Blogger’s trip to Trivandrum!
Blogger(s) in this post refers to two people – Me and the popular (and) Cricket-is-my-religion blogger Kanagu. Once in Trivandrum, we were joined by another popular (and) never-tired-to-reply-to-million-comments blogger Vimmuuu.We went to attend the marriage reception of another popular (and) mish-mashed blogger Ashwathy 🙂
There are two mis-conceptions about my visit. People are thinking that I am desperate to please the (just) 6-7 readers who visit my blog regularly in order to avoid that count going down to zero! And, people are thinking that I have a lot of time in my hands now. Well, I have to clarify that both are absolutely True! 🙂
Since Kanagu had planned for this before about a month, he had reserved the train tickets for both of us from Chennai to Trivandrum. But it was just five minutes for the Train to start, and I was about to abandon the journey (tickets were with him) when he comes rushing in! I should say that while coming back, he tried to do something similar but since I was there with him, he was not able to satisfy himself with his passion of catching the train in the last minute! 🙂
We started from Chennai on friday afternoon, and reached Trivandrum by Saturday morning. We should thank Ashwathy for having booked a room for us in a nearby hotel. From there, we went to Vimmuuu’s house. On the way, we had got some flowers and a small vase to prepare the gift.
Kanagu had already coordinated for the planning / conceptualization of the gift by inviting suggestions from various popular bloggers. He had even printed the photos of the profile pics of bloggers beforehand. Vimmuuu used his craft skills & handwriting to make the gift a reality. Yeah, I too pitched in – I cut some cello-tapes to stick the photos 🙂 The photo of the gift we prepared,
We even wrapped up the gift in a gift wrapper and took it to the reception. When we gave it to Ashwathy, she took the gift by holding it sideways. Since we were not able to offer any warranty for the prepared gift for more than half a day and since the photos could fall down anytime, Kanagu warned her to handle it carefully! I think she guessed what we brought, and held it from below 🙂
Next day, me and Kanagu went to Kovalam beach (One photo taken there is above). Actually we planned to see the sunrise and wanted to start by 6:30 AM in the morning, but in actuality we reached there by around 10:30 AM! It was a different beach with both rocks and dark sand. And the water was splashing due to the rocks.
Then we went to Gandhi park in East Fort road (Photo above, I hope you can see the photo of MK Gandhi in the center!) in order to relax for some time. I should mention here that at this point of time, Trivandrum weather is much much better than Chennai! We did not feel the heat at all.
Then we were joined by Vimmuuu and his wife and all four of us went to explore the main (fort) museum. But due to some renovation, they closed it temporarily. Maybe it was blessing in disguise as we found out another good newly opened museum called Keralam museum nearby. You can see one photo taken there above, and I must say that it was a neatly kept govt. museum with a guide coming with us to explain about the exhibits! It seems this is an interactive museum and they had touch panels installed in various places to get more info about the exhibits. Pretty impressive!
Since we had some more time, we went back to the Fort Museum (photo above) and spent some time sitting and chatting on a wonderful lawn over there. We discussed many intellectual topics like Google+, Lakhs of crores of rupee worth gold statues discovered from neighboring Padhmanabha temple, probability of becoming a yoga master to earn crores of rupees, why bloggers were inactive in blogs but active in facebook, etc 🙂
We should thank Vimmuuu for coming to the railway station to see us off. In Kerala, one dish is prepared by making a bajji out of sweet banana slice – I forgot the name for this. We tasted that too – When the train stopped in Kottayam, thanks to the ever alert Kanagu who suddenly woke up from sleep, got out of the train when it stopped and brought this for both of us 🙂
Destination Infinity
Oh u guys actually implemented that gift idea in Trivandrum? Kudos to all of you! Looks really cool and nice!:) Waiting to know Ashwathy’s reaction!
I could see the GandhiJi in that pic 😉 The fort seems really interesting 🙂 Thanks for sharing 🙂
I should concede that the idea and the efforts were mainly from the other two. I blame the background for the invisibility of the statue…
Destination Infinity
It must have been fun to meet fellow bloggers 🙂 🙂 At the same time you got an opportunity to visit some new places. Seems you had a great weekend 😀
Yeah, we did visit new places. Especially happy about visiting the Keralam museum – that was quite well done…
Destination Infinity
wow…it must have been very exciting trip….
moreover i liked the idea of gift, having fotos of all fellow bloggers….really very nice…. 🙂
Though I would like to take the credit for that gift, it actually came from many bloggers and was coordinated by Kanagu. So, thanks to them… 🙂
Destination Infinity
Lovely idea .. Missed the wedding 🙁 did not know you all guys would have been there …
You had a great time .. excellnet
Bikram’s
Don’t worry, weddings keep happening every now and then 😉
Destination Infinity
The gift idea with photos is fantastic! Ashwathy must be happy about it!
If you had not told us to look for the Statue of Gandhi, we wouldn’t have see it with the dark background!
The lawn is clean without plastic bags, great!
Yeah, the lawn was so clean. The govt museum complex was kept very neat. We ought to appreciate that.
Destination Infinity
It was wonderful to read this post! It’s such fun to meet people whom one has known only online. It is exciting to see whether they will be what one thought they were and I have at least not been disappointed. I have met Shefaly twice, Man of Roma once, a Gopinath once alongwith another blogger from Pune, and Priyank twice. There are others I plan to meet sometime, and Prerna is certainly one of them. She and me started blogging together. Each of these meetings has been absolutely great.
MOR came from Italy, or you went there? One advantage of blogging is you get to meet similar and well intentioned people online, whom you don’t know offline. That’s one thing that other social networks do not enable you to do. BTW, if you come to Chennai, do let me know – we can also meet.
Destination Infinity
Its a good trip DI 🙂 I liked it 🙂
We had nice conversations, some sightseeings and the team work done on gift 🙂 but the find of the trip for me is that public park… still dreaming of sleeping on those grasses 😀 😀
The lawn is maintained so beautifully in that public park around museum! There was no littering around the place! If they can do it in Trivandrum, we could maintain our public places like that across India.
Destination Infinity
Coming here after a long.Missed few post of urs.
Your trip sounds so much fun.Nice gift idea DI, whose idea it was??
Clean and green park,we hardly get to see such parks here in hyderabad….
Actually a mail was sent to many bloggers, and someone suggested the gift idea – Don’t remember who. But the concept was coordinated by Kanagu and he deserves all the praise for it.
Destination Infinity
the dish name is pazham pouri..
Yeah, Now I remember. Thanks for reminding – Next time I know what to ask for…
Destination Infinity
OMG!!! I totally missed this post!!!!! I think this was during the time I missed checking any blog posts. Posted on July 4…no wonder!!
When we gave it to Ashwathy, she took the gift by holding it sideways. Since we were not able to offer any warranty for the prepared gift for more than half a day and since the photos could fall down anytime, Kanagu warned her to handle it carefully!
ROFL!!! 😀
Banana fry – pazham pori. You could’ve eaten it in Trivandrum itself. It’s a yummy favourite of most Keralites! 🙂
I can barely make out that Gandhi statue in the background!! 🙄
It was lovely meeting you and kanagu….thanks for bothering to come all the way for this 🙂 Wish I could have spent more time together with you all….but I guess I was in no condition to sneak away from the festivities 😛 😀
Next time definitely !!
Oh, that was our pleasure. Thanks for the accommodation arrangement… 🙂 We know everything went perfectly except the gift. We didn’t have time to make it better. Anyways it was a great trip, and hope to make more trips like this…
Destination Infinity
wow! such a nice gift!