Valparai

It all happened on a night like this. I was going through my newsfeed while taking a break from my coding session and I happened to see the film 'Living with elephants' by Sara. I was amazed at how efficient the system was inspite of it being very simple. However, I noticed that most of it was manual and I thought of trying to automate it. I realised that it was not going to be a very difficult task and began to work on it. A working system was ready in a night. I sent a few mails to the guys at NCF about it. I even called some of my friends to my home and we had a brainstorming session on several other ideas that could be implemented. 

Fast forward to the 14th of August. I was now setting out to Valparai to work on this project. Karthik and I had managed to reach the railway station very early so that we could get seats in the unreserved compartment. After standing in the queue for more than 2 hours and with only about 15 guys ahead of us, we were pretty confident that we would get seats. There were three constables standing nearby and we foolishly believed that all would be fine. But come on folks! This is India. When the train arrived, the coaches were already full! For a second, we did not even understand how this thing had happened. However, we tried our best to get inside the train with our heavy bags. After squeezing hard, we realised that we only had the luggage rack to sit. But before we could climb and sit there, a distant relative of the Orangutans occupied it. My father gave me a call and told me that he had managed to get a seat in the next coach. The adventure began. Now in order to get to that coach, we had to leave the one we were already in. But it was next to impossible to get out when there was literally a 'mob' trying to get in. After hearing a lot of good words and Karthik loosing his cool, we managed to reach the door. But wait, it was not over yet. The people still didn't understand that we were leaving the coach inspite of me talking in almost every language I knew. It was not that I noticed that the other door of the coach(the one that doesn't have a platform) was comparitively less crowded. So, we went there, jumped on to the track and climbed the platform on the other side which had a lot of wet cement on it(thereby spoiling our pants) and we finally reached the the coach my dad was in. But wait..our happiness was shortlived. It was not a 'seat'. It was the same luggage rack. However, not wanting to sit on the ground or stand all the way to Coimbatore, we hopped onto it. We had a tough time that night with our backs and necks that were struggling to fit into that tiny place.  

8 hours later, we found ourselves in our favourite city - Coimbatore. Somehow, this place has grown close to my heart. It was here that I first came for an intense 4 day trekking course, it was the first stop in our first ever 'go to anywhere' trip, it was here that I got chased by the police for the first(and only) time for sleeping on the platform and it remains the only city where I have the confidence to roam about aimlessly at 1AM in the streets without the slightest sense of fear. Before the sun could rise, we found ourselves travelling along the beautiful road to Pollachi and we got into a Valparai bound bus after a round of 'Nair-kadai chaaya'.  

An hour later, we found ourselves negotiating hairpin bends on the Valparai road. The huge Aliyar dam looked inviting and I literally wanted to jump from the bus and dive into the dam :P Karthik soon dozed off(as usual) and I requested a lady sitting near me to inform me when the Valparai town post office arrived. She agreed and later asked about the purpose of my visit. I told her that I was there to try and improve the elephant warning messaging system, she gave me a look that was a mixture of joy, thrill and gratitude. I have never seen anything like that till date. Explains the kind of respect the people at Valparai have for the amazing work done by the guys of the Nature Conservation Foundation.

We reached Valparai and were greeted by a group of Lion Tailed Macaques. We were later told by Ganesh Raghunathan that these were a highly endemic species and Valparai was one of their main living habitats. However, continuous fragmentation of the rainforests in the name of estates, development, etc. have affected these species. We met Ganesh at the NCF office and he started to show around the place. We also met Sreedhar, who studies stress in elephants. We then went to Mary Matha to have our lunch. In Ganesh's words, Mary Matha was the 'safest place to eat in Valparai'. However, it looked really humble and  a lot like the kind of hotels I eat in during my treks. Another proof for the fact that appearances can be deceiving. We discussed various things with Ganesh and this particular conversation still echoes in my head. 

(Paraphrasing)

"Giving gifts and offerings is a very monkey thing. It probably came to us due to evolution. Little monkeys give gifts to big, adult mokeys just like how we bribe policemen, politicians, etc. When humans started to give food to monkeys, even the smallest monkey began to feel superior. And then men became more foolish by feeding monkeys with their hands. This was the time the monkeys were waiting for. They now felt completely dominant over humans and they started to snatch whatever they want from humans. And now, we humans are blaming the monkeys for this!".

It has to be said that one of NCF's work has been installing aerial ropebridges in Valparai so that these Lion Tailed Monkeys(LTMs) could cross roads without being run over by speeding vehicles. Inspite of being highly arboreal and gymnastic, these monkeys were not able to survive in the wide road conditions of today and hence NCF had come up with this wonderful initiative to protect this species.

We also visited the information center that had been set up by the NCF and it was literally a treasure trove of information. The walls were painted with wonderful looking fauna drawings all hand-drawn by a single person!

On our way back, Ganesh took us to the Forest Office where a leopard was being prepared to be sent to Chennai for treatment. A majestic creature inside a small cage. This was a pathetic sight. But some medicines are supposed to be bitter, aren't they?

We then came back to Mary Matha to have our lunch and then proceeded with working on the project. I don't get many readers on my blog and I would not like to chase the few ones with details of my programming work, so fast forward..

Late in the evening, at about 7, Ganesh and Sridhar had left the office to do some work. Karthik and I were working alone when this happened. All of a sudden, we heard some noise in our backyard. I had already shut the windows that afternoon as it looked big enough for leopards to get through and Ganesh's mention of a leopard in that vicinity somedays back were echoing in my head. Karthik went and shut the door immediately but the sound still kept coming. We then gathered the courage to open the door and we noticed a cat-like figure there. That was more than enough to freak us out. Luckily, Vaishnavi, another NCFian had also come to the backyard now and we realised that it was only a cat. We had a small talk with her and she told us that she was there working on the forest restoration program. Her work included identifying abandoned patches of estates and trying to convert them into forests again by planting seeds that were recovered from the roads. Fabulous indeed! We then continued with our coding work. We left the NCF office in the night and then proceeded to the basecamp. Now if there was one thing I have to tell about this place, it has to be this. It has a board in the front saying 'Siruthaigal nadamadum paguthi'(leopard zone) and not far from it is another board saying 'Yaanaigal nadamadum pagudhi'(elephant zone). A week back, an elephant had walked into the entrance of this building and Vaishnavi had got to see it from the inside of the building with all lights turned off. In fact, the trees and bushes that had been damaged back then was just being cleared when we arrived. However, after that leopard incident, I had somehow got used to the place and I felt fully confident now. 

We later had a chat over dinner and we shared many funny videos, incidents, etc.Plenty of sarcastic remarks about Vijaykanth, TR and Raghuvaran's 'I know' jokes later, we somehow found ourselves talking about rocket launches. I guess it was me who started it. I was showing them the rocket lauch videos I had taken in Sriharikota and Vaishnavi told me that she knew a guy who goes to Sriharikota to see rocket launches. I later realised that it was Deepak, a fellow CACian. She asked me if I knew of the Chennai Astronomy Club and asked me to consider joining it. And boy, I was like.."Actually, I am the Co-founder of the Chennai Astronomy Club". Ganesh and Sreedhar then turned on the TV to see some 'romba mosama translate panna' Chinese action movie. Not able to bear the very poor translation, we guys turned it off immediately and then found solace in our sleeping bags. 

The next day morning, Karthik and I went for a small walk around the basecamp. We saw a pugmark that later turned out to be a 'pigmark'. We also had fun listening to the music of the whistling thrush. Ganesh and Sreedhar were courteous enough to make breakfast for us and after filling our stomachs, we headed back to the office. There was a power cut after some hours and we used this time to relax in a stream that was flowing near the office. Just the mountains, stream and nature. This was amazing. We then headed back to the office and resumed our work. We went to 'Plaza', another hotel in Valparai for lunch as Mary Matha was crowded.

In the evening, Ganesh suggested taking a break and going on a ride to Nalamudi Pooncholai or somewhere else to see elephants. So, we packed our bags and cams and left. We had Silamban with us. Silamban was Ganesh's assistant and a very valuable person. He tracks elephants and was also one of the first persons to spot the Purple Frog - a recently discovered species endemic to the western ghats that can be seen only for about 2 weeks a year during the monsoon. It spends the rest of the days under the ground! Ganesh and Sreedhar shared a lot of their experiences during the ride. We then reached an old mud road. We spotted a few peacocks and a grey hornbill. A few moments later, there he was! A lone elephant standing graciously. We went like 12 meters close and it didn't even bother about us. The sounds of the insects and LTMs were very high and the place felt so lively. We spent more than an hour taking photos and watching the elephant before we left. Only when we were leaving did I realised that I was bleeding badly thanks to leech bites.

 We then resumed working on the project and it was ready by that night. Mission accomplished. We then had a group snap taken and Karthik and I left the office with a pretty sad feeling. We slept early that night as we had to leave early the next day morning. Ganesh took us to a place where gaurs can be commonly seen but we found none there. However, we spotted a civet, a brown fish owl(this one was huge) and a few other species whose names I don't remember.

The next day morning, I woke up and got shocked on seeing the time. It was almost 6! We were to leave at 6:30 and we had also planned to take a sunrise timelapse! So, I rushed to Karthik and woke him up..Trust me, waking up Kumbakaran would have been easier! To our surprise, the sun had not come out yet and we were also fortunate to see a young barking deer run into the bushes. I also got a glimpse of the Whistling Thrush that evades Karthik till date.  We got to see some Nilgiri Tahrs on the way near the 9th hairpin bend.  We finally bade goodbye to our hosts and left Valparai with the same feeling that I get while leaving every mountain after a trek. To be frank, this time the feeling was a little more. I still miss the place badly - the omnipresent LTMs, the huge elephants, the sneaky leopards, the chirping of the birds, the song of the thrush, the comfortable cold and the amazing company of NCF folks.