympics. Please have a look here. Also the career service activities are keeping us busy with many workshops. All these means less time to sleep. My average sleep hours in the last few weeks is about 5hrs. But it’s fun!

There’s an article on Bloomberg Businessweek about our MBA orientation with comments from our super energetic assistant Dean, Diane Badame. Have a look here. Here’s a small video of orientation – visit to dodgers game on last day of international orientation, outdoor activities with different cores and finally the performance of Trojan marching band :

Many of my friends are asking me how is LA. I love the weather, it’s very very much like Bangalore. I haven’t got much time to go out and explore LA much, but I’m having a great time in the business school. But I did travel around San Francisco and San Diego on my first week in the US, and will write about it some time in future. LA can wait.

P.S.: The image and video were captured on my HTC Inspire phone – impressive, isn’t it? Of course the image quality.