Sister's Rodeo

"Can we go for Phil’s trail on Sunday?" me

"Oh, no I brought tickets for Sister’s-Rodeo" Yogesh

"Ummm.. ok" me

I Practically hate the social gatherings here and I didn’t wanted to ruin my Sunday afternoon . Here all the social events revolve around beer, period. Particularly I don’t hate people drinking beer, but I hate it when I am drinking just a lemonade and they give me look like ’oh.. so you are pregnant?’ because I don’t look like a minor and there cant be any other reason for drinking a lemonade!!!!!

So sisters is a small town near Bend, and Rodeo is the ‘small town’s world famous event’ :D(same as 'akkha mumbai mein world famous'). Ever since I have heard about this word Rodeo, I always miss spell it a as ‘Ghodeo’ :D You will know why, when I will give you details about the event :P 

When we reached at the event, right from the parking lot it felt like true Oregon so sunny, so dry and so rustic. And when the event started, from the first announcement I started digging it (this is the latest addition to my dictionary, please refer urbandictionary.com)

Let me tell you something about the event, it’s a cowboyiesh side of Oregon. Big horses, raging bulls and rustic cowboys! 

There were different events like team bronc riding, tie-down roping, steer wrestling, saddle bronc riding, team roping, bull riding and barrel racing. Except bull riding everything else was ever unheard of for me. That’s the reason I got so excited and started writing about it :D Though these all aren’t very dashing games, they go on like Clint Eastwood’s movies, very slow but at the end you have a something to say about. They don’t go like a flash through your memory. 

In the start there was a grand entry. Around 30 horses and their cowgirl riders. Those girls were wearing the cowboy dresses, spur shoes and of course cowboy hat :)  It was a nice presentation with the ‘final countdown’ track in background. The best thing about that presentation was all those girls where doing that voluntarily; they were raising money to help cancer patients.

This isn't the photo of the grand opening. Actually we came for rodeo directly after trail.. so when the grand opening was going on both of us were eating, in one hand nachos and in the other pepsi and I could not spare a moment :) . So i dont have any photos of the opening. :(

Next was tie-down roping, so here comes the real thing. Initially when these people came to West side of America, there were big ranches, but due to dry weather the grass could not grow thick so big herd of cows require an even bigger region of ranch which is practically impossible to cover on foot. So these people started maintaining those herd on a horseback ride. 
The goal of tie down roping is for the rider to catch the calf by throwing a loop of rope around its neck, get down from the horse and restrain the calf by tying three legs together, in as short a time as possible. And to make your score valid, the calf should not make any movement for 6 seconds after its been restrained. The winner did it in 8.32 seconds :D

The upgraded version of this tie-down roping is, there will be two ridders, one of them would throw a loop around the calfs neck and the other one should throw it through its hind legs and restrain the calf!!! And ya, just one chance to throw the loop!!!

After that there was steer wrestling, in which the rider has to chase a young bull, dismount from the horse, wrestle the steer, ground it in the minimum possible time.

Then Bull Riding , I think everyone knows and see the pic J

In the Next pic, the in the clown is sitting in the barrel. Since the last 2 days the clown was pissing off the bull on the last day he finally charged him :D

Then saddle bronc riding, its same as bull riding, but just replace the bull with the wild horse, bull’s power with the horse’s speed + power …

  

And the last one was barrel racing. Again all the cowgirls were there in this event. There were 3 barrels in the arena and the rider has to go round them and come back in minimum possible time. It sounds simple but to turn the horse in such a speed with keeping the barrel on ground takes a hell lot of expertise. All these girls were participating in this race were local and were participating in this event since they were 10 or 11 J

It was such a thrill to watch this event. I am always fascinated by the speed of horse, and yea me too had dreams about horse rider but it wasn’t ‘sapanon ka rajkumar’ but it was me riding a white powerful horse through a big ranch with mountains behind it. In some way I lived that dream :) before this I haven’t seen such a powerful horses and so fast riders. 

7 pounds - Seven Names. Seven Strangers. One Secret.

Calling 911….

911: Yes we got you, what is the emergency?

Ben: There has been a suicide here

911: Who is the victim?

Ben: I am

First scene of the movie 7 pounds!!
This is one of those movies whose hangover doesn't go away easily. Well that could be the reason I am writing it here!

It’s a story about a man whose past has invaded his present and destroyed his future. But while he gives away everything how he changes some lives for forever forms the plot of the movie.

Ben Thomas is an IRS agent. Destiny has pushed him off the edge. This man has decided something and has no reason to look back. He has chosen his way for squaring things and nothing could angle him off from doing it. But life never goes the way you have planned. He falls in love with a girl having critical heart issues and finds a reason to smile back at life, but....

It’s a tragic mystery with a passion for life.  A man who has no desire left for himself and yet understands other people’s urge to live and wants to help them.

The story unfolds quite slowly while encircling new characters. A blind, vegetarian meat salesman (Ezra), an agitated Mexican woman with two kids(Connie Tepos), a lovely self employed greeting card printer with a severe heart disease (Emily Posa), Ben’s brother and Ben's pet box-jelly fish. 

How Ben chooses these people is also an interesting part of the story.  

In a scene when Ben and Emily talk in a field about Emily’s desires, she urges to do big things like traveling around the world and her logging for running. She chooses a big dog as pet because Great Danes also have heart issues same as her. She wanted to take care of someone rather than being taken care of. The dinner in the backyard of Emily’s house. Things like this add some life to these dying people's story.

Will smith has done full justice to the role. The film reminds me of his performance in 'Pursuit of Happiness'. He has very well portrayed Ben’s journey of redeeming himself. Not even for a single movement his misery goes off his eyes. He has successfully shown his struggle with his life and death. It’s a bitter sweet role. You do feel sad for him but don't pity him.

This same team of ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ has gotten together once again to create 7 Pounds. Director Gabriele Muccino has kept the emotions in the film at its optimum level. Its very difficult to bind the audience with a gloomy story for a long period of time and in this story there is no bright spot.  So to keep you on glued to the screen, he has beautifully woven the story into a mysterious plot. And thats where I think he scores as a director. Grant Nieporte's  story is excellent. What triggered him to write such a story is that one day in a party he saw a man a, really sad man and when he tried to get more information on him, he found out that this was a man involved in a national tragedy which happened a few years ago. A man, haunted by his own past thus became the genesis for 7 pounds.

  

Lovely acting, superb dialogs. The clever use of silence in certain parts of the movie is commendable. The Background score adds a light touch to the plot. Even when the film ends, thoughts keep lingering around in your mind : "Its just one life and ya I don't want to die in a disgrace."

New In Town

Yes... if you have seen this movie you will get what this means exactly :D
I am equally bad (mad) at snow as the leading lady of this movie!!!

I haven’t seen snow in my entire life except in the freezer. It’s been almost 3 months the winter is freezing us but still I hadn’t done even a single snow activity. And I have a very genuine reason for that,
I have very good memories with snow from India and I didn’t want to ruin them. Whenever we say ice it has to be an ice cream, ice candy, ice Gola, ice tea/coffee or just the ice stolen from the freezer. It feels awesome cracking ice with teethes, sucking the gola and drinking the cold drink till its lastest drop!

But here the snow comes at brutal temperatures and wind chills. I had isolated myself from all this since last 3 months. And one more reason I hate it coz whatever trendy, cute, colorful top/dress you are wearing a boring jacket has to come over it :( I HATE that!

Anyway but after doing snow shoeing I kind of started liking snow, the weather where I have to survive for the rest of the winter!!!
On 30th Jan 2010 it was a full moon, so Yogesh’s colleagues had decided to go for a snow shoeing in the full moon. It’s the simplest snow activity. To do this all you need is good thermally rated clothes, shoes and the snow shoes. And you have to just walk putting your legs in it! That’s all about it, so I was pretty excited. We rented those snow shoes and did car pooling from Chris's house. We were 7 people me, Yogesh, Becky, Bryan, Greg, Chris and Melody. Out of which Becky and Greg were going to do the cross country skiing and rest of were just going to walk through the snow. And yap how I could forget, we had 2 more members Becky’s dog Mickey and Greg’s bird hunter dog Rosco. Mickey is huge dog, she is almost of elk’s size and Rosco is the regular one but he was totally jittery.

So we started at almost 8.30 or 9 in the night at Edison Park, it was little fogy when we started but got cleared up in first 15-20 mins. It was all snow, pine trees and some bushes popping out of the snow. Moon was glowing with its full wattage and the ice was sparkling in that clam light. Sorry people you have to imagine how it would have looked coz I could not catch it in the camera!!!! Well, few things are just meant to be felt!!!!

One thing I noticed about people around here is that they don’t talk much when they are doing any sports activity; they really don't know that they are missing a great pleasure of playing Antakshis, movie/book reviews or ghost stories while doing treks or taking walks :) I miss this part the most from my treks back in India.

Anyway back to snow shoeing trail... it was a bit difficult for me walk with those big duck like shoes. Some times when I put my leg in snow, just the regular shoes used to come out :D the snow shoe used to stuck in the snow :)
They were a little big for me but after a while I learned how to walk (again at the age of 26).

So finally at 11 in the night we reached to the shelter. It was well equipped with the wood stove and logs. It feels good when your tax is repaid like this!!!! The shelter maintenance is done by the park rangers. It felt really cozy when Becky lit up the fire!!!! She bought bread for everybody. she kept that over the stove and it turned out hot crispy and damn testy :) we had some discussions about bird hunting with the dog, Vegas should exists or not, how Californians suck, why Californians are so obsessed with the way they look, why chocolate tests great with black paper and fennel seeds liquor :D

While we were having these discussions, somebody had found an ice slider. Everybody did the sliding; it was just so awesome :) I felt like being a child again! It’s the simplest thing; it was plastic plate you have to sit in it and just slide over the ice, that’s all. Sometimes you enjoy things more when they are not under your control!!! Just go with the gravity and scream at the top of your lungs!
So with this little fun we headed towards our base camp and came back to home at 1.30 in the night!!!!

Just to make most out of the rent, we (Yogesh and me) decided to do one more trail in the day. It was a bright sunny day almost 50F, we just couldn’t sit inside the house, that would have been a sin. So did one more trail it was 'Virginia messier trail' bright sun light, warm weather and walking through the ice!!! It was all same as the nights trail but it feels good when the temperature is humanly! It was an uphill trail, from the top you could see a panoramic view of mountains and ice patched forest. On the background of clear blue sky the iced mountains looked just stunning.

It wasn’t an adventure, it doesn’t appear to be very exciting thing but this was my first snow activity so I have document it :)

The Glitter, The Solitude And The Beauty

It’s the only longest holiday of year. 10 days, from 24th Dec to 4th Jan. To escape from the brutal winter of Bend we decided to sign in to the hot Death Valley National Park and then to hit the party in Las Vegas!

It was all set, first Death Valley then Vegas then Zion National Park and back to our territory Bend!!!!

It’s going to be very difficult to distill down 8 days trip in just 1blog. Hope you won’t be hundred years old till you reach the last paragraph.

Day 1 (28th Dec) - Rough start

We’ve been planned to fly out to Vegas from Bend. It’s just a 2hrs journey but it got stretched for the whole day. Due to bad weather the flight got delayed by 5hrs :( so finally at 6 in the evening we fall in the Sin City!!!!

It was glittery, jazzy, loud and just by looking at the air port you will get why they say “What ever happens in Vegas, remains in Vegas!!!” There were slot machines at every possible location; pictures you usually avoid to have a look at when somebody else is around were on big hoardings with flashy lights!!!!!

Whatever considered as crooked in rest of the world has given a public appreciation in Vegas. For people in Vegas smoking, drinking and gambling is not an event it’s a continuous process!!! You will find people playing at slot machines and drinking even at 4 in the morning!!!

So this is all the ‘most talked about’ side of Vegas. But there is something more than this, it is the entertainment Capital of the world, live world class performances right from cirque du soleil to David Copperfield till Jeff Dunham! Deluxe hotels and top notch cars will be at your service with a cost next to nothing!!! The definition of luxury changes in Vegas!

 But despite of all this bewitching of Vegas, we hold all the temptations and PILAN KE MUTABIK we en routed to Death Valley!

Day 2 (29th Dec) – Amazement

Death Valley National Park- One of the largest national parks in US.

It’s the Grave of Glaciers- in the ice age there used to be glaciers in that region but after that all the snow has melted away and just the dead earth is remained. Life has been largely stripped away from this region. It’s low, rugged, hot yet magnetizing. Somebody has written this about Death Valley "Here you can’t hide, so you find yourself". Death valley is a place where one can experience the dispassion, cos there is no life all you can see is just the bare earth.

The Name death valley came like this- 50 wagons were trying to cross this valley 49 could not survive through the heat. The only person, who could make it through, turned back and said “bye bye death valley” and the name stuck!!!!!!

First we saw 'Harmony Borax Works' it was a fully operating borax plant in 1880s.Now there are just the remains of buildings, machinery, tanks, piping, and waste tailings.

After that we visited was Golden Canyon. As its name suggests it’s a canyon of yellow colored stones and sand. It was a surprise hike! You can climb up through the cranks in the walls of the canyon. These cranks were created by flash floods and the unsettled earth.

Though the climb was like 30 mins, but the view from the top was breath taking. I felt like I am looking at a satellite picture of salt and alkaline flats and broad regions of sand dunes. It was amazing!

After that we walked almost a mile in canyon but then we realized we are not going to find its end even if we walk for the rest of day. So we turned back and headed towards the Natural Bridge. It’s a big rock arch intersecting the canyon. View was amazing, clear blue sky and dark brown colored rocks in golden sunshine!!!!

Then most visited point of Death Valley 'Bad Water Basin'. It has a little story behind its name, 'once upon a time a horse rider offered this water to his horse and the despite of all that hot dessert around the horse dint drink the water’ hence the name 'Bad Waters'. Bad water is the lowest point in US. Way back there used to be a lake but now there is just a patch of water!!! Isn’t it scary? When we were roaming in Death Valley I felt that Death Valley is a live (dead??) demo of the consequences of Global warming!!!

The 2nd last point was Devils Golf Course- It’s a rough space formed by salt crystals. It’s been named so coz only devil can play golf in such plane. :) A very nice location for photos and for final fighting scene of Hindi movies!

Nywy it was almost 4 in the evening and we had only half an hour before sun set so we decided to do the Artists Drive! As its name suggests it’s a drive through the art works of God. In Death Valley the earth is bare...you can see its different layers and colors. Minerals give colors to the earth and you can see its diversity. It was a drive through beautifully painted hills. It felt like walking through a scenic portrait!!!! And as the sun was setting the colors got glorified in the yellow sunlight.

By thanking God for such a wonderful portrait, we ended our day1 in death valley and headed back to our base camp in a town called 'Beatty'.Believe me the phrase 'Ugly Betty' must have been came from this town. Its a B grade version of Vegas!!! 

Day2 (30th Dec) – Disappointment and the Surprise

Sunrise at the sand dunes

The day has started very early as we wanted to catch the sunrise at the sand dunes. After struggling with our sleep we finally reached at the dunes before sunrise. But the sun rise didn’t happen as we were expecting. It was a cloudy morning :( We actually wanted take photos of dunes in the golden yellow light on sunrise but Bad luck!!!

It was not that bad, we had good exercises in climbing up almost 20-30 feet high dunes and a mile long walks in the sand. With hungry stomach we attacked on a huge breakfast at stove pipe wells :)

Mosaic Canyon

It’s a half mile walk through the canyon narrows. They are smooth polished marble walls ,Yes marble walls!! Natural marble!! It was incredible, first time in my life I saw such narrows with so beautifully decorated walls. You can see the layers and different type of formations in the walls. The narrows are like a hallway and it ends in a big canyon. Huge rocky walls with mud fall over it. They call it mud falls coz the dried mud is still on the walls and it looks like a fall.

Scotty’s castle

Ya you got that right, there is a big castle in the dessert. Sounds weird and the story behind the castle is even weirder.First let me tell you the story of the castle, very first thing it is not owned by Scotty and the second thing is it’s not a castle it’s a two story Spanish style villa.

This castle tells story about friendship between a millionaire gentleman and a fraudulent gold mine founder Scotty (aka Death Valley Scotty).

Scotty was a great story teller. He has been grown up in the Death Valley so he could come up with very realistic fake stories about it.

Albert Johnson has invested in Scotty’s gold mine but even after investing millions he dint not get any return from it. To find the truth about the mine, Albert Johnson made a trip to Death Valley. But in the first visit it self this gentleman felt in love with Death Valley and Scotty’s company. He started visiting the place more frequently. Despite of the fraud of Scotty, Albert Johnson and Scotty became friends. And to make the visit more comfortable for his wife too he decided to build a villa. Scotty used to entertain him with his stories.

After the great depression Johnson has opened that villa for tourism and because of Scotty’s entertaining company soon it became the number 1 destination for Death Valley visitors.

Titus Canoyn

It’s a 26 mile long canyon and its one of the entry point for Death Valley. It is so big that you can drive a truck through it :) Its huge rocky walls make you feel so tiny. Despite of the heat outside, because of the rocks it was very pleasant inside the canyon.

After returning from the canyon we again tried our luck for sunset but again we couldn’t catch it at the dunes. But we clicked some really beautiful photographs of the rising moon. So the day started with dunes ended on the same dunes!

Day 3 (31 Dec) Last stroke

It was our last day in Death Valley. The last points were just as the last finishing strokes.

Zabriskie point, Dante’s view and ghost town (Rhyolite) are the places which can be called as the signature poses of Death Valley.

Ghost Town Rhyolite- Crumbled buildings are the main attraction of this ghost town. Death Valley has many ghost towns in it. These are basically abandoned towns due to the closed mines. In the gold rush due to mines some places have been civilized for the mine workers. But as soon as the mine closed down the towns got stripped away.

Zabriskie point -

Its a part of Amargosa Range. Very beautiful convoluted rock formations just have a look at the pictures

Dante’s View-

Dante's View is a panoramic view of the southern Death Valley basin. You can see the lowest point bad waters and highest point telescope view at the same time. The point has been named after Dante for his poem Inferno- Means a large controlled fire. From this point you can see the burning valley.

It was the best point to crown the trip. Ending on this lovely note we headed towards Vegas for the 31st night.

Vegas 31st Party- It was smoky, boozy and freezing night. A cultural shock for me :) but the firework was stunning. First time in my life I have seen such a big celebration for the New Year!!!!!!

1st and 2nd Jan- Zion National Park

After wandering through the life less stretches of the Death Valley, Zion was the perfect choice. It was mighty and exquisite. What more to say I felt in love at first sight with Zion. Big reddish tan colored sand stone walls, lush greenery and all year round gushing Virgin River. It was all picture perfect. Ideal location for Shahrukh Songs :P

Actually winter is not the right season to visit Zion. There are so many adventurous trails and hikes but because of ice we could not do anything. So the Zion visit was almost like a virtual tour. Did not do any hikes but catched a very good sun set and sun rise. Sun was just so in favor with us, sunrise at 8.15 and sunset at 5.45 no hurries!!! We enjoyed the beauty of nature with some ice skidding and frozen trails :)

There is so much write about the beauty of Zion but as pictures are worth 1000 words I am posting those :)

3rd Jan - Last day of the trip

It was a day specially spared out for leisure. Actually we dint get a flight for 3rd Jan so we planned to come back early on 4th. So 3rd is just a buffer to end the trip with a big sleep, king size lunch and dinner and the last finishing touch cirque de soliel.

We saw the KA show. It was thrilling, captivating, mind boggling and in short a must watch. Cirque d soliel has taken the circus to a way different level. It has drama, action, romance, comedy and everything has woven in a beautiful story. The visual effects and the techniques used are just stunning. A Grand set up, big and continuously changing stage and world class performances. Trying to keep the joy in our minds we ended the trip and returned to our home sweet home :)

We enjoyed the flavors of these places fully because all the places were so in contrast with each other. So after clattering Vegas we could enjoy the serenity of Death Valley and after the DEATH Valley we could enjoy the vivacious Zion. Ultimately it turned out as a beautiful collage :)