Smell The Coffee!

Even though I have largely been a tea-drinker for the last 15-odd years, I do occasionally enjoy a cup of very strong coffee with a hint of cream and just about a pinch of demerara sugar.

Coffee for me has this amazing ability to "wake me up", to heighten my sensory faculties, to leave behind that amazing bitter after-taste in my mouth that keeps me "high" for a few hours. And the aroma of coffee is  nothing but simply magical.

Coorg was the place where I discovered the best coffee. I cannot forget that day in January 2011, sitting in the veranda of that 100-year old colonial plantation bungalow and sipping on an amazingly aromatic thick black coffee liquor. It was a lazy day, bright and sunny with a rather cool breeze blowing. All around were sounds of silence, green plantations and the aroma of freshly brewed coffee wafting in the air.

That was sheer bliss for me!

More recently, Bru introduced premium world coffees in the market, Bru Exotica - coffees from the Killimanjaro, Brazil and Colombia. I could not resist picking up a bottle of Killimanjaro coffee despite its steep price of Rs. 300 a bottle, simply because this coffee supposedly came very close from my motherland, Uganda.

Talking of Ugandan coffee, which has been very prized for long, during Idi Amin's reign of terror, the economy had collapsed and the Shilling crashed alongwith the onset of spiraling inflation. In those trying times, coffee was the unofficial currency for Ugandans in the countryside. The resilient Ugandans used to risk their lives carrying coffee in their canoes all across Lake Victoria to Tanzania or Kenya for some money that was worth more than wads of Ugandan Shillings. (My Dad has lucidly described the resilience of Ugandans in his blogs). That's how they survived. Today, however, Uganda has regained its prestige in the world of coffee, but climate change does threaten it.

One coffee that I would really love to try is the one from ancient land of Ethiopia. The Ethiopian civilization is quite old. It predates Christ and goes way back to age of Solomon the Great, who supposedly was madly in love with an Ethiopian queen, the Queen of Sheba. (Indeed, Ethiopian women are really pretty - ask me, I recently saw the flight crew of Ethiopian Airlines in Mumbai - they were all lissome and sharp featured!)

Legend has it that Ethiopia has been the cradle of coffee. A sheep herder once saw his flock chewing on some berries and getting high. Those berries, with time, came to be known as coffee berries!

In 1981, our family did pass by Addis Ababa for a few days. I was 5 then - too young to have coffee. But today, I am a big boy(!) and I would love to go back to Ethiopia, smell and drink Ethiopian coffee and also visit the great heritage of this ancient civilisation - rock carved churches at Lalibela, monasteries at Axum that are believed to house the legendary Ark of the Covenant and tablets of the Ten Commandments, the Blue Nile monasteries of Bahir Dar, castles of Gondar and the grand Rift Valley! Ethiopia also has a rich culinary heritage - injera (much like our Indian dosa), fit-fit, wat and many other delights!

It isn't hard to understand why they say "Smell the Coffee". But for me, smelling the coffee right in the morning is a big NO. I would rather wake up saying to myself something I adapted from a dialogue from one of favourite films, Jerry Macguire - "I have rolled with the punches, but today is another day!"

That does keep me going, till about afternoon, when I sometimes indulge in literally smelling the coffee!

Starbucking Has Just Begun!

A few years ago, while visiting Hong Kong, Starbucks (Staabaa as the locals called it in Hong Kong!) was the preferred place for us to have a steaming hot cup of either coffee or tea, alongwith a few green tea cookies which we absolutely loved.

Then, almost a year after that we visited Coorg, where it was enthralling seeing how a uniquely aromatic coffee is grown in lush green estates of Tata Coffee, alongwith spices like cardamom and pepper. That inspired Neeti, a pure tea-drinker to write about flirting with coffee, which she had covered in her blog.

Little did we realise at that moment that Starbucks was going to partner Tata Coffee to get the chain to India, sourcing coffee from the same lovely green plantations that we had visited about two years back.

About 10 days back, their first outlet opened at Horiman Circle followed by two more, one of which was closer to home, at Oberoi Mall.

We made a serious attempt to visit the outlet for breakfast today - the anticipation of having green tea cookies again kept awake till long last night! But we overestimated ourselves. Breakfast at Starbucks was tall order, as laziness ruled the weather, at home, this morning.

I thanked my stars when we finally left home at nearly 1PM. In about 20 minutes we were at Oberoi Mall. But the time we saved in getting to Starbucks was all wasted in the long queue full of excited people - mostly young, some elderly and few expatriates for whom having Starbucks coffee surely must be nostalgic.

After about 30 minutes of waiting, we got a table. We were to place our orders - frappucinos, double chocolate chip muffins, mushroom chicken pie and a corn brioche.

I must admit that the frappucino was intensely flavourful. The pie was flaky, crusty and fresh - the chicken inside was meaty without an overbearing spiciness that is so common at a Café Coffee Day or a Barista. The muffin too was much better than what I have had elsewhere. As Neeti put it, it was again, another flirtation with coffee!

But to my dismay, there were no green tea cookies!

As we moved out, the Café Coffee Day outlet hardly had a soul in it. So did Gloria Jeans. This was the Starbucks effect for sure.

While the stuff here at Starbucks was excellent, it is indeed too early to give a verdict. Today Starbucks has only three outlets, all in Mumbai. Will the quality still be the same when they have over 50, 100, 200 outlets? I wonder! It will be a challenge - in the Indian restaurant and café business quality does indeed take a plunge with an increased reach.

Despite enjoying a decent snack, my mind was still on the green tea cookies! And I could not resist calling my sis to send in some from Starbucks in China! Our real Starbucking has just begun!

Votti (ਵੋੱਤੀ), Sotti (ਸੋੱਤੀ), ACL Tears and Getting Fit Again!

After successfully poxing out the pox in August last year, I was again forced to be off everything (I mean that literally too!) in December again.

Towards the end of November, after having done a lot of travelling, I was drained and exhausted and a bit under the weather - just wanted to be off for a weekend at least, to sleep early, wake up late and just laze around. But as some Murphy's Law would have it, it was exactly then that we from office had to travel to Goa over the weekend for an offsite.

The super-lazy me wanted to drop out, but then super-wifey, Neeti, admonished me for my laziness, moralised on what is right and pepped me up. And then, the "right"-side of me woke up and I hurriedly packed to sleep in time for the early morning departure to Goa. Was that feeling that I should not go a premonition (of sorts) of a forthcoming event?

Goa was as lovely as could be. The early morning air was as fresh as it could be, the morning sun was warm and soothing but the icing on the cake was Dabolim Airport which was a spotters' delight - being the tourist high season, Dabolim's tiny remote parking bays were teeming with jets (with exotic liveries) from western Europe and Russia. Just as our Air India Airbus A321 was taxiing in, a Monarch Airlines Boeing 757 was being towed out. The board in the terminal showed an arrival from Yekaterinburg - Екатеринбург, the city infamous for the murders of the Romanovs in 1918, following the Russian Revolution, and that gave me an eeky feeling.

Soon we were on the tree lined road to our resort on Arossim Beach. My memories took me back to May 2006, my first time in Goa, when Neeti and I had a lovely time cycling on the same road.

The first day was pretty enjoyable with a number of fun filled activities and it went off before we thought it was over. The second day went off pretty well until we went into the last activity of the day - dodgeball. I was a bit exhausted after the whole day in the sun and felt like dropping out, but the rational side of me forced me to play. On one occasion, when I was inside the circle, I stumbled over a colleague as I attempted to avoid the ball which was coming towards me. And I fell on my right side, twisting my lower leg. But I got up and within seconds, I was back in the game, only to get out after a few minutes.

The evening passed by, and we went to a beachside shack for a party. I never realised anything was amiss until the next morning, when I was unable to move my leg - the knee was swollen. Somehow, after mustering all energy I managed to get ready to return back to Bombay. Getting on to the flight on the ladder was a task - it took me a full 5 minutes, but I was aided by my helpful colleagues, Suyez, Pankaj, Nilesh, Deepak, Rajnish and few others. On reaching home, my personal physician, Neeti, took charge of me - my knee was liberally coated with Volini and I was padded up with tight crepe bandage. We were convinced it was a minor sprain, which would heal up by morning. And then we called it a day!

The next day, a Monday morning, the situation had worsened, the pain was as intense as ever, and I was not in a position to move. And my in-house physician decided it was beyond her, so our ever helpful physician, Dr. Ullal was called. He suggested an immediate MRI scan of the knee, before we met him in his clinic. And we quickly rushed for scan. The scan began - I was strapped on the couch, which then moved in, into the tube and a series of jarring, creepy noises started. In all, it felt as though I was being abducted by an alien spaceship!

The results showed a tear in the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), a critical ligament for stability of gait. On reviewing the report, Dr. Ullal classified this as a sports injury. In all the physical pain, that was a source of jest for Neeti and me - "How the hell can a lazybone like Rajeev get a sports injury?"

Dr. Ullal referred me to Dr. Dinshaw Pardiwala, a sports injury specialist, at the Kokilaben Dhirubhai Hospital and also was kind enough to speak to an administrative person at the hospital to facilitate an early appointment, as Dr. Pardiwala's appointments runs into a waitlist of upto a fortnight! Dr. Pardiwala recommended conservative treatment - no surgery, which relieved me. Immediately my leg was immobilised in a full-knee brace, with minimum movement, that too with a walking stick, which I never imagined I would ever use, at least before the twilight years set in.

Meanwhile, Neeti's Mom figured out that her ex-student, Dr. Jashan Vishwanath, was also an orthopaedic surgeon at Jaslok Hospital and suggested we meet him as well. That was quite useful as he reaffirmed that we were on the right track, but also suggested immediate physiotherapy to prevent muscles from wasting away, which was a distinct possibility.

My immobility made me quite a kid, and Neeti played parent to perfection - dressing me up, getting the shoes on, getting me food and all that was required. I remember the day I rejoined office two weeks after the accident, Neeti came with me downstairs to the car, just as a parent would go to see off a kid to the school bus!!!!

Then my folks came visiting. My Dad insisted on massaging the injured area himself, while Mom ensured an endless supply of great food to elevate my spirits!

In a few days, as recommended by the two doctors, my physiotherapy started - that helped to get the strength back in the limbs. My physiotherapy started under Heath Matthews and his team. Heath had treated quite a few Indian sports-persons and is a renowned name in that field. During the first session I had with him, he mentioned that Sania Mirza had a similar injury in 2007, but had recovered with conservative treatment, and went to achieve some success. That reassured me and also was another source of jest as Neeti often jocularly said that I was in the same league as Sania Mirza!!!!

Slowly and gradually, but convincingly, as the physiotherapy sessions by Heath and Shraddha progressed I limped back to normal. I gradually increased my time in office, started moving around at home and even went for a short vacation to Kodagu, which was covered in my photo-blog earlier, alongwith my folks, though Neeti's folks could not make it. There too we had our share of fun. The photographs that had Neeti, me and my stick were called votti (ਵੋੱਤੀ) and sotti (ਸੋੱਤੀ) photographs -- what a rhyming caption! The word, votti, means wife in Punjabi and sotti, stick!!! That became a joke in the family!!!

As my phsyiotherapy became intense, I was require to spend at least an hour in the gym. And then the next thing that started off in the family, initiated by who else but Neeti, that this was the only way to get lazybones of mine to exercise, a wake-up call! True, it was after nearly 3 years, and a few kilos of weight gain that I was getting back to serious exercising.

Religiously, I started going to the gym early in the morning, after a round of persistent persuasion by by my votti! And I have been doing the rounds of the gym regularly, with a few exceptions (yes, these were exceptions!). I did find that the seriousness was missing in most of the people visiting the gym. Most seemed to be there just to gossip, some to flirt with the supposedly, hot chicks, while the gym instructors would enjoy all the attention they got from the females. Some would spend just two minutes exercising, the next five minutes wiping off the sweat, and then gossiping around for the five minutes before getting back to the next round! Is that exercise? Perhaps, flirting and gossiping does burn a lot of calories, for some, at least.

My rounds to the gym, after intense persuasion by Neeti, and through weekly interventions by Heath and Shraddha, I have regained almost full functionality of my knee and all should be well in the next few months.

In a sense, my ACL injury was indeed a wakeup call - to eat right, sleep right and exercise right! I only pray that I have the strength to continue with my exercise regimen.

A Journey Through Spice & Coffee Country....

The other day Neeti went about flirting with coffee, albeit on her blog. And then, she inspired me to write a photo blog on our journey through Kodagu, earlier this year which we thorougly enjoyed. Undoubtedly the place was good - no traffic, no hustle-bustle, no deadlines for those few days and more importantly, the company was great - spending quality time with Neeti and my folks was priceless. Unfortunately, Neeti's folks could not make it.

The best way to begin a journey through Kodagu, India's coffee and spice country is in the morning. Numerous trails will lead you into the various coffee plantations, which offer an exciting insight into how nature balances itself and how man can optimize conservation and commercial cultivation!

Plantation Trails -- The rutted paths lead us deeper into the heart of the plantation.... The lovely greens and the constant chirping of birds give us a spring in each step we take!

The sun rises, lifting the veil of mist through the greens.....

The plantation has quite a magical and enchanting feel to it. Look at the pure dewdrops dropping from the leaves... Why couldn't we see this in the city each day?

And we walk on, in amazement and in wonder, thinking of the bounties of nature, that we never notice.... Each step we take rustles the dried leaves on the rutted path!!!!

The coffee plant glistens in the morning sun...... and berries drink in the golden rays to give you the robustness of your morning cup!

A coffee plantation always gives more than coffee. These tiny chllies that grow in coffee plantations are quite a bomb, they can make your skin burn for long.

I wonder whether these ones are deadlier than the Bhut Jolokia of Nagaland that is the deadliest chilli on earth - heard that DRDO is developing an effective, non-lethal weapon from an extract of the Bhut Jolokia!

And pepper too!!! Numerous wars were fought in the medieval era for the fruit of these vines. Some say the Crusades were fought to secure the spice routes.
But here humble pepper corns wait to reach your dinner table!!

The brilliant blue sky, what a lovely morning!

The ants are preparing to call this coffee leaf their home

A lovely example of his wondrous ecosystem thrives. The spider that makes this web lives in burrow beneath. The web traps pests (insects) that thrive on the coffee plant!

A lazy day in the plantation!

These berries will someday be ground into aromatic coffee, which will find its way into your cup!

Gently flows the Cauvery!!!

Such a pristine environment!!!

Would love to spend more time here!!!

Waterbodies in the plantation complement the ecosystem!!!

You should not be surprised to see this in a plantation. As jackfruits ripen, elephants come into the plantations from the reserves to feast on them....

And that's vanilla pod, which left permanent stain on my denims! The aroma was amazing!

And that's a cardamom.....

And the sun sets on the plantation!!!

And watching the sun go down on the Kodagu hills is an unforgettable experience.