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| Riverside Fairgrounds, Deccan, Pune. |
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| Pune Civilian Airport. |
In India, I can think of no town or city where the early
mornings are quiet. Blaring religious
chants from small and large temples in every neighborhood on crackly amplified
sound systems provide a constant backdrop. One
might think that this is an urban phenomenon. It’s not! It’s equally bad in the countryside. It’s really depressing when you wake up in the
morning on a trek in the mountains and hear these sounds floating up from a
village way down below. The religious (Hindu mostly) chants and hymns start
around 5 am. They usually stop by about 7:30 to 8:00 am. I think we fear hearing our own thoughts first
thing in the morning and have to snuff them out with the name of the Lord(s).
The sound I really
like in the morning is that of Sukhoi fighter planes, in pairs or singly on practice sorties
above Pune. It starts like a distant
rumble of thunder and waxes and wanes in the wind. As they get closer the jet engine
sound becomes apparent. You can
rarely see them. Black triangular specks
in the sky. They Doppler out going overhead and then go back to being a rumble.
The
Indian Airforce has based a couple of squadrons of these Russian war planes, Sukhoi Su-30MKI in
Pune. They have a very nice
profile. They resemble General Electric F-14
Tomcats but are not that large. Similar
swing wing, dual engine/tailplane fighters.
