The Story of My Tour to Puri

It is often said, we Bengalis have only three places to go,Di-Pu-Da. Digha, Puri & Darjeeling! I myself being a Bengali, am no exception. I have visited two of them Di and Pu, yet to go to Da. The pictures are some of the snaps of my tour to Puri.

The tour is a memorable one to me. It was January, 2010, me and my wife was going there on our own. Though my cousin brother and his wife had promised to accompany us and their tickets were booked with us, they cancelled their journey citing some silly excuse. So it was left to us alone (though we were two but got the opportunity to get alone). I was a little bit nervous since this was going to be my first expedition on my own. My wife had just entered college, she too had very little experience of outing. But we decided to go forward (now looking back I feel how good that decision was) and our family, though a conservative one, approved. So we set out. From where we live, we had to come to Howrah and catch the train that carried us to our destination.

After reaching Puri at the dawn, we caught an auto-rickshaw and went for a suitable hotel and got a quite good one near a relatively less-crowded beach. It was the first time my wife came face to face with the greatest feature of the earth, the sea. 

The countless waves, roar of the sea and the white bubbles on top of the sea water made her speechless. We just completed the necessary check-in formalities of the hotel and rushed to the beach. The water was coming continuously, kissing our toes and asking us to join her in her play. We could not deny her anymore and jumped into the water. The water was caressing our body and mind with soft touches and soothes us. The fatigue due to overnight journey just washed away. When we returned to our room which was by then prepared by the room service, we were literally soaked in salt water. “It is the best morning in my life ever”, my wife had told me many times by then. That day and the next we spent embracing the sea. We took long walk along the sea beach, took part in making castle of sands, enjoying the beach-side foods and bathing in every available opportunity.

Then came the day we decided to go to the famous ‘Jagannath Temple’ to pay our tribute to the god. Though I myself is not a believer of gods (actually a hard core fan of the ‘God of War’ game series), but went there to see the magnificent artworks of the temple. Only downside is that camera is not allowed there, photography is strictly prohibited. However my wife said her prayers and offerings though through some ‘Panda’(another downside).

 

Then we started for ‘Chilka’. Chilka is a brakish water lagoon spread across Puri and its neighbouring districts. One of the USP of Chilka tourism is boating at the vast water of the lake. There are several packages consisting of different features. We bought the best one and sailed. There was a point in the options to watch the Dolphins, but they were somewhat displeased with us, I guess, cause they seldom showed up and whenever I was ready with my camera, they just disappeared! Alas no picture of the Dolphins were shot. Then after cruising here and there for some time, we came to the sea mouth. It is the place where the sea meets the lake. The outwardly beauty of that place left me mesmerising. The different colour of the water and their mixture was a must see. The deep blue of the sea and the green of the lake and it gradually becomes a little transparent towards the land in which we were standing.  I have never been in Kashmir or Switzerland, so I cant compare, but it seemed to me a piece of heaven had dropped here. We could have spent the whole day there, but the time was coming short and we had to return.

Read on to see more.

Let's make the world better

In recent times we saw the power of people through online activities, whether it's the gathering at Anna Hazare's campaign or the dethroning of the Egyptian president. We also saw its dark side at London unrest. In a word, the online world, specially facebook, had given us enormous power. A power beyond imagination. Many of us as individual had little  value to them who sit at power. Our voice did not reach to them let alone our demands.

That's where online world comes in. It gives us power to raise our voice, to raise our demands to those who had been reluctant to us before. Before that there was none to listen us. But now we can spread our words through the wall or blog or some other means and get noticed by a number of people. If there is something important, something touching in those words it would cause a stir. That stirring could change the present. The change could be good, could be better but could be worse too.

With great power comes great responsibility. We could use it against corruption, exploitation. We can tear apart the mask hiding the corrupted by taking the advantages of modern technology and sharing them online. We have the power in our hands and the key to the future. It is in our hands to utilize the power to make a great future rather than causing it harm beyond repair. A new horizon can be seen. Let us make it a better world.