Kilimanjaro Malai Kani Manjaro !

The first thing people  visualize when I say that I have been to Kilimanjaro is the  location of the song from Endhiran ‘Kilimanjaro malai Kani Manjaro’ .Then I have to give them a bit of gyaan saying that Rajini romances Aishwarya not in Kilimanjaro,Africa but in  Macchu Pichu in Peru,South America  the land of the Incans.[Now that I have cleverly included Rajini to increase my view count lets go back to my post ]

We were a group of about 17 people from all across the globe who had enrolled for the Kilimanjaro,Trek in Africa. We had decided to pursue two different routes to the summit. A group of six people  chose to take the Rongai route whereas the rest of us were to take the Marangu route to the Summit.I will write about our adventures in the Marangu route 

 

Day-1

After a round of introductions at the Mumbai Airport all of us departed for Addis Ababa,Ethiopia. Here Ramesh taught  us a couple of breathing and stretching exercises and we started doing the exercises at the airport much to the amusement and bewilderment of the passengers there.From there we took the flight to Kilimanjaro

                We landed at the Kilimanjaro International airport and went to our hotel the Shah,Inn Moshi. Moshi is a small  town at the base of Kilimanjaro where most of the trekkers who want to Summit Kilimanjaro stay in.The official currency of Tanzania is the TSH(Tanzanian shilling) and we get about 1600 TSH per dollar.We were obviously thrilled to change USD into TSH since we became lakhpatis and crorepatis in an instant(though the prices were insane as well , we had to pay 1000 TSH for an apple!!).

We had a briefing with our tour company named Akaro  and  those of us who were a little understocked on gear planned to rent it from them. After dinner we went for a well deserved nap

Day-2

                We got ready in the morning  bade farewell to the Rongai folks.We were especially sad to see Ramesh leave as he had given us a lot  of advice right from breathing tips to dietary advice like ‘Soy milk’.After getting introduced to our  guide Jimmy and his team we were off to the Kilimanjaro National Park, the starting point of our trek.

                After a bit of delay we started off on our first leg to the Mandara Hut through the dense equatorial forest. We were able to see a few colobus monkeys and some white necked ravens(just our normal  crow slightly bigger with a white collar around its neck, it did have a good white collar job though, collecting the leftovers from our meals and keeping the other crows at bay).People have high expectations of the animals you are expected to see in Africa and anything less  than lions and tigers will not do for them. Unfortunately(or fortunately) we were not able to see any of that

As we  kept walking through the forest  the vegetation started to clear a bit and we started seeing the first of the moss covered trees. We were able to make it to Mandara at about  4 in the evening

Day-3

                Today we had to make our way from the Mandara Hut which is at 2750m a.s.l to the Horombo hut  which is approximately 3800m a.s.l which is a 10 K.M walk. The vegetation started to rapidly clear as we kept walking.We had lunch midway in one of the specifically designated spots the weather started to change rapidly  and from  about 20 degrees it came down to around 5 at this point [thankfully we were prepared for this).After walking for some more time we were able to see the strange looking alien type plants called Lobelias

After walking for about six hrs we made it to the Horombo huts. The view from these huts were simply ‘out of the world’.In the daytime one could see the clouds below   

and in the nights one could have a clear unobstructed view of the sky with the shades of yellow that characterize the milky way.Even though we were very tired we  just could not fail to appreciate the sight of the night sky

Day-4

            This was our acclimatization day where we had to ‘go high and sleep low’.We were to go just above 4000m to a place called the zebra rocks and then return to the Horombo hut. This passed pretty uneventfully and we are able to easily finish the 1.5 hr climb..After taking a lot of pics near the rocks we returned to our camp.

            We were able to get some sleep in the afternoon and we all spent the evening outdoors.We met an interesting guy from Holland who shared his trek experience with us.He even made a good mnemonic for us to remember on Summit day 1,2,3,4.1 Pair of boots, 2-Pairs of socks , 3-Layers for the lower body and finally 4-layers for the upper body.After basking in the warmth for a while we went to sleep early(fattened calfs getting ready for the kill )

Day-5

   This was to be a long day and an even longer night.We started early in the morning and we were able to reach our next pitstop the ‘Kibo Hut’ just at the  base of the Summit. By this time the mountain had taken its toll on all of us and all of us had some sort of ailment. After trying in vain to get some sleep we got ready to summit the mountain  at 11:30 PM

       The last part of the summit was pretty tough.The inclination was close to 60 degrees .So we had to zig-zag our way up the mountain.Also the temperature was very low ( about -5) so our guide didn’t really allow us rest. The sight of everyone with a headlamp making their way up the mountain like a slowly moving  caterpillar was pretty impressive.To prevent us sleeping our beloved guides started singing African songs with absurd lyrics containing all our names .‘Zaina Zaina’ and ‘Jambo Sana’ come readily to my mind

After what seemed like an eternity the sun started rising and to our pleasant surprise we were not less than 100m below the  first summit. Sunrise just below Gilman’s point where you can see the Mawenzi crater and the whole of Africa beneath you just makes you breathless.The sun really started to warm us up both in mind and spirit in no time the Cognizant Adventurizants team had reached Gilman’s point J.

Cheers!!!

At this point most of the folks felt tired and started the downward climb. Some felt more adventurous and started the 1.5 hr further climb to Uhuru peak, on the other side of the crater.This was really a cakewalk compared to the earlier climb and we were at Uhuru peak in no time J

All of us had to quickly descend to a lower altidude.So we skated  our way over the gravel to make it fast to the Kibo hut.After a brief rest and a  quick meetup with the other group we descended quickly to Horombo

Day-6

  This was the last day of the trek and there was a definite ‘End of the adventure’ feel hanging in the air. All of us reached Mandara hut by lunch and we had a great time recollecting all the wonderful memories we had. After that we quickly started the downward climb to the Park gate. We had an incredible catharsis of emotion when we reached the park gate. Happy that our ordeal is over but sad that our trip had come to an end.

With heavy hearts we all assembled to have one last meal at our hotel before bidding farewell! Thanks to all especially to Amit Chilka and the team from Akaro who made this possible.

Till our next adventure

From the Kilimanjaro Adventurizants team

-Adriel

 

The importance of clear articulation

Today I had a pretty interesting encounter in church.Two foreigners came to church today.One of them, a Mr John from Europe approached me and started asking me a lot of questions.Here is an excerpt below
(FG-Foreign guy)


FG::So what do you folks do apart from Church ?
Me:Well we have fellowship every sunday where we meet up

FG:Well dont you guys do anything apart from that ?
Me:Well we witness wherever we are, whenever we get the opportunity

FG:Well what do you think about so many divisions in the Church , there are Catholics,Protestants etc etc?
Me:As long as people are united in the essentials I guess it shouldnt really be a problem

FG:People might not be really united there , what about your belief of Salvation by faith whereas, some others believe
in salvation by faith+works?Dont you think thats a key issue

Me:Yes that is a key issue .Divine sovereignty and human responsibility you take either
of those away and you have a problem, this is an issue which is still held in some tension and I am happy to let it stay that way

FG:Coming to that.Do you believe God predestines people ?
Me:Yes.

FG:So that means you are a Calvinist?
Me:Yes.

FG:So that means you must also believe in double pre-destination ?Dont you think thats unfair?
Me:How Calvinistic was Calvin anyway ?That is a slight distortion.I believe that God is solely responsible for our Salvation and while I believe that God pre-destines people to heaven he does not pre-destine people for Hell.To summarize I would say that if we are saved it is because of God,If we fall then that is because of us.

At this time my mom called and I had to leave him :) .

The point I am trying to make here is that.Try to have not only have a clear understanding of the Gospel but also try practicing a clear articulation of the key points of Christianity.I felt I could have articulated some of the points above a lot better[Quoting scripture,making it clearer, asking him counter questions etc..]

I believe that the person was a Mormon and if I had continued.He would have told me that Joseph Smith had the answer to all of this.I am beginning to lose my faith in these foreign people especially since I had a previous encounter with another foreigner who did the exact same thing.Will it not be better for these guys to preach the message of the Gospel to non-christian people ?

Personal Responsibility and corruption

Starting Aug-16th in what has been characterized as the second freedom struggle for India,Unprecedented Media coverage has been given to Anna Hazare.While the nation has very rightly stood behind Anna and voiced its anger over corruption.I still feel that a lot more has to be done with respect to corruption.We have conveniently left behind our personal responsibility in the matter

How many of you would

1.Stop downloading movies/songs from the internet because they are pirated ?

2.Stop bribing the traffic cop and instead go to a court and pay the fine ?

3.Stop indiscriminately take xerox copies of the foreign author book/study material because it violates copyright?

4.Stop posting something on your Facebook wall and start doing something concrete instead?


Everything starts at the lowest level with self.Instead of blaming the government over and over again why do we not try to improve our country by correcting something we can.Of course it is basic human tendency to take the shortest and easiest way possible and it will be hard to break out of this , but at the end of the day nothing significant got done without hard work.

Also many innovative ideas are being proposed and some have been implemented to eliminate corruption.One innovative example was the number-plate registration procedure in the RTO.To get a fancy number earlier you might have had to shell out a bribe.However now the government collects money and even issues a receipt if you want fancy number.How cool it would be if bribes were legalized.What an idea Sirji???

I am pretty sure that we can all come up with innovative ideas such as these to lessen corruption.With this combination of innovation and personal discipline I am sure that corruption will come down far more effectively instead of the blame-game going on

"Be the change you want to see."

Christianity in a Nutshell

What does it mean to be a Christian? .The word Christian means many things to many people .Hence it is essential that we have a clear understanding of what it means to be a ‘Christian’

If we ask a random set of people what it means to be Christian the most popular responses you would get are ‘Someone who follows the ten commandments’ or ‘Someone who does good things’ and so on. I would like to define Christianity in very simple terms below

‘A Christian is someone who believes and affirms the life, person and work of Jesus Christ.’

That is the Christian acknowledges the life of Jesus Christ , his ministry here on earth and his death on the cross for our redemption and that belief in the above is the only way to salvation.

Though there are many many more things which are necessary for Orthodox Christianity , the above encompasses the very core of what it means to be Christian. That is if you do not agree with the above you can call yourself something else but not ‘Christian’

Often we tend to ignore this very central fact and disagree about things which are far less important/trivial to the faith. We should not disagree with people on things such as whether drinking is sinful, what sort of music/worship we should have in Church, views on creation/evolution etc where the topic might be much more subjective and there is no one ‘Right Answer’ to the question .Though we can debate on these things( and such debate is helpful) it is far more important to remember what the essentials of Christianity are

Therefore choose to fight your battles very carefully .Make sure that you are rejected for the ‘Right reasons’

What is theology?

What is Theology?

The word theology usually conjures up images of people in white robes who sit in a dim room and pore over big books , or of big professors in well dressed suits discussing it in some university campus.

Wikipedia simply defines theology thus "Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary." .Boring people poring over boring stuff :)

Though this is the formal definition of theology ,I would say that everyone who has thought about or asked the Ultimate questions in life is a theologian in some sense

Why is there something rather than nothing ?

What happens after death ?

Is there someone called God?

Is there only one way to God? etc..

Why should we study theology?
As in my previous discussion.Religion is the Primary Lens through which we tend to see the world.Therefore whatever views we may tend to have on issues such as abortion and the way we live will be governed by our belief systems

Also it is important for all of us to understand Why we believe what we believe.The first greatest critic of our religion will usually be ourselves.Therefore it is essential that we test our belief systems both rationally and intellectually before we commit to it. Or if we are already committed to a position we should just back up a little way and understand why we do it.This will help us get confidence in what we believe and we will be able to present a reasoned and mature defense of the gospel whenever we are called to do so


How should theology be done ?
Theology is best done as a community.This is where a strong fellowship will help us out a lot.For example if you had noticed that when most of the girls speak there is more of an emotional angle to it whereas men tend to think and speak more rationally and logically.Both sides are important and will help us get a more well rounded perspective of the issue at hand.Of course this does not in any way undermine the importance of good personal study

I hope I have given a fair understanding of the Why's and What's of theology.Please do give me your thoughts and suggestions

Blog Theme Theology

When I started this blog.I didnt really think a theme was necessary.However now after a very long time,I feel a theme is necessary because 'You need to stand for something , or you will fall for anything'[How cliched can you get!!]

Going forward my posts are going to be primarily on theology related items.The theme of my blog is 'Faith seeking understanding' .All of us were brought up in some religion because our parents were so.But as we become more and more mature I feel it is necessary to go back critically evaluate and understand the belief systems we have imbibed from childhood.

We critically evaluate almost every other thing in life be it a utility purchase, a life partner choice , a career choice etc. But we somehow have forgotten the need to evaluate the religion we follow.Religion is the lens through which we view the world and it affects almost everything we do.Therefore to understand why you follow something becomes very important.Ritualistic religion which we see practiced around is really going to get us no-where

Though the views on this blog are primarily from a Christian Standpoint.I am sure it would be very useful to others who have an inquisitiveness in theology related aspects

Disclaimer: I dont claim to have the answers to everything or to have everything figured out :).Therefore I might not have the maturity/knowledge to engage in meaningful dialogue on certain issues

A Historic moment for India

In a historic moment that ended more than three decades of nuclear isolation for India, the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) decided to resume global nuclear trade with New Delhi.
The NSG's decision to grant India a clean waiver from its existing rules, which forbade nuclear trade with a country which has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), came on saturday after intense lobbying by both India and the US

This decision also frees India to sign bilateral civil nuclear cooperation agreements with France and Russia, who were both instrumental in getting the deal through

Some sceptics in the nuclear club(Austria and New zealand for instance) resisted till the last minute , but relented after coming under intense pressure from the US.These countries were proposing termination of all nuclear business if India resumed Testing.

However India's case is a very unique one .We have imposed on ourself a 'voluntary moratorium' after 1998 .Thus a set of India specific conditions were drawn up so that the deal could go through without India signing the NPT.Our impeccable record with respect to 'non proliferation concerns' was also a big factor which helped the deal go through .
Cheers to clean and green Nuclear power.!!!!