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Going From Somewhere to Nowhere

I get anxious about the uncertainty of going from somewhere to nowhere. It seems cool and exciting in the beginning. But you need to move your butt out of that somewhere. 

Where should I go?
Will the experience be worthwhile?
How do I get there?
Will it be a comfortable journey?
All these questions and more swim in my head busily but going nowhere. I look searchingly for a signal from the universe. Nothing comes. Back to absurdism. I have to decide.
Choices - Left or Right?
Even though I have told people around me that I am going to Karuna Farm, I prefer it isn't the highlight of my trip. I'd want to discover something new. On this trip, my experiments are to play badminton and to interact with people. I wrote to some Kodaikanal people on the Couchsurfing website a couple of days ago. But they seem to hold my nationality against me. Not exciting enough to be a worthy guest.

I had a confusing time figuring out the different exits from Kerala to Tamil Nadu. My somewhere was Kottayam. I met my wife's distant relative who went to Kodaikanal regularly. I told her that somebody asked me to take a train to Madurai or Coimbatore. She rubbished it and gave me another route via Kumily. The Kottayam-Kumily route and the Kottayam-Munnar route, both lead to Kodaikanal. But the relative was authoritative and so I decided to take that route.

I stayed at Kumily in the night. Kumily is shared between Kerala and Tamil Nadu and divided by a check post. I was told that there are buses to Kodaikanal from Cumbum (pronounced 'Come Bum'), which was 15 km away. Instead I went to the bus stop across the check post and got a bus to Theni, which is in the plains near the foothills of the route that diverts to Kodaikanal. The bus conductor told me that Theni was approximately two hours away from Kumily. Theni turned out to be a busy town with all the expected trappings. Definitely not the place I wanted to stay! I got off the bus and asked for directions. Something seemed amiss. I felt a tad lighter and free-er. The alarm bells went off in my head. Then it struck me that I had left behind the my bag with badminton racquets and my new sandals in the bus. Thankfully Theni is a bus depot. And, the bus was still parked where I had left it. I found my bag hidden from everyone's sight in the overhead storage. But before that I spent some anxious moments checking the wrong bus.

Following the instructions given to me by a shopkeeper at the Theni bus stand, I took a bus heading to Dindigul. Dindi-sounds like 'Didn't he' and gul-sounds like the 'cul' of culminate. I got down at Vathalagundu. Vath-ala is said rapidly. It also sounds like Bath-ala. Gundu sounds like gundu for chubby in Malayalam. The name had a nice ring to it. It also sounds like a Telegu name. I imagined Vathalagundu would be close to the hills and expected it to be picturesque. Based on such a notion, I planned to stop there for the night. But the town was dusty and unappealing. So I decided to carry on. There was a bus at the Vathalagundu depot heading to Kodaikanal. The ride would take an hour and therefore I expected to reach before 12 midnight. But the bus took a long time to leave. Meanwhile I booked a hotel online. After I made my payment, something went wrong with the Internet connection and I got an 'unsuccessful booking' message.

As the bus took a detour from the highway, the road curved uncomfortably and it got colder.  My worry lines creased as I wondered what lay ahead of me.
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