Chilamkur night sky

One night, after dinner, Praveen and I were walking within The India Cements Limited, Chilamkur staff colony... And suddenly there was a total black-out. Absolute darkness! The first few seconds we just saw black every where, then slowly, as our eyes adjusted to the darkness, we could see thing in the faint light coming from the sky. I looked up, to the sky, it was packed with stars; tiny, small, big and large. This is the first time I saw such a scene- jet-black screen with twinkling, shiny dots. That's when I realized the beauty of the rhyme-

Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky!

Chilamkur is a remote village near Yerraguntla in Cuddappah District of Andhrapradesh. Between 1993 and 1998, we used to visit the cement plant quite often and got a chance to see the beauty of interior Andhra. We traveled the stretch between Chilamkur and Kurnool few times and every time it was an adventure. Flash floods forcing us to take long detours, road blocks, our Maruti Omni having trouble with lights and once hand-brake jammed... I remember seeing a small spot full of date palm giving an effect of an oasis in the Mid-East. During another visit, we drove next to red colored hills which looked like a picture out of Texas.

I love to see sunrises in Andhra, there's some special effect in them.
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