Day I in Bhubaneswar - India trip January 2026

First night after the arrival from traveling across the globe can be painful. A stubborn jet lag can be a real pain in the butt. My body clock simply refuses to relinquish the US Time Zone as I woke up at 2 A.M. in morning. Jet lag for me now seems to get too stubborn to relent as I age. It feels miserable to get up so early in morning, without being able to sleep any further. Kishore Kumar's song from Rajesh Khanna's movie AAP KI KASAM - KARWATE BADALTE RAHE SAARI RAAT HUM (turning sides on bed for whole night) never sounded more prophetic. 

We have installed net across the windows to prevent the mosquitos from getting in and an "All Out" brand repellant in the room in an effort to keep most of them away. But if you think that they are too less in number and too small in size to make an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito in the room. No more than a couple in number, they still kept bothered me as I battled them in darkness to clap them to death.

Thanks to the internet, Facebook and my addiction to blogging, I kept myself busy until the murmurung of mosquito gave way to the tom tomimg of GHANTA (brass plate) from a nearby MATH (monastery) sounded like music to me, more musical than the sporadic KAWALIs (group music) from stray dogs. No sooner the gang of musical mongrels on the Eastern end of the street finished with a seqience of wooo.. wooo..woof.. than their western side competitive cousins responded with their musical version of wooo.. wooo...woof. The Kawali sessions continued for the better part of the night with intermittent 10 - 15 minutes of break.

The long arduous wait in darkness paved way to dawn. The eastern sky grew brighter, turning crimson red as the light slowly drove away the darkness. By now the early rays of morning sun sprinkled the trees with a golden hue, giving their dust covered leaves a shining copper coating. It hasn't rained for a long time in Bhubaneswar, the sporadic winter rains are missing. Lack of precipitation and lot of constructions has converted the temple city into a dusty bowl. The chirping of birds turned louder, so also the sound of GHANTA from the nearby Monastery - sounding the beginning of morning prayer session. Wafted in a Bengali Bhakti (devotional) song through the dust laden mango, jackfruit, coconut and betel nut trees. I could grasp the following stanza - 

JASHODA JANANI DAE, 
BAL KRESHTO KHAE RE.
SONAR NUPUR BAJE,
HARI JENE JAE RE. 

Roughly transliterated... 

Mother Yashoda gives,
Kid Krishna to eat.
Golden anklet makes sounds,
Wherever God goes around. 

I went over to the balcony to take a peek at the outside world. A Bull was placidly chewing cud under a big mound of sand nearly. Couple of mongrels sleeping nearby noticed the tectonic shift in their surrounding as the giant bovine stood up suddenly, shrugging off sand from his body. The doggies shifted further off to a nearby semi-broken concrete culvert, apparently perceived by them as a more secured, safer location. 
One of the dark skinned parish dogs whom we lovingly called "Kaalu" tried to sniff his way near to a man plucking flowers leaning over the nearby fence only to be shooed away - HEY HEY JA JA (Hey, hey, go away). The doggie nonchalantly walked away. From distance approached Newspaperwalla (guy). He swung and threw the paper past our main gate with immaculate accuracy and moved on to the next house.

You must have heard about Sand mafia, Land mafia etc. Have you heard of Flower mafia ? They come at wee hours of the morning, steal flowers from the frontyard gardens and sell them off to the larger market segment. My senior citizen father can hardly do anything to stop them. A very moving morning after my first night's nap in Bhubaneswar.

A jet lag can be an irritant, a nuisance especially for those plying between India and United States. The long journey can put one's body clock out of whack, which varies from individuals who experience little or no jet lag, to those who have to make a trip to the Doctor's office for medication when their jet lag stubbornly refuses to relent. Eventually most get over it. For me it lasts for 3-5 days, now more on the later side as I get older.

Here are a few tips on how to minimize the jet lag. This is hardly scientific, rather based purely upon personal experience. Try not to sleep during the day. Keep yourself busy, sip some caffeine, especially  during late afternoon when your eyelids refuse to stay open. The more you sleep during the day, the longer it takes your body to adapt to the new clock. Also don't forget to drink plenty of water and go easy on food. Don't splurge on fried foods and alcohol when you still have a jet lag, it can cause havoc to your system. 
Last but the least, time is the best healer. Let your body clock take its own sweet time to adjust. If it's already a week since you have landed and the jet lag refuses to go, better see a doctor. More later...