Weekend with my In-laws

As mentioned in my last blog, Rekha and I along with my in-laws and sis-in-law, visited a few places last weekend and was great fun and introspection.

Friday was when they arrived and I returned from work early and we headed to the Sankhamukha beach, a few Kms from my house, a beach within the city. We had fun in the water for nearly an hour. The thing that hit me there was, how much of the each had really eroded, don’t know, whether it is because of the rains and monsoon, or whether thanks to global warming the water level have risen. I clearly remember when I arrived in Trivandrum a good nine months back, we had to walk atleast 50 feet from the road to enter the water and now it’s down to about 20 feet. I also recollect that, the road near the beach was being re-constructed in September, end of the monsoon season due to the effects of the water. Will wait and watch for the reason. The hypothesis doing the rounds is that, there is a mermaid built of stone, which is about a 100 feet away from where the beach begins and it is attracting the water from the sea. Old times say the mermaid was closer to the beach, than where it is now and water had encroached near the mermaid.

Saturday, we left late in the morning, thanks to watching the India T20 game till late the previous night – and we lost as history would remind us. We headed out for Madurai type lunch and then to theTrivandrum zoo. WOW, it was a great experience. I really cant recollect the last time I went to a zoo, may be school, but really do not have an experience of a zoo in my brain. What stood out for me in the Zoo was, the big cats – the Lions, the Tigers and the Leopards. Fantastic is word I would under use to describe the experience. The roar of the tiger sends shiver down your spine, though it is caged the feel of the roar 5 feet away – cant explain, brilliant. The Tiger’s – phew!!!. Great animal, huge, atleast 8 to 9 feet, easily 300 Kgs, amazing.

Only a week ago I had read in an article in the Times of India – ‘The Speaking Tree’ (a daily routine for me to read the article online – great insights), a theory which defies Charles Darwin’s theory that we evolved from apes. Rather the articles talks about how human beings evolved from the souls of animals, like Apes, Lions, Elephants’ etc. And this is profoundly supported by modern psychoanalysis, particularly Carl Gustav Jung's school, because in the collective unconscious of man there are memories that belong to 'animalhood'.

If man is taken deep into hypnosis, first he enters the unconscious mind, which is just the repressed part of this life. If he is hypnotised even more deeply, then he enters into the collective unconscious, which has memories of being animals. People start screaming - in that stage they cannot speak a language. They start moaning or crying, but language is impossible; they can shout, but in an animal way. And in the collective unconscious state, if they are allowed to move or they are told to move, they move on all fours - they don't stand up. Truly revealing thoughts.

Sunday, we visited Neyyar dam, a 35 Km drive south east ofTrivandrum. We reached there to find, we had some good options to spend half a day, though initially I was told by my peers, that there existed nothing. We had an option for a boat ride for a hour and a half, which included a Lion Safari, a visit to the deer parkand a crocodile farm and all for a 140 bucks a head – worth it. We had to wait for more than a hour, as the next boat was available post lunch at 2 p.m., so we decided to have our lunch too and found a dingy restaurant run by KTDC – My suggestion, time your trip appropriately to avoid the restaurant.

The time arrived for us to board the boat and I was really jeered up to have a look at the Lions. I was told there were 2 Lions and 5 Lioness in the safari. We crossed the catchment areas and found a bus waiting for us for the safari. All of us literally ran to the bus to catch the window seats – vantage point you see, as there were others along in the safari. As we entered the park, it was reminiscent of Jurassic park the Movie – a shutter opening to allow the vehicle into the park, high fences, rules written on a board along with the literature about the park, the animals and their feed and of course a pole, where they would tie a goat for the lions to consume.

We drove a few feet and we caught a glimpse of a lion and lioness lazing away near a fence, but we could not a clear picture of them. We need drove up into the park and real feel began – a lioness sitting on a rock, 7 feet away from the bus. WOW – man it was a great experience. All it needed was one pounce and it would reached the bus, but she sat unassumingly in her environment and we clicked a few photos and proceeded. For the next few minutes we were still allowing our eyes to prey around and my heart to relax and allow the experience to settle – a free lioness 7 feet away.

We did not find any more and drove back to the first spot and by now the pair of animals we spotted initially had moved to better place for us to view them. The Lion is truly the king of the jungle, what a sight, what an animal. Trust me when he roars, the roar can be hear a few kilometres on the other side of the embankment.

We then proceeded to the deer park and crocodile farm, which was not even close to the experience of watching the lions. We headed back to Trivandrum and visited the Veli’s tourist village, where we had some snacks, caffeine certainly was the need of the hours, felt the back water and headed home.

A great experience being with the lions, especially when introspected, with the hypothesis that we could have evolved from their soul.