September 25, 2012

N. P. Bay !!

"Sangam, Bhubaneshwar chal !" They said. 
"Quiz hai." They said.
18 mahine pehle bhi Bhubaneshwar gye the. Quiz tha. We went, We saw, and We came back. I had suggested something. Not taken seriously I was. Neither reasonable I was (I wasn't christened Sangam for doing the reasonable). But this time, I was the planning commission. And We went, We saw and We conquered...and We celebrated, Gangnam-Juggernaut style.

September 20
Thursday (evening).
Bharat Bandh. But we found a very brave Auto wala, who risked his life and drove us through the city to the Hatia railway station, and charged us the amount that could take you to Bhubaneshwar twice. Anyways, here we were, life and Tapaswini Express ready to take us on our way to make some memories. Eight minds, cooking up their plans...

Bhokali Nawaab : Dhaniya-NO, Pudina-NO, Kadhi patta-NO, Some unknown leaf-NO, Sandwich*-YES !! ( also, ITER me apna fan following double karke hi aana hai. (he did). )

MATLABy Nawaab : The same as Bhokali Nawaab + high hona hai + Jamshedpur + Project + Fb/comments + will somebody miss me ? + high hona hai (he cudn't).

Sangam : Puri ( 26 hours 52 mins 34 seconds left ) ...quiz?..i will blame it on Kela for not coming...and Kaka for coming. So satanic. (it actually took 30 hours 19 mins 54 seconds).

Kaka : Quizz... hmmmm... quiz... hmmmmm... .inter hostel football.. .mera bina sak paayenge? ..hmmm ...quiz.. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz (he slept, for better part of the odyssey).

Tyagi : Iss baar jeet ke aana hai...Bharma..bharma..shitt...quiz..sala upper birth mai hi maarunga...quiz quiz...bharma. (bharma..does anything else matter ?)

Rico : Quiz...police se nahi pakdana hai..shave karke aaya hun...Train ka velocity kitna hai ? ...mera bag kahaan hai ? (he got apprehended by the police and lost his bag thrice).

Maan Singh : Just chill , pata nahi sabko kya load hai...masti karna hai....bas apni sister se mil lunga (he didn't).

Shanky : IBMer...yeah... N.P. Bay !! (N.P. all the way !)

*Sandwich : the same reference as that often used in the series 'How I Met Your Mother'.

...in the train. 

 
~ ~ ~

September 21
Friday (morning)
ITER, Bhubaneshwar.

Quiz prelims was scheduled at 1130 hours. We were there at 0630 hours. No, it wasnt too early. We had stuff to do, mobiles to charge up and we went about it, using the Dean Office Porch as our base camp. Tyagi and I set off to do our stuff. But it seemed like we were caught in the labyrinth, just not finding the place we were looking for.

Tyagi : "Sangam bhaiyya, uss bande se poochh ke boys' hostel hi chalte hain."
Sangam : "hmmn".
Tyagi cornered the banda, "Student ho ?"
Banda : "haan".
Sangam : "Boys' hostel kahan hai ?"
Banda : "Kaun sa number hostel ? "
Sangam : "Koi bhi."
Banda : "Kya kaam hai ? "
Sangam : "****** hai".
Was the banda disgusted ? I don't know. I was looking in the direction he pointed and took off, Tyagi following close on my heels.

Meanwhile at the registration desk :
"Mesra ke Bhokali Nawaab, BIT, Mesra", said MATLABy nawaab to the girl on the registration desk. The guy next to her replied;
"Dharohar winners ?!"
Bhokali Nawaab : "yes".
From then until we left, a lot of fingers were pointed and looks were darted in our direction. We all shared the glory.

The quiz began on schedule. Surprising. 
Mesra ke Bhokali Nawaabs cleared the prelims. Not Surprising.
Team Rico + Tyagi didnt qualify. They were surprised.

Team Sangam (I) + Kaka didnt qualify. They were not surprised.
Team Shanky + Maan Singh didnt qualify. NP Bay !!

The mains commenced. Bhokal ruled from the word go. Other teams kept quiet, most of the time, but spoke when they felt it was time to humour the crowd. Sitting in the audience we won chocolates and cooked up conspiracy theories as how the organisers had followed the undeclared rule of having only one team from one college in the mains, and let those undeserving, f******, m********, a******* googlers take up the stage at our expense. It was satisfying. Cursing often is.
The show went on.
"Kakatiyas ruled in which region of modern India" ?
"abey Kaka, tere ko to pata hoga KAKAtiyas ke bare me", I quipped.
Kaka was sleeping. I looked towards Rico. He was looking for his bag.

The quiz was won. We pit-stopped at the Pizza Hut and then boarded the bus to Puri. Finally. 
Once there, lodging was arranged. Dinner was followed by the victory party. A sleeping Kaka was woken up and everyone raised their Cans.
"Kal subah beach kaun chalega ? Sun-rise dekhne ?", I asked. It was actually Bhokali Nawaab's idea. 
All were affirmative in their response. Even Kaka.
"Thik hai, 5:30 pe utha denge".
"Sala, savere koi nhi uthega", I said to myself. I was wrong. ( not totally though ! Kaka never woke up.)
~ ~ ~

September 22
Golden Beach, Puri
0540 Hours.
"The sea never takes anything", said Rico. A big wave came. Swept the slippers out of his feet and pulled it in. Later, Tyagi aptly put it forth in the following words :
'The most hilarious moment of the trip when the sea tried to take something from Rico (read his chappals) and the ninja action we got to see when he darted after them with a huge wave approaching, grabbing them and then darting back to save his arse....frigging epic.'
Other than Bhokali and MATLABy (and ofcourse Kaka), rest of us waded into the Bay, and stayed there until the we realised that the checkout time of the hotel was minutes away. Before leaving we tried doing the Gangnam style beckoning the waves. The sea replied with 'This-is-Sparta'; and kicked us right into the balls.
This is how Rico put it all later :
'The sea's only gifts are harsh blows, and, occasionally, the chance to feel strong.... And I know how important it is in life not necessarily to be strong, but to feel strong, to measure yourself at least once, to find yourself at least once in the most ancient of human conditions, facing the blind, deaf stone alone with nothing to help you but your hands and your own head' : Primo Levi.

...at the Beach. 


Chilika Lake
1120 Hours.
The boat ride was going to be over 4 hours long. Seemed exciting. Prospects of seeing dolphins. Seemed even more exciting. More importantly, this is the part of the story where the hats come in, and become an integral part of the group, just like the ukulele and the red bays (for a change, there was a ray ban too. It shouldnt have been there).

"Chilika is the second largest lagoon in the world", said Rico.
"35 rivulets flow into it" , Tyagi's turn it was.
What. Did you forget it was quizzing group. such discussions keep happening.
"Abey bird Sactuary bhi hai ye",thus spake Kaka.
"And home of over 135 Irrawady Dolphins", Tyagi again.
"Dolphins rape people", Bhokali nawaab caught everyone's attention, and imagination too, i guess.
"Haan be, they are the second creature after humans who have sex for pleasure," continued Bhokal. If he hadn't caught everyone's imagination the first time; this time he surely did.

...the Boat. 


The first stop was some marshy island with red, angry crabs. One of the island guys took my ukulele. Cool. Then i dont know why, but in the name of Moriarty, he messed up the tuning knobs. Cool ? I urged the red crabs to gnaw his bones. Meanwhile there was an exhibition going on aboard our boat. Very impressive it was. Kaka woke up to listen to those guys! I am not supposed to say much, but the very purpose of my blog is to burst bubbles, so i will stay cryptic in my approach.
Connect :
1340 Hours.
Somewhere in Chilika Lake 
(jahan Dolphins dikhti hain)
We have reached, the Boatmen signalled. We had barely started looking around when a couple of dolphins jumped across our boat. There were dolphins jumping up everywhere. We didnt know where to look. We were all overwhelmed by the sight before our eyes.

This is what we thought would happen.
But heres what actually happened.

"Abey wo rha dolphin !"
"Kahan ?? Kahaan ??? " 
"Dolphin nhi hai re, just a bird flying close to the water".
"Koi Supersonic whistle karo, dolphins respond to that."
Kaka started whistling (persumably supersonically). For once I agreed he was right to keep sleeping. It would be better than facing this disappointment.
"Supersonic nhi be, subsonic sound ko respond karti hain dolphins".
Kaka started whistling again (persumably subsonically). Needless to say, it didnt help. Nor did Rico's attempts to locate the dolphins by wearing sunglasses (red bay) over his normal spectacles.
Yet, Tyagi , perched on the front edge of the boat, kept looking.
"Tyagi ! hat jaa wahan se. Dolphin aa gyi na wahan to pakka r*** kar degi tera." 

         * * *
At around 1530 Hours, we hit solid ground. Lunch was next. Dil khol ke order kiya sabne - fish, chicken, prawn, lobster, crabs (you should see MATLABy crack open the pincers ! ).
The bill. Kaka saved us the embarrasment. Shanky handled the rest. N.P. Bay !!

Back in Puri, half of us headed to the beach, and the other half to the Jagannath temple.

The Temple : Bhokal, Sangam (me), Tyagi and Rico. We got our bags taken care of and entered the temple. We decided to keep our mobile phones with us (and not submit it as we were supposed to). Inside, we wee busy evading the Pandas when we discovered Rico was missing. We put our faith in Lord Jagannath and moved on hoping to find him outside when we were done. But Tyagi spotted him a few minutes later.
'kya hua be, kahan kho gya tha", asked Tyagi.
"Police ne rok liya mujhe, bola mobile rakh ke aao" , replied Rico.
"Ham teeno ko to police kuch nhi boli, tere ko hi kyun pakdi be ?"

10 minutes later, we were done. We collected our bags and left. 
"Mera bag kahan hai", Rico realised he hadnt collected it and ran back to do so.
We were all going to head back to the beach to join others. We took a break at the Sulabh Shauchalay. Bhokal went in first and came back instantly. "Abey ye Bhojanalay hai shauchalay nahi ". Damned Oriya script.
Finally, we did find the shauchalay.
"Chalo..sabka ho gya na ? ..Rico kahan hai ?", i asked.
"Wo fir apna bag chhod aaya andar".

Meanwhile, at the Beach : Kaka, made up for the loss in the morning, and entered the water. So did Shanky and Maan Singh. As Kaka tore off his t-shirt, out flew his Ray-Ban, into the water and the waves pulled it in. Kaka, caring for nothing dived after it. He was ready to risk his life to save that Ray-Ban, to get it back in his fist..so that it could sit royally  on his nose again. Kaka Fought hard, but the waves were stronger. Nevertheless, Kaka went perillously deeper into the sea. This made the life guards active..and they rushed to pull him out...so did Shanky and Maan Singh. They caught him just in time and pulled him back. Kaka kept resisting.
"Chhhod do mujhe! Jaane do  mujhe! mujhe Ray-Ban ko bachana hi hoga!", retorted Kaka.
"Bhool jao use Kaka, ab tum use nhi bacha sakte", consoled Maan Singh.
Kaka fell back on the shore. Shanky sat beside him, patted his shoulders and said,
"N.P. Bay".

(I mite have been pressurised to depict this event in this manner.)
* * *
Puri Railway Station
2040 Hours.
The train left timely. The dying spirits were lifted by one quick round of sandwiches*. Just as we were reliving the moment, something whizzed by us. BANG. A big stone lay on floor, broken into two pieces because of its collision with the train wall. Some nut hurled a boulder at us. 8 people sitting, and nobody was hit ! I didnt want to imagine what could have happened. Praise Lord Jagannath !

Soon, we all retired. 
The next day, back at college hostel, it was as usualness again.
There are promises of more such events in coming future, but the heart does rue the end of a great one. 
For now, classes, lectures, labs and keeping up with the 75 mark. I just try to find solace in what Shanky might have said,
"N. P. Bay" !!

        One pic to sum it all up..

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 Rights to exaggeration and bragging reserved.
N. P. = No Problem
Bay = Bey or Be (as in Abey oye !)
Data and Information used might have been manipulated to suit the storyline.
No characterisation intended.
Everything is relative to your perspective.
*