SOU - Statue of UNITY - A trip worth making time for

SOU is in Kevadia, after Baroda on your way to Mumbai. This means if you are in Mumbai, you must drive towards Baroda and take a right into Kevadia.

How to reach SOU?

1. Rent a car from Ahmedabad and reach Kevadia in 3.15 hours or from Mumbai in 5.5 hours

2. You need to park your car usually at Bharat Bhavan since one cannot take the car without permission, which is only available in Gandhinagar, possibly since it is the capital of the State or need special contacts (I do not know how that works).

3. You can hire e pink rickshaws (driven only by women) for 2 hours or 4 hours or 1 entire day. Rates are better compared to the time you lose in catching the free govt bus from Bharat Bhavan to main station. 

The main station is next to SOU premises and there are 6 to 8 stations that take you to locations like parks, jungle safari etc.

4. If you buy the ECO tourism ticket, you don't have to pay Rs. 50 (per pax) which takes the bus from the station to the parks, then you can just hope onto the bus for free!

5. Yes, you can travel by Vista dome too from Ahmedabad to Kavadia (Ekta Nagar) station and hire e ricks for entire day. (Simpler if you are going to manage all travels in and out of the city by TRAIN).

What to carry?

1. You cannot miss your sports shoes. 

2. Carry a jacket during winters as after 5 pm it gets cooler, and you will feel cold after full sundown.

3. Glares and caps/hats are a must since there is almost 10 to 15K steps to walk during each day

How many days?

2 nights are enough if you want to cover most of the special places and 3 nights to be easy and not tired till you get out.

What must you do?

Reach as early as you can and check in to tent city (Rs 25000 for 4 people for 1 night) or better stay at Ramada (near Bharat Bhavan) or the Fern (Rs. 11000 per night for 4 pax). 

Directly begin with gardens like Ekta Nursery, Cactus Garden and Butterfly. Entries close at 5.30 pm and you will be asked to leave from the gardens by 5.45 to 6 pm.

You go to the Sound and Light show inside SOU or if you cannot manage that, seeing light show from the main station is also worth seeing. Parallelly, you will hear sound and laser show at Sardar Sarovar Dam when you reach the Unity Glow Garden.

All the above you manage on day 1. Keep snacking and sipping AMUL chaas, milk, cold coffee during your internal commute. Places are far off from each other, possibly 3 to 4 kms minimum.

SOU - Buy a slot either 4 to 6 pm for day 2 and start with Jungle Safari and Valley of Flowers after breakfast. We had done slot of 8 to 10 am for SOU.

Slots mean that you have to be at the elevator (45 minutes walk from the main entrance) to the statue to go up his chest for Viewing gallery. Thereafter, you spend time inside the museum beneath the statue and go upto his feet using the escalators. It is an experience that you would have never seen such a marvel. You will also observe Sardar's shawl threads made up of the metal wonder.

This entire place is made with finesse and has been made to look like a foreign city. No wonder Make in India concept was the driving force and it took the GOVT and the companies 5 years to bring the best possible trip you can ever have.

You can eat at Sankalp at Ramada Inn, Subway or the food court inside SOU.

Memoirs of Memory

 Me, I, myself come in your way,

Conversations which must affect you are ignored in the day.

You only hear with a closed mind, 

Then you ask your friend after 10 years, why am I so behind?

The lack of focus due to lack of interest persists,

You just do not wish to listen even if someone insists.

Inspiration is not available for free,

You have to develop a habit, may be two or sometimes three.

Do not lead the decision with a judgemental mind,

Do not be hard on your self but be a little kind.

Develop observation skills, don't remain blind.

Be alert, breathe in the moment and that's the life you must find.

Create a secretary for yourself, delete the unnecessary,

Keep the creativity in the flow state,

Stop depending on some unknown fate.

Life is when the unplanned happens, the time is right when the wisdom awakens.

Love your memory no matter they hurt you,

It will play like a child if you have a good one and dance around you all day long, you have to let it be and let it enjoy its moment.

It will be sick and tired like the old man if you have a bad one, it will sleep, rest, get bored and irritated and confused most day, you have to energize it and let it become enthusiastic.

@DJwrites to remain close to ALMIGHTY.

10th Nov, 2022

Can we manufacture time?

 One of the meaning of TIME by Thesaurus is "Lastingness". Humans are either accustomed to spend the day with the activities coming their way, or planning their own schedule. Most of those who are trying to earn a living have to sway in between both of these. But, I feel that is more classy as long as you ate able to have a closure with things you need to act on.

If you live as planned, and if you live as per others plans, then you will become slave to time in the first place or else slave to the one planning for you. But the dynamics is in plan a little, sway a little and make sure you do finish whats on your plate.

There is a story we have all lived atleast once, I don't have the time. Some just say it as they are able to remain uninspired, and some others who really really are bogged up with responsibilities and endless projects.

In such scenarios, we must come together with those who you work with, with whom you live with and discuss what is the impact of your survival and conditions you live on your health and your mind. Specially your mind will try to reject and eliminate those events which actually make you happy, relaxed and calming. Let's say meditation or reading 1 page of a book a friend has been recommending you. This rejection is only coming out of a definition of your being, and that chanting Oh, I don't really have time is a myth that you are creating for a few more months.

These months will turn to years and then you will enter a phase called Regret. This will lead you to chain of health issues and that will only question your past. It's cyclical. This then you will call it Karma since you have no one else to blame.

Yes, there is a reality that we all experience. But the reality also have those moments where we can stop everything at any time of the day and possibly sing, dance, paint, meditate, go or a drive alone, shine and reflect or just journal. We are born intelligent. We have forgotten to use it for our own selves. We are constantly using that intelligence for others. 

Hence, the only way to manufacture time is to Pause, Halt for a few moments. Do not evaluate if there are waves of thoughts coming to your mind. Let them flow. Make a decision, this decision is to do something what you have been wanting. Do not evaluate. Do not judge. Do not wait for appreciations on social media, do not ask for anyone's confirmations. Do it.

Next, stop follow ups. Once you do not follow up, you free your energy. You only remain absorbed in what you need to do. So, we all wonder how will it result in success if we do not follow up with others? The answer is simple. For those who are sincere, will regardless deliver results and for those who are not you will have to catch hold of them; make them sit by you and DO IT YOURSELF (DIY)!

Rest all others, IGNORE!

This is the second way to manufacturing time. Then comes the question of Money. If I am to do what he is supposed to do, why should I be spending? You are spending to free yourself from the micro management, the nitty gritty, the data conversion to information, from communication with 10 others who are attached to that event/project.

And now, the most important. While you WORK DEEPLY (Read Deep Work - by Carl Newport once in this lifetime), you actually will stop time. You will realize that your hours turned to minutes and those are still ticking to seconds.

Above is tried and tested since a while.

Much love and luck

Author.

I want to be a child

I wish the little child in me always stayed,
Seeing the sun she went out and with the flowers played..
She admired the little doggies, the little kittens on the road,
When she saw her mummy come pick up after school, her smile went broad.

Emotions except motherly and fatherly love was not known,
Laughter was so innocent without any second thought...(not that I think now to laugh)...
Looking out of the speeding car was amazing...
When I sat in the airplane, I found it so stunning...

Today, when I scan back the past,
I realized there were so many awesome things I alone did and they were vast.
I was secluded and I was not known,
But when I was known, I had to buy a phone!

The child in me drifted to a teen,
I still love watching Rowan Atkinson's Mr. Bean!(argh....)
I made more friends dearer and closer,
I cant think any day better that those fun tossers...

Love being a child and shall remain one,
Like the coal mines in which diamonds have shun hehehe

Kudos children...HAPPY CHILDREN'S DAY!!!