RFI Hunting and Wells

Me in front of 1 of 30,
45m antennas.

Our RFI hunting Jeep driver.

RFI is radio frequency interference. RFI hunting is the tricky business of trying to find it. It's like trying to find an invisible needle in a forest. Cell phones cause RFI. There's an alarm that goes off at the GMRT if it detects a cell phone on.

It would probably look really funny if you chanced across us while we were hunting. We are all holding antennas and GPS's and following the crackling sound of a speaker that crackles more when you point it at radio objects and merely sizzles when you point it anywhere else.Everything makes RFI. Every single engine that is running within a kilometer creates radio waves when the spark plugs fire. In this way we can actually sense a car coming before we see it if we want to.

The Mountain as seen RFI hunting.

Anyway, RFI hunting is tedious and dirty. We walk through farmers fields, over hills, and across river beds. We go in whatever direction our antennas tell us to. Sometimes it seems totally absurd when I examine myself from outside. But then again everything seems absurd when examined from inter-moral space.

Traipsing through farmers' fields in
search of RFI.

One thing that our RFI hunting has found are wells. These are rather open concept wells. There are no walls around them, they are 3 meters across, and they are at least 10 meters deep. To fall down one would either maim you on the rocks at the bottoms or you'd drown in a disease filled water. These wells were particularly on our minds the other night.

A Puppy seen as we RFI hunt.

We were all sitting in at the computers in the Terminal room when suddenly Connie and Nidhi bust in and frantically explain that there was a bumping beat coming from the forest. Someone was letting out there inner dance gods somewhere nearby it seemed, in the pitch black night. Everyone but Mark and I rushed off to pursue the strange music into the wild (leopard filled) forest.

Dense foliage that cuts you like a knife.

We were not in a rush and besides we wanted to finish up work. We left in pursuit 10 minutes later. We left wearing what we had on at the time. Me in my Vibram FiveFinger toe shoes; Mark in flip-flops. I was clearly more prepared to be walking around in the dark Indian outback.

We instantly heard the music when we stepped outdoors. It was fun sounding! We doggedly took off after it on the whimsical hope that there might be booze, girls, and food, perhaps not in that precise order. At the same time we hoped it wasn't a gang of ruffians who would kill us and bury us under one of the huge ant hills. It sounded like it was coming from the edge of the field (near where some of the other GMRT guests played cricket). Perhaps it was them having a fire party!

Some gadgets we use.

It wasn't. We walked for minutes and minutes stumbling over this and that, hoping not to step on a huge ant hill, but never did we come across a clearing of dancing people. At one point we caught sight of a green glow stick off in the distance. A rave then? Hooray! But no, it was not. We kept going and eventually caught up to the green light. It was Hans, Nidhi, Connie and Greg and we had caught up to them!

We started running to catch up to them (and scare them in the dark). Mark lead the way. We were about 50 meters away, in a crouched stealth glide, when suddenly Mark dropped away!

A local farmer stores onions for the next growing season.

His scream cut the humid night air which all of a sudden seemed cold to me. What was I going to find when I looked down? In an instant I was at the edge, and I couldn't contain myself. I broke out laughing my ass off! It's wasn't a well as I'd feared but a little hole in the ground (as tall as me but not even close to well depth). Mark lay in the bottom groaning, but I cackled on regardless. He had stubbed his thumb on a rock. Meh it hardly even bled.

Mark's outcry and my laughter had alerted the others (hopefully scaring them, as our ruse was ruined) and they quickly came to offer help. Mark shrugged it off and we continued onward towards the mysterious sound.

For Jacob - A well above which hang
 these weird nests or hives.

It turned out to be very far away indeed. A patrolling GMRT security Jeep found us and informed us that it was a wedding taking place in Narayangaon (a small town north of us but still about 5 or 10 more kilometers away). We got a ride back with the security to our compound and the night's adventure was over. I was utterly sad to miss out on a wedding. I love weddings and Indian wedding are renown for their peaceful environments where social borders are transcended by all classes. I will see one yet before I die!

How I Got Cholera

The Chhicken Maharaja Mac is only 135Rps but the
consequences are 2 weeks of sloppy ploppies.

It's a nasty parasite. It happens when you eat something washed with contaminated water. I think I know where I got it from. It take millions of parasites. They all fall into your stomach and nearly all of them die. A tiny percentage of the population survive by going into a hibernation mode and shutting down the production of all proteins. Those few that live get dumped into your small intestines where they feel an atmospheric change. A good change. They come out of hibernation and begin torpedoing through the mucus lining of your intestinal walls. They are shaped like little drill bits. They drill into the wall and attach themselves there fully producing the proteins that will soon wreak havoc on your body. They pump chlorine ions into your digestive tract which then bond with sodium ions to make salt. Now your have a tiny concentration of salt in your intestines and water, through osmosis, begins to be leeched out of you. Up to 10 liters of water each day! The water builds up so quickly that you must go to the bathroom several times per hour. It smells terrible and there is no cure except time. You MUST keep your self hydrated by drinking salt water.

Look how happy those prices are!

Salt water counteracts the salty concentration in your intestines. When you already pour salt water into your intestines then it becomes hard for the parasites to pump more chlorine in. The common recipe for hydration is 1 liter of boiled water, half a teaspoon salt, six teaspoons sugar and a banana. It spreads when your toilet water goes into the water supply (as it almost always does in India) and the Cholera has a chance to multiply underground.

Ronald McDonald is a creepy clown who gives
children lifelong fears.

So there I was at McDonalds actually for once in my life looking forward to the horrible food they served. It was something different than the food they served in the canteen. Mark and I ordered the Maharaja Mac (the Indian Big Mac). The lettuce is where I'm nearly positive I got the Cholera. They must have washed it in tap water. Mark was lucky and none made it through his stomach acid. Perhaps it was because I drank too much water and diluted my stomach acid.

Anyway the effect was almost immediate. On the car ride home from Pune (I had just picked up my laptop from the Pune Airport) my stomach told me something was wrong. The symptoms were textbook perfect. I got a fever on night two after McDonalds and I had stopped drinking water. The next day I could barely function. I was shivering and sweating and light headed. I felt like I had very low blood sugar.

The damn things made us so happy. It was probably worth it.
At least now I can look back and laugh.

Perhaps around day five after McDonalds I found the insight to google my symptoms. And that's when I found out I had Cholera, one of the big causes of death in poor countries. Almost as soon as I read about it and started taking salt in my water I felt a noticeable improvement. After about six days I was on track again and somewhat healthy. The food was still terrible and I was beginning to feel malnourished. I didn't take any pictures while I was sick, I couldn't find the strength.

The Mountain (climbed)

The Mountain can be seen as we drive around doing our RFI hunt.

22:37 Thursday, June 30, 2011 - Tomorrow morning at 07:00 we plan to make the trek to The Mountain. It has loomed over us for a long time now, and we are finally about to take it on. Every time we go RFI hunting we can usually see it off in the distance.

Our expedition party may have expanded. Now we may be a team climbing The Mountain. Hans, Mark, Connie, me and Anna-Lisa (a PhD Italian girl visiting the GMRT). Wow! Should be an event.

The best picture we can get from the ground of the temple on the top.

Everything is contingent on Mark's stomach. If he feels ill in the morning then we will go another day.

Friday, 1 July - Not climbing today. Someone's being a literal mr. poopy pants.

22:05 Saturday, 2 July - Looks like it'll only be Me and Hans climbing the mountain. We leave camp at 07:30 tomorrow morning and should reach the base of the mountain at 09:30. From there it's about 1.5 hours to the top which should put us at the top for lunch. From there we'll explore the temple and the ancient fort that was abandoned hundreds of years ago. We'll make our way back hopefully in time for Greg's farewell dinner. He's going back to Canada on Monday. Wish me good luck! This'll be a terrific time!

Supplies for the trip as they occur to me:
- Polyvalent serum
- 4 liters of water
- 5 meters of rope
- Bug spray
- Pack of raisins and some cookies
- Toilet paper
- Camera
- Sun glasses
- Hair bands
- GPS (for the altitude)
- Notebook
- Rain coat
- Pain killers

Going to bed now.

Sunday, 3 July - Here's a panorama from the top.

A panorama from the highest point on the mountain. It was hard getting there.

My ripped toe, oh no!

As we set out.

8 July - Finally updating this. Me and Hans left at 07:30 and returned at 16:00! He almost died! And I did too for that matter. We got into some tight situations on the mountainside.

Before leaving we asked for anti venom and were told it is not available and we'd have to drive to get some. Great! We asked for some rope and they said we wouldn't need any because there is a donkey path up the side. They clearly didn't know what we were about to do! Anyway we left because we didn't  want to argue further with them.

Walking back.

Hans had never climbed before but he
made a fine effort.

The walk there was only about 30min. It was closer than it seemed. At the foot of the mountain we found a shrine with some tattered clothing and clay pots inside.

Temple at bottom.

Hans about to begin sliding to reach a
ledge about 10 feet below him.

We started climbing and got up to the first plateau. At the top of the next plateau we saw a wise old monkey sitting of a rock! Clearly he would grant us three wishes if we could climb up to him.

After our first defeat we had to look
deep for the courage to carry on.

We tried one approach for about an hour before getting stuck half way up. We had a hell of a time getting down and I ripped my toe.

On a game trail.

The next one proved to be too scary to climb but I got about a third of the way up before turning back (Hans watched from a ledge below). It was the most terrifying experience dangling from a ledge  and looking down only to see about 300 feet of thin air. My heart was in my throat!

Self picture.

The way we did is was by getting to a ledge where we could rest and choosing the next part up from there. I wish we had had ropes so that we could have stopped to get pictures from the best places. As it was we could only spare a hand on rare occasions.

These thorn bushes were everywhere!
No leaves just thorns! - for Jacob.

Exotic flower - for Jacob.

When we finally made it up we found some Indians who we headed to the temple at the second highest peak so we followed them on the ridge to there. There we had snacks and rested.

Me near some ruins.

Some creature's den. So high up and
seems like it would be impossible to
get there. We found egg nests there.

We then headed over to the highest peak by following the ridge along. There were exotic looking plants everywhere and we came across an abandoned ruins. We found that it was mostly destroyed by weather but the parts that could be seen were impressive. It would have been extremely difficult to build that hundreds of years ago.

Planting Jenn's Sunflowers on the
mountain:)

And some water.

I had a special little thing I had to do along the way, a few seeds to plant, so I found a location rich in sun an dug as deep a hole as I could in the rocky soil. The monkey sage would have to water it.

I took a bunch of pictures from the peak and made a panorama later.

Exotic plant - for Jacob.

The walk down was easy enough because we took the donkey trail. It may have been easier but the thorns we had to walk through we disgustingly long. I got some sort of rash on my foot from the whole experience.

A view from high up.

When we got back Mark was feeling better and terribly angry I didn't wait for him to feel better so he could go. I still feel bad about that and need to find some way to make it up to the guy.


Not carrying a 15 pound bag would have made the whole experience easier but as it was I found out that my backpack is very sturdy and comfortable. It's a 40L Ascend Sequoia 3300.

I want to go again. Mark better not be sick this time!

Monkey on a rock at the peak of final wall we had to climb. There's one in the tree too.

Our first picture from after starting climbing.

Hans cresting a ridge.

Another den formed naturally but probably houses something.

Side profile of the mountain.

Other side profile. We chose the other one to  climb because we didn't have ropes.

The Vegetarian Within Us All

Once I would have thought meat was a regular part of one's subsistence, so tasty and natural it is. It seemed a simple truth thinking that as beasts ourselves it is our rightful place to eat other animals. And yet one forgets that many animals don't eat meat at all. I noticed on Saturday, 25 June that we do not necessarily miss meat.

Me, Mark, and Hans in the back seat of a tuk-tuk
whizzing through traffic. 

We had packed our bags with toilet paper, medicine, and money for we were going to the city! We all needed to escape the terrifying diet imposed on us at the GMRT. Everyday of the week the GMRT has a different meal planned for us, in theory. And yet to the untrained tongue it all tastes the same. Not only does it taste the same, for that could be livable, but it looks the same.

Our diet is composed of coupons. We buy coupons from a booth and hand those coupons to the next guy in line. Then we grab a metal plate and shuffle down the line. First there is a bin of yellow goop, usually called dal, but it is not! There are no lentils in it! But it is yellow always, of soupy consistency and if you're lucky will find a carrot sliver inside. The next is rice and a cracker wafer, which tastes good, and it has structure (the cracker)! The next bin is a red goop with beans or lentils inside. This is followed by yogurt and a green mixture of bitter vegetables.

Chinese dinner on Mondays. It's the one break in an endless
sea of red and yellow mush.

This is the way it goes for lunch and dinner every single day except on Mondays! On Mondays they make a pale version of Chinese food (noodles, vegetable rice, odd pan fried vegetables), and red goop in case you want some of that again. On Wednesdays, if you ask the kitchen before noon for non-vegetarian food they will charges you three times the price and give you a tiny chicken thing but I have never ordered this.

I think this is a form of mental torture. If they feed us the exact same food everyday except on Monday then we grow to depend on Mondays. Then once we rely heavily upon Monday for our sanity they can manipulate us. I won't let this happen!

So on Saturday we all made a journey into Pune. We left at 07:05 on the GMRT shuttle bus. It is normally a 2 hour journey but today it turned out to be 3 hours. We arrived at the NCRA, where I had slept that one night on my way to the GMRT. There we ran into the Director, the man who had helped me retrieve my laptop.

A Food Bazaar is tiny in comparison to Walmart or Sobeys
and yet it was heaven on earth to find. That might be a little
too exaggerated, we weren't that desperate for better food right?

We had no clue of where to go for shopping and we were thinking of just renting a car for the day (3000 Rps perhaps!). He advised us to head by tuk-tuk to the Pune Central Mall, East Square Mall, and Ozone Mall. None of them were more than 4km away so taking a tuk-tuk was the best option by far. The six of us would fit into two tuk-tuks and the average price of a tuk-tuk is 11Rps per kilometer. So we ended up paying 120Rps. for two tuk-tuks to take us to Pune Central Mall, the largest of the malls.

It pales in comparison to a Canadian mall but it is the tabernacle of society in Pune, as all the cool rich kids hang out there. We all headed up to the top floor, for it was designed up, instead of out like the sprawling malls of Canada. On the top we found our true destination. Me and Mark found Smokey Joe's Pizza! At last we could have a crust on our bread! We ordered two large pizzas for 845Rps. Each was 30.48cm in diameter, one with pineapple, pork bacon, and pork sausage, and one with chicken, garlic, and pork bacon. It was a hefty price but worth it. All the insanity that the GMRT canteen had worked up within me seeped out as I enjoyed stuffing my face with pizza and drinking a coke (the first coke I'd had in years). But it was so refreshing! We saved half of each pizza for the next day at the GMRT.

Then we got down to business. Some people had to buy clothes, some people wanted to grocery shop, and some people wanted to lounge on couches and digest their pizza. And what's that?! The Miss India Beauty Pageant Tryouts to were about to take place? What splendid luck! It truly was going to be a glorious day.

Mark trying on clothes at Fab India.

The pizza wasn't sitting to well with us. We both each still had a stomach flu. Mine was just pittering out but Mark was only on the verge of his. He wasn't feeling too good and the bathrooms were out of service. We were fine really, it was more that our stomachs had recently shrunken and we had just over eaten by a lot.

So as everyone else hustled about shopping and purchasing we sat on couches and watched some guy spin a disk. The guy was to DJ while the girls got their strut on. He'd crank the volume too loud and the manager would come out yelling at him, not that we could hear him, we were on the second story looking down on them from above. It was very funny to observe, the guy would blast it again as soon as the manager disappeared. Eventually he just unplugged the DJ.

One of two nice restaurants near the GMRT.
The other is a wine bar! I''m going there tomorrow
after climbing the mountain!

We were getting kind of nervous. Where were the girls? I wanted to see the possible future Miss Indias'. I felt I had experience in the matter and perhaps could help the judges out. But they weren't supposed to start until 16:30! Noooo! What horrible luck, that was the exact time we had to be back at the NCRA for the bus ride back to the GMRT and we still had another mall to go to too.

Well we knew we were defeated so we decided it was time we got our asses up off the comfy seats and do some grocery shopping. We were on the market for something easily made. The only cooking device we had access to was a kettle. Microwaves are obviously forbidden on a radio wave telescope observatory. Your not even allowed to have a cell phone. So with only a kettle our options were limited. Instant noodles, cookies, oatmeal (with assorted additives), and things for our hygiene. This is what we got. The oats were actually one of my favorite buys. It has so much needed fiber, protein, starch, and combined with cashews, almonds, dates, raisins and haselnut spread made one tasty meal. And it only requires a kettle.

Later, we made our way to Ozone mall. It wasn't so much a mall as a department store with food. Not very big but enough variety that some of us bought more things. I bought a wooden brush for my hair.

Then we made a quick stop at Fab India, a fabulous fabric store. They sell cloths, bedding, dishes, candles and furniture, kind of an Indian Ikea.

Kobe Sizzlers Steak House. We each had a lemon-cream,
a tasty concoction of sprite and vanilla ice cream.

Our last destination of the day (it was drawing near 16:00) was Kobe Sizzlers Steak House. What, you might ask, a steak house in India? Yes, and this is where I made my realization that people don't necessarily require meat. Many Indian people are vegetarian, and those few that aren't tend to only eat chicken. And yet here they served a sacred animal, cow.

I was thinking that perhaps eating meat is just a way of signifying status. Or rather, perhaps excessive eating of meat, without regard for the origin of the meat, is what gives one a sense of status. In many cultures meat is ingrained into the cultural menu and I think that is perfectly fine because those cultures (traditionally, pre-modern era) raised the meat that they ate. The First People of North America were very spiritual and revered the animal that they would eat. It was treated as an equal.

There were a few people inside already. A family just sitting down to eat. The food they served here looked amazing. Great heaping plates of vegetables with a steak sizzling on top. Of course they served all sorts of meats from seafood to pork, chicken and finally beef. They also had a great vegetarian section including pizza and pasta.

Everyone ordered a lemon-cream (or lemon soda with ice cream) except Connie who ordered a sizzling steak. When it finally arrived it looked tasty. But she hardly touched it and in fact we had to help her eat it so that we could leave in time. It was surprising how little we actually wanted the meat when it was placed before us. Nidhi is a vegetarian and so she couldn't help, but Greg, Hans, Mark, and I did. It was very tasty which perhaps tells of why its so popular in developed countries.

Pune bridge.

On the way back to the NCRA we got stuck in traffic and had to walk part way and catch another tuk-tuk back. Our driver was stupid and took the wrong route (because he was afraid of getting caught without a license). We arrived just in time to catch the bus and arrived back at the GMRT at 19:30.

We packed our new food away and quickly fell asleep. Perhaps the stomach flu, in my case Cholera, still hadn't passed.

Overall a nice day.

Whats Next

Me with my physics face on.

Now that I've arrived at the GMRT, my place of residence for the next two months, the average reader may not wish to read about my day to day life. Where previously it was adventurous and risky now I spend most of my days at a computer observing the pulsar B2045-16 in hopes of understanding the infant universe. There is much more to it than that and I will share it all but there is definitely not two months worth of material for me to write on. I'm to have to dig deep as it is.

So in order to keep your attention I will let you in on a few things that are to come. Perhaps I am too presumptuous thinking you will be interested at all and so I will leave a few surprises off the list, hoping that curiosity will draw you back at a later date to see what they are.

Mark trying to understand the universe.

- There is a grand mountain that pokes up from the ground. The distance to it is hard to judge but I think it is easily safe to say that it is larger than the one in Jaipur. There are no stairs on this mountain that I can see. There are no roads leading up to it that I know of. And every night we see a fire burning at the second highest peak at what appears to be a temple. Me and Mark will leave early one morning and travel by foot to the mountain and scale it to the top. I'm looking forward to these pictures. I'll take a GPS so I can let you know the altitude at the top.

The shielding door on the Terminal Room. We spend most
of our time behind this door computing. The door is
supposed to be for stopping radio interference but
it's really for keeping leopards and tigers out.

- There are at least four different kinds of reptiles (not including the snakes), and a plethora of large bugs. I would like to document them all in a long post full of pictures and descriptions of their behaviors.

- Hopefully we can track down a leopard. This one would be a challenge.

- All four venomous snakes. They are known as The Big Four. I'll be sure to bring along the polyvalance antivenin just in case.

I have had a week to the day (upon writing this entry) at the GMRT and I have been trying to clean up my backlog of blogs. Soon I will run out of old material and I'll be fully up-to-date. Keep checking back.

To the GMRT

Security check in through Jaipur is slow and inefficient! They have different scanners depending on your airline and sometimes there is a huge lineup at one while the others are completely free. Possibly due to all the commotion around me to get through security I forgot my laptop in the plastic bucket after it went through the scanner.

Trees with unusual roots coming out of branches.
For Jacob's Tree Collection.

I walked away from security with Mark and Connie up to the bookstore and finally to boarding thinking I had everything. I should have found it odd that my bag was lighter or that while mark was using his laptop I wasn't. Apparently they called over the paging system for me (though it was probably in Hindi). 

I realized once we landed in Pune and midnight that I had forgotten my laptop in Jaipur and suddenly a whole ordeal began that would end up last for days before I finally got it back. The lady at my airline counter in Pune called Jaipur and confirmed that they still had it. She gave me a handwritten note saying I had to send scanned documents to Jaipur airport in order to get it back. I was happy with that and so I cleared my mind of worry and we searched for a taxi.

As we try to find a taxi.

That's not such an easy job apparently. We were supposed to have a taxi already booked for us but that didn't happen. All the normal taxis were busy and we didn't want to take a tuk-tuk (auto-rickshaw) because we had too much luggage. We found a pre-paid taxi service that over charged us. We paid 450Rps but didn't care because we were tired and it's not that much in CAD.

We were going to the NCRA or National Centre for Radio Astrophysics where they had a guest house (70Rps/night) and from where we could take a shuttle bus to our final location in the morning. The taxi, when it finally arrived, smelled like rotten fish.

Stray dogs who chased me.

The guest house at the NCRA was nothing special. Bugs everywhere as expected and a tiny bar of soap on your pillow. We finally checked in and were asleep by 02:00 and had to wake up at 06:30 whence I got chance by a stray dog probably with rabies. We paid of night fee and took the free shuttle bus to the GMRT or Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope. The trip was about 2 hours though it was only 80km away. The average speed of drivers in India seems to be around 70-80km/h.

When we finally got there we found the atmosphere significantly better than previous accommodation. The campus was secluded and there were no honking cars. There were next to no stray dogs. There was free drinking water in most buildings and almost everyone spoke English well enough. There were also massive antenna cover the country side that could be seen from anywhere! Those were the antenna that we would use to observe to universe as an infant.

Our guest house has a square courtyard inside it.

We still hadn't seen very much rain. It was supposed to be the rainy season in India right now, from June-August, though the worst hit the south. It was however a lot cooler than Rajistan. Off in the distance a mountain loomed over us. It clearly marked an adventure to come. Me and Mark would climb that mountain before we left the GMRT (still haven't as of writing this).

The first day consisted of orientation with the technicalities of the software and hardware. The GMRT is a working, constantly updated/modified apparatus designed over 15 years. The professor I was studying under was one of the co founders and he wrote much of the software.

Me and Mark share a room at GMRT.
(Mark is a slobby gremlin)

My side of our room.

Also on the campus I found a gym, ping-pong, and cricket, as well as various reptiles and amphibians. There are also somethings to watch out for: 4 types of poisonous snakes, leopards, and scorpions. Of these dangerous things I have only seen scorpions.

Also after losing my laptop (which I still had not recovered) I did not take very many pictures. I'll take more once I get it back.