Back when i was an aggressive idealist (i was in high school then), i decided to “blaze my own trail in life”. So, instead of taking up engineering, which was what was expected of me, i enrolled in college to study zoology. Five years, many many lemons and gallons of lemon juice later, I passed out of University with a Masters Degree in Marine Biology. This was last month. More lemons followed. Then, last week, I was appointed Junior Research Fellow at the Center for Marine Living Resources and Ecology (CMLRE), Kochi (under the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India). What this means is that I am an underpaid Indian scientist. A Marine Biologist, to be precise. I try to stop smiling about it, but fail miserably.

My work is expected to involve spending time on board a research vessel (FORV Sagar Sampada) and in laboratories, studying various living things (NOT just fish) from the ocean deapths.

I’ll admit that I’ve spent my first week of work doing absolutely nothing. I expect that to change next week, when I embark on my cruise on board Sampada. We cast off on Monday and i know i’ll probably spend a lot of time being sick, but i’m really looking forward to sailing! Yippie!!

Sipping Lemon Juice, singing One hand in my Pocket, smiling.

I checked. found out that we travelled 1555 Kms on the trip. Phew!

Wasn’t bored for a minute on the trip. Okay, so maybe i was a little bored on the first day. But that problem was solved completely by SKS on the second day when she started dancing. and wouldn’t stop. not when she knocked her head on something, really hard (this actually made her even MORE enthusiastic about dancing)….. maybe that hit destabilized her forever. cant really say.
seriously though, shes a hoot. and i love her. i love her for making us all dance like no one was watching :) the day we visited her house was particualry nice. the wind, the beach, the food! coming to think of it, i think that was the first of the characteristic “FUN!” days in feb.

if jan was a month of being “stressed and busy”, i’ve pretty much spent feb (so far) refining “relaxing” and “partying” to an exact art.

first there was S’s place. then the whole roadtrip extravaganza. and then 5 days after we came back – it was Marine Bio Day!!

phew!! There was so much planned for that day. i think everyone was waiting for SOMETHING to go wrong. but everything was pulled off without any glitches. :D hats off to the soc. right?

anyway, partying time is now over.

we had our last cruise today. it is officially crunch time for project work. i’ve come a full circle. back to back-breaking.

:) the break was totally worth it. :)

I got back last night. barely able to move my fingers even now….
Major trip, this was. I havn’t measured but i think we covered around 1500 kilometers in 6 days.

route: kochi–>kovalam–>kanyakumari–>tuticorin–>madurai–>mandapam/rameshwaram
–>kodaikanal–>kochi
THATS RIGHT! by road!!

are we crazy?? we might be…
did we have fun? HELL YEAH!!

highlights of the trip:
snorkelling around krusidai island (protected area under Gulf of Mannar NP). it was amazing, all those corals, anemone and fish. marine biologists’ paradise. :)

visiting 3 major temples within the span of 2 days – Kanyakumari temple & Madurai Meenakshi in one day and Ramanathaswamy temple on the second :)

worst moment:
spotting a sea snake swim less than 5 feet from AC… and then watch as he tried to provoke it with a stick :|
(background info: sea snakes are much more poisonous than land snakes. plus, there was a boat ride and atleast 10 kilometers on land between us and any medical attention. not that medical attention would have been much help. AC’d have been toast if he’d got himself bitten)
EVEN WORSE: i felt like an idiot when nobody else seemed too bothered by the presence of sea snakes in the water.

wierdest thing:
for reasons not known to me, i cant get the song “vasantha mullai” from pokiri out of my head :|

lots more to blog about :D
for now, though – hugs to everyone that travelled with me :)