A trek to remember!

As I was flipping the pages of my book at night, I got a call from Bhaiya asking “we are all going for a trek to mudumalai forest, one seat left in the car, you want to join?
The 14th August long weekend had just begun and I was all alone in peace reading at my home. I asked when you are all leaving. He said tomorrow early morning at 4.00 am and I agreed to join him and his friends. As ever Bangalore is a place of friends of friends.

I went and parked my car at Bhaiya’s friend home, where all others were waiting. I greeted them all and there it began- the life of roller coaster fun, peace and excitement.

As we entered the forest, we switched off the AC and put the window down and I felt as if I was not in India!
We reached our greenwoods nature camp and were welcomed with a hot tea and bright sky with the forest stretching in front of us. We sat for few hours out there, enjoying the scene, for all we get to see in our daily lives and in our offices are the wall papers of such beautiful places in the laptop.


No hurry, no one running around and it was like life had come to halt. I was watching a still life painting right in front of my eyes. I closed my eyes absorbing the moment as the wind hits my face.

After few hours of silence and serenity, we decided on the trek to forest the next morning and got to sleep soon hearing the insects and birds mild chirping outside our tents at night. Well we also heard a roar! Not sure if it was a tiger or a friend’s snore in the adjacent tent.

We all got up early and were ready. As we were wearing our shoes, our guide who was an old man entered the gate of our tent resort and asked “Are you all ready?” We all nodded and it was around 6.15am that we all set out for the trek.


It was all till this moment the life was different. And post the trek had begun, I realized life was no different from our daily corporate life.

We all followed the guide talking amongst ourselves. One of the friends in the trek asked the old man “have you ever seen a tiger?” and he was cool with it and said “yes couple of times” as if he was talking about having seen a dog in the forest. For next 15-20 min we continued to walk climbing a hill which had the path and there comes in the first challenge, a river to cross.

I shouted aloud “Don’t tell me, we are supposed to cross the river”. Every one turned back to me and said “ Shsshhhh…” no more talking or shouting as we are entering the forest. The old man asked us to put the phone on silent. I smiled thinking we do put our phones on silent before every meeting in the office as well. I have mentioned about success and failure transfers in my blogs earlier in which we convert our past failures and success into the future success and failures. In my last trip to mekadatu, I had to cross the river and as I was trying to hold my friend from slipping, I had impressively slipped and fell in the river with ice cold water. Well that was a moment of laugh for my friends and hot topic of discussion in FB for few months post that. But I was thinking of that failure transfer (slipping and falling in the river), wondering that might happen again.Lesson learnt: We do success and failure transfer in real life too and not just in corporate life.


We reached near the river and I let few of my friends go ahead, wondering I might try and do their success transfer to mine thinking ‘if they can cross the river, so can I’. I watched them all cross and finally bhaiya was right behind me “Go, start walking on the rocks, you can do it”. I said “ohk, I will”. I started. I looked down and flow of the water was way faster than I had thought it to be. Some where there were rocks and somewhere rods connecting the rocks. We had to walk on them. As I stepped on the rods, Bhaiya said “don’t look down, see they all reached, walk faster and try reaching them”.

I looked up and walked faster. I again shouted at my friends who had almost reached the other side “mujhe swimming nahi aati, do any of you know? If I happen to fall in river, do save me”. One of them who was walking behind me shouted back “ mujhe bhi nahi aati”. I felt like kicking him for those words at the wrong time. The noise of the river water was so much that we had to shout to talk. Another friend from other side shouted who called me ‘ghost eyes’ shouted “I know to swim ghost eyes, relax and cross it”. Ohk that was somewhat assuring and I walked a bit faster doing some circus type balancing acts. Lesson learnt: Knowing the targets to reach in life is as important as the corporate world and having a backup makes us achieve things easily.


Post this challenge we entered the real forest. Some of the guys ran and joined our guide, the old man. Rest of us were following them in bunches walking together. Well that did reflect our attitudes. Those who were eager to know things moved ahead to the guide. I, who prefer to be safe, walked in between where there were few of them before and few after me. There were few walking at the end were the ones who were not scared of what might happen at the back, but ensured people in front of them were safe. If I get deeper into the analysis, I believe the roles or the places where we work actually made us do that or may be vice versa.

In some of the places we were covered with thick trees that there wasnt place for two people to walk side by side also. In between the guide would stop. He would try to hear and was trying to analyze if there is a probability of seeing some wild animal. He was the visionary and we were all clueless about what he was trying to see or hear. Lesson learnt: In real life also, most of us are clueless about the path we are taking, though we might know the purpose. We may need a guide or a mentor to take us through the journey of life with the help of his experience and knowledge.


Then there was a roar that we really heard. We all stopped for a minute in silence. The Guide turned whispered “keep walking”. I wanted to shout ‘enough of the roller coaster trek, I want to go back’ and that lead me to think, if someone asked me to walk back, I doubt if I would be able to trace my path. Lesson learnt: In real life also, we can’t use the same path to go back in which we had started and there would be chances, when all we can do is to control the emotions and just follow the leader. Something that we do every day in our corporate life as well.

And finally we reached the middle of the forest, where it was open. Ohk , I can see in few meters around me and there wasn’t any wild animal.The guide announced, you all can take a break for 10 minutes and then we would walk back. It was worth the effort to walk to see this scene. For few minutes it felt like heaven does exist on earth.

Post clicking some pics, we started to walk. We asked the guide, “if we are going to follow the same path?” he said “no”. Oh some relief, as I didn’t want to face the tiger roars again. Lesson learnt for real life which applies in corporate life as well, path unknown is easier to go than to go in path where we know challenges exists.


The rest of the trek was smooth and the guide would show us the marks of animals on the ground and tell which animals had crossed this path and when that would have happened.

He told us about the trees and talk about different people who would come for trekking. In corporate world people brag about their degrees and universities. But how many of us do what we really like. He was far more knowledgeable than any of us, when we talked about animals and forests. The old man could have to gone to some city to work in some corporate company and would have earned more than what he was doing now. Lesson learnt: In real life also education and literacy are two different things. What we don’t do is to follow or do what we like.


I observed that no single leaf or the tree was same. All were in different shapes and patterns. Isn’t it same in the corporate world as well. No single individual is same and everyone has different capabilities which are so unique. We still expect the same results from everyone while working.


Finally i had the river to be crossed again.I managed the same way I did while going.I ensured that the friend who knew swimming helped me cross it.:p. All exhausted,we reached back to our tents where we were served with hot breakfast.As we ate,a friend announced – we trekked 14Kms, 166650 steps and burnt 750 calories. I looked at the food and said "I think we have compensated that by eating some 1000 calories in last 5 minutes" and everyone laughed. Lesson learnt: Who says goals of real life are not measurable.


While returing,I looked back at the forest looking forward for a trek again.