My first trip/trek @16- Siddara Betta, Tumkur

My first trek was at 16 to Siddara Betta, Tumkur.

Siddara Batta is a rocky hill 3660 feet above sea level. It is Sacred Place where many sadhus/Holy spiritual men made meditation and worship of Lord Shiva. We can still see some sadhus meditating here and some more are in samadhi state. Here is a famous temple situated at the Top of the Hill. Though the major crowd which visits here are pilgrims, this place is also interests for trekkers and other nature lovers.  Siddara Betta is 12+Kms from Koratagere in Tumkur district and is around 95+kms away from the Bangalore and 35+kms from Tumkur.  Distance from Bangalore: 95+kms.

It was amazing experience far ( not soo far ) away from home. Never i had taken cold water bath till then. I had to experience that. Never i was so discipline of waking up at 5 am get ready by 6 am and do yoga for 1.5 hours and then breakfast for 30 mins. Then get ready for some activities like playing, chanting, learning mantras etc etc.  I learnt most of the mantras here. I learnt how to mingle with people. I learnt how it feels to be discipline in life.  After evening snacks, there used to satsagha ( means, Good companion). Its motive is to educate people in how to tangle things in life. we were very small to understand those spiritual teachings but it did affect our lives. Not to lie, Not to steal, Not to laugh at others pain, Not to feel shy in helping others, Not to get afraid, Not to stop until you reach your goal were few things which every kid needs to know. It was part of the programme.

I remember i was told to write all your experiences at the end of the day.  I used to write everything in one book so promptly. Unfortunately, i lost that book.  I bet it would have been funnier to read that now :)

I remember i was told to write a letter to my parents. Never i had written any letter in life. I didnt know how to write apart from writing letters in exams on A4 paper. Now i had a real letter in my hand. I was blank as to what to write to my parents. Then i was told to write about my opinion on this trek, what am learning, how much am enjoying and not to forget to ask about your parents wellness. That was one awesome feeling to write and imagine the expressions your parents might give reading that.  Unfortunately, i have not stored that letter :(

second day, was the trek to most amazing place Siddar BETTA :)
I remember i was jumping, crawling, walking, running all over the place. And at the end everybody assembled in one place where sadhus used to lite up diyas and medidate years together. It was such a peaceful, enchanting experience. We all small kids lite up diyas and you will never imagine how quite all kids were :) everybody could sense that inner peace :) strength to achieve in life.

At the end of the trek, we got some ayurvedic tablets so that we dont suffer much from after effects of trek.
Next day leave to bangalore with having a feedback session. :)

One of the best and first trek of my life :)

That thought of conquering whole world

In this post i would to like to tell you all how that thought of travelling whole world got exposed :-)

I am basically from an orthodox family. My school was very near to the place where i stayed, ~1.5 kms (15 mins walk). All through my schooling, I didn’t travel much which is the case for most of the middle class family. I get to hear stories from my friends after vacations as few of their relatives used to stay far away from them. But in my case, all my relatives were in Bangalore. My mom’s mother (though I have never seen her) was just 2 mins walk from my place. Few aunts, uncles stay in the same colony. And few not so far place and we get to see them during some or the other occasions. So vacations was the most hated days for me. I never get to go anywhere. So I grew up with the dream of exploring world, Dream of travelling every corner of this world, Dream of knowing the purpose of life, Dream of flying high. It was always wonderful to meet new people, get to know their culture, their pain, their happiness, their inbound knowledge.

It was after 10^th (my schooling), I got a chance to stay for 3 days far away from my parents. Parents never allow you stay away from them. Me being in orthodox family, girls were never supposed to go anywhere without parents accompanying them. It was the time where all my elder cousins got married at the age of 17/18 and by 20 with kid/s. After 10^th, I had lot of time before I join college. 3 months, I guess. So I myself and my childhood buddy Bhavya joined Yoga camp organized by Pathanjali group at Ram Mandir which was 5 mins walk from our place. Me and Bhavya stay in the same colony since childhood. For her, Yoga is a passion. But I joined because I was fat. It’s after joining yoga camp, I realized the essence of it. I don’t exactly remember the duration of the camp, may be it was for 1 or 2 months. It was the first kids yoga camp organized by them and the end of the camp they would take you to siddara betta, tumkur. Rama swamy, who has excelled in yoga field and who guides this pathanjali organization will take classes those 3 days. As soon as we heard about this 3 days outing, we(me and bhavya) were excited to go. But big part was how to convince parents? It wasn’t easy but it wasn’t impossible. So both went back home discussed this with our parents and their obvious reaction was “are you mad? Keep doing your work, don’t irritate us. We won’t send you to any trip”. We even convinced them saying, we don’t have to pay anything for this trip except for bus fare. But they didn’t. I had decided that I have to go no matter what. So I started satyagraha J Me being my dad’s pet daughter, it was little easy to convince him. Finally I got permission to go for this trip. Since my dad had agreed, bhavya’s dad started actually giving it a thought. And finally we both were super excited for our first trip(trek) J and upcoming post will tell about how amazing that trip was to both of us J