NYE 2016

Kerala 2016

I’m at the end of yet another weeklong vacation that evaporated in an instant. Another end of the year trip reconnecting with family before getting back to work action. This break was just as deserved as every other end of the year breaks I can remember, where I am just so tired with the work through the year that I cannot wait to put my legs up in the quiet of the Kottayam house. In spite of this being a year that was relatively less stressful for me at work, whilst ensuring I ended with a 4 rating, towards the end things got really heated up at work with the Sudhir Growth Hypothesis presentation, followed by the Projects presentation, that I began needing this break just as much as the others.

So as usual, it began with a trip to Kottayam on Dec 24, which thankfully fell on a Saturday, leaving the perfect Sunday Christmas to follow. But as is the norm, I was the only one excited about such things, and turned out being the only person who visited church on the Sunday.

It was a good experience though, as I went to this shrine of Mount Mary walking distance from home, and had a peaceful quiet time to myself.

The rest of this Christmas weekend was about playing with Soha and catching up with parents and the ever growing backyard that is now a continuous source of organic veggies for mom to cook. The biggest shocker this time were coffee beans that dad saved, which he claimed were hand (or mouth, or rectum) delivered by a civet cat.

On Dec 26, Geet had had enough of chilling with parents and the house, and wanted to make use of the time to prepare for Naan’s wedding and also get some retail therapy given she’s been pissed with me for the last few weeks.

So we all headed out shopping, and she shopped and shopped and shopped. So much that she didn’t realize lunch was delayed, and worse, didn’t notice Soha getting increasingly cranky. So I had to ask Jeethu to take Soha and mom back home and I would continue assisting Geet.

And Geet just carried on through as if nothing changed. She shopped from about 11 in the morning to about 8 in the night when shops began to shut and bought all the pending sari’s, including some that were already purchased, but deserved a replacement as per her.

I kept up with her the entire time, giving pointless feedback, taking photos, sending them over Whatsapp, whilst trying to preserve as much of the phone battery on both our phones.

Anyway, Dec 27 was the day we were to meet the gang on the House Boat, and first Sagar and Disha came home as they had an early flight, and by the time they got ready and we reached the boat, the rest had already boarded.

We started off only by 2pm and the boat guy was almost planning to dock us back by 5pm. I somehow convinced him to extend for another hour and by 6pm we were on our way back home after much toddy, beer and Kerala meals including tasty sambar, fish and prawns.

The night was spent partying outside home where Shreyansh set up a bar for himself, and the wee hours were spent playing “I have never ever..” where Jeeth and Ankur were giving me much competition for this one game I usually get the gold.

There was also one moment when Jeeth, Sagar and I went to the terrace for a smoke and we caught a firefly - it was almost this years version of the shooting stars we saw the previous year and i promptly made a wish.

The next day, the crowd left to Periyar and they spent the rest of the day trying to convince Geet over senti whatsapp recorded messages to reconsider her decision to get back to Bombay for new years and rather spend it with them at Munnar where they were heading post Periyar.

The entire plan was an elaborate one that Sagar had prepared, and the last leg was to be at Munnar that Ankur was organizing, and I was sure that the bit that Ankur was doing would have something special for Geet as he’s very close to her. That was the reason I really wanted her to be part of this trip, but she was much too adamant about it. No amount of convincing from everyone in the group moved her even an inch.

I even had return flight tickets booked from Coimbatore, but that was the least of the worries. Her improving her mood mattered the most and it showed no signs of alleviation, and I felt terrible for the rest of the gang who planned so much keeping us part of the proceedings.

Anyway, the next day we started our drive to Bangalore, dropping Geet off at the Cochin airport at 8am and then reaching Bangalore by 8pm after a slow but comfortable and safe ride by Jose who came to Kotayam the previous night just to do this drive.

Made it to Bangalore just in time to catch up with the school friends. It turned out quite the reunion as it wasn’t just Hari and Tunu who were there with the usual suspects of Aash, Sush, China and Munda, but even Karthik R who dropped in with a date, and Sherry and Keshav who dropped by for 5 mins.

We met at Hoppipola in Kammanahalli and totally had a blast. I couldn’t eat much given the beef cutlets from Kerala I’ve been hogging all day during travel, but drank enough, including getting everyone to do a Jager train to keep the spirits up.

Started the next day early to cover some ground on pending errands and managed to close home loan and apply for appostile of my birth certificate. With that done, decided to take an early flight and get to Bombay and pick up a leather jacket that I’ve been wanting to gift Geet.

But as luck would have it, the flight got delayed and I landed in Bombay only by 9 with just an hour on the clock before stores shut. I still rushed to Dharavi and managed to pick a jacket up and got to Palm Springs before lights went out there.

Caught up with everyone including a make up with Geet and surprised her with the gift the next day, post which we watched the movie Dangal, had lunch at Made in Punjab, quick nap and headed out to Bangdu’s house for NYE party.

We caught up with the gang at Munnar over Facetime, which was where our original party was supposed to be, and instead had a ball at Bangdu’s where we celebrated Bangdu Poonam marriage announcement, Sohini’s brilliant funny moments, a rare sighting of an owl and a splendid display of fireworks from all around Bombay from Bangdu's terrace, a spoilt attempt at Chinese lantern given a hole in the dam things, and lastly, ending with my order of 18 big pizza boxes which was such an overload that people just couldn’t stop laughing.

I just had to end the night with an epic display of my stupidity, but there it went, another act of mine that will be remembered through time.

Anyway, here’s concluding the entry with some snippets of the night:

Sohini, Boka, Geet and Sandy staring at the sky
Sandy: wow look at that Chinese lantern go
Geet, Boka: ya, so cool
Sandy: look it's cutting across the Orion constellation now
Geet, Boka: ya, so cool
Sohini: (suddenly pointing at the same lantern we've all been looking at) hey guys, see, shooting star!

Bangdu: (shouting at somebody else) hey what are you doing ya?
Sohini: I'm just dancing Bangdu
Bangdu: ya but I'm not talking to you!

Sohini: (to Geet) isn't this the correct dance step
Geet: (gives disgusted expression because the step was incorrect)
Sohini: I'm I such a bad dancer!?

(Ravi and Poonam are doing papa pancho to Bangdu)
Sohini: who is that?
Geet: Ravi
Sandy: Poonam

Bangdu: (to Sohini) Give me any number. I'll prove how it's not a number (WTF!)