Prashath AKA Guptaji made all the essential arrangements for a gang of nine in our office to attend our azziz dosth ki shadi. Shadhi ko dhek ne ke liye aat log tho dafthar se nikal tho chuke, lekin sirf saath log pohunche Indore thak, aur chey log shadhi ke waqt per hazir they. Dont get confused about all the chaotic details, let me tell the whole story clearly with a spice of my newly learnt language.
Amit is our close friend and also our colleague. His wedding news brought great delight to all his friends and little bit of apprehension to all the Jain gals who had some faint feelings for him. Arguably the most enthralled about the news were we nine, namely Shital, Prashanth( Gupta), Prasanth (Sivaprasad), Vishal, Radhika, Abdur, Nitika, Rupali and me. We were all set to go but unfortunately Abdur sab ko melaa stay order from his Home Department. The enthusiasm was so jumped up that we left the office before the start of peak hours to catch the evening train. I must agree for the fact that we left without much of usual lame delays caused by gals, which was an indicator that the trip was going to be all right.
But it was not all that "All Right". Rupali’s family members had other plans. She got down at Nagpur Railway station, which is near to her home, to spend time with her dear and loved ones. That was little depressing for us, however she was glad to be part of the Anthakshari, card game (called unohttp://www.uno-game.com/) and other point less discussions before she left us. We also talked about marriage and related stuff for which Gupta gave his thoughts.
We reached Bhopal nearly on time. The TC asked our tickets in the station with some kind of suspicion, later directed us to the station exit with humility. Climatic conditions wise, Bhopal was no different from Hyderabad but food wise it was. After getting out of the station, we could pretty quickly trace our cab (Innova) sent by Amit in that freakin hot air. We had our first breakfast in a small food outlet, which sold 'Poha'. I have no idea of the equivalent name in English but I will recommend you guyz to just have it whenever offered. Having that delicious food we left to Indore. In no time we had our second breakfast in a fast food restaurant which was located beside the Bhopal - Indore high way. During this time, I don't remember how much and what food we had, but one thing I know for sure is that we took millions of pictures. Yeah, this trip was too much of a camera affair. I love pictures, especially when I am in it doing some yo-yo actions or if some chick (sundarsi ladki) in it.
Gadi mey chalthi huve ghana sunkar arr kabi kabi hamara awaz behi melakar, safar ka maza loote ham sab ne. Indore shehar ki gali gali mey mahavir bagh dond they dond they akir me saphal ho gaye. hamra dosth Amit ko dhek ne ke bad sakuun aar chain mela hum logon ko. Amit aar unke kas rishthe dhar hame swagath kar ne ke liye bahar intizar kar rahey they. Unn logon ko mil kar hum bohuth prassan huve. Kaas kar ke Amit ke bhai Ankit ko mil ke.
Ankit is this guy filled with amazing sense of hospitality and enthusiasm. Later we figured that he dances as good as his brother. The moment he met us, he mentioned about the dance that we (Amit, Shital, Rupali and me) did for the family day. Shital was pretty up set when Ankit could only recognize me from that video which Amit had sent him. Moral of the story is quite evident for those who read my previous post. Besides, good arrangements were done for our stay in the chowltry with all the air cooler and stuff. Gals and boys were given separate rooms with very well separated distance for all the conservative based reasons.
One of the high points of the trip, which is still having an effect, was that we got a terrific Mehendhi on our hands, that too on both the sides. The Mehandhi on our hands were not much inferior to the one put to brides and bridegroom's hand. It's all together different matter that I had to sacrifice my first day's lunch but it’s far worth it than the state of these gals who didn't get Mehandi put on for the complete day. The first day of the wedding constituted the 'Sangeeth' to entertain the wedding invites (A tradition to sing, dance by the relatives and friends of bride and bride groom as part of the celebration).
Abb me app logon ko 'Sangeeth' ke bare me kuch bathana cha ha tha hun. Sangeeth samaramb rath ko shuru huva. Uss se pehele ham kafi tayari avam intizar ki. Jab samramb shuru huva mud ne ka name kabi bhi nahi leya. Kahi reshthy dharone nrithya pesh ki. Chote bade aar buude, sab ne unka uthsah se sabko manoranjit kiya. Bad me patha chala ki bohoth tayari ke thi ke tha ke achh se ache pesh kash ke jaye. Amit ne bhi Neha bhabi ke sath dhuva dhar pesh ki, aar sab ka dil jeeth liya. Baad me Amit ne Nehaji ke leye Ghana pesh ki orr Nehaji ne Amit ke liye. Bohoti badya tha. Khana be laga tha bhil kul sameep me. khana ka kya kahuun, ethn achha tha, ethan accha tha ke me tho sab ke sab dho bar chataliya. Ethna purn sasyahari khana ap ko koyi shadhi me nahi mele ga. Ab agar me ek aar labz khane ke bare me bolu tho aap zarro eese nibandh ko padna mana karenge, eesi leye yahi khane ke bare me samapth karunga.
Second day was a very long day. The plan was to go to Ujjain and to visit Maha kaleshwar temple, whose idol is qualified as a one amongst the 12 Jyotirlings. We started the day again pretty much the planned time, as no one wanted to take chances with God. By the way we met Kiridh, who was Amit's roommate and also was in our company before. We took him along with us for the Ujjain trip. Kridh was pretty amused by my hindi. He started speaking like me, in fact every one started speaking to me exactly the way I spoke. I speak excellent Hindi ;-) We had terrific fun while going to Ujjain by that Innova. We played Antakshari, two things I specifically remember while playing, one is Prasanth (Sivaprasad), Vishal and me were in one team and we had this pact that we would sing only rocking songs(no slow, emotional or romantic types). The other thing is that Prasanth and me, both south Indians, stated singing Tamil versions of the Hindi songs (eg Mukaabla Mukaabla, Mustafa Mustafa etc). It was fun.
We finally touched the "Mahakaleshwar madir ka ling" and got blessed after standing in long queues. We did get a snap by a professional photographer near the temple as we were abandoned from carrying electronic goods into the temple. Going to the temple was surely a spiritual delight to some of us but it nearly cost us sunburn. It was too damn hot, nearly burnt our feet. This is the worst season of the year; you don't travel unless you really have to.
We reached the wedding hall well in time to have our lunch. I don’t want to bore you by again talking about the entire foodstuff we had. We did some time pass till the 'Baraath'.
Rang manch me nach na aar shehar ke gali me naach na alag bath hey, lekin mere liye nahi. Me tho kahi bhi nachu who nach na nahane ka kamre me nach ne ki thara hothi hey, yeh bath me nahi mere dosth log kehethy hey. Mere mana yaah ki me bikul behatharni narthak huun. chodiye yeh bath ko. Amit ke bharaath me tho kethne ghatya se ghatya nachne wala bhi sharm nahi mehasus ki, arr hass hass ke nach li. Hamare sabi dostho ne bhi uthsa avam kushi se badya nach kiya baraath me. Hamra Amit godi me baite kar hamra nachna dhek raha tha. usse dehk kar laaga ki hamara nachna usse bohot bohat kushya aar hassi dhilayi.
I owe Amit and Ankit a treat from a restaurant of their choice. Before leaving to Indore I was supposed to go for shopping to buy a good kurta. That didn't happen. When I went to Indore I thought I will buy one there. Well, I didn't find a shop that was open for that purpose of mine. After understanding my situation, Amit tells Ankit " mere dosth ke liye ek kaas sherwani jaldi se jaldi la ker usse dhe". Ankit, being so much hooked up with many tasks for weeding arrangement, goes and gets one Sherwani from one of his relative. Not only he gets one to make me happy but to make me look like a bridegroom. Yes, the Sharwani, the traditional outfit that he got me was nothing less than Shehazadhe Shahajahan’s official outfit. I was so much blushing when I was wearing it. I could not control my happiness in wearing that neatly stitched garment. If any of my friends would have worn that and I was wearing an ordinary kurta, I would have been so freakin jealous. I was kinda dumbstruck looking at the pics of me wearing that glittering Sherwani. In short I was looking like a mirror cracking material. Okay enough of self-praise, you should know how rocking the gals were looking in that Reception. My number is 09963258880, call me I will tell you ;-)
The reception function, which was followed by ‘Bharaath’, was very similar to most weddings. We had great food and all, but Nitika had some trouble after the dinner. As the food was so freakin delicious and varied, I guess she consumed more food then what her digestive system would support, so she had to back off for the final wedding ceremony, which stated at 2AM. However we did get a neat group photo with Amit and Neha bhabi before the reception was over (nearly at 12 noon).
I was puzzled witnessing the final wedding ceremony. Firstly, it was at such an odd time, that is at 2AM (Me being a hard core south Indian, have to say that) Second one is a more primary reason. Here it goes, when the wedding rituals were carried out with the help of a Pandit, many of Amit's close relatives were making fun of the Pandit. They started passing many sarcastic comments on him and which made every one witnessing the wedding laugh. More surprisingly no one objected about the act of violation, including the Pandit him self. The wedding got over at about 4 AM. Only after that, I learnt from Ankit that passing sarcastic comments on the Panditji was very strategic. The idea was to keep everyone awake by making such unintentional practical jokes on the Pandit like asking him to recite the verses multiple times and to explain them. Ideally, the Panditji is kind of sportive about the whole idea. However Ankit mentioned that the Pandit who officiated the wedding of Amit and Neha Bhabi did get little pissed off during few occasions.
The third day didn't go as planned, except for the fact we didn't miss our train to Hyderabad. All of us were tired due to the events that took place on previous day, so the effect was directly on our getting up time. More over the cab driver screwed it up even more by coming nearly 2 hrs late. To be honest I was not at all that pissed, I was in no mood to get out in that hot air to see any places of interest in Bhopal -Indore.
Driver ke aane ke baad, ham sab log Amit ke ghar chale. Waha tho sab ne hamra ethni aachi tharha se dhek bhal ke, hum tho kuch zadha he waqt tehare chuke. Waha Amit aar Ankit ke bachpan ke chitra dhur darshan (TV) ke bagal me raka tha. who bhohoti sunder tha, uuse dhek kar kushi aar hassey dhono saath hey saath hone laga. Hassi eesiliye kyu ki ek chitra me Ankit ko ladki ke kapdey pehanaya gayatha. Poha, phal aar meeta kha kar hamne kahi sare chithra (photo) bhi keechey. Amit ke sabhi ghar walon ko hasthe hasthe alvida keh kar hamne gadi se nikle. Ek baath tho spasht se dhik rahatha who hey ki ham ne Amit ke ghar walon ka dil jeet liya tha.
The drive from Amit's place to Bhopal railway station was pretty salient, at least I was mostly inert, either sleeping or listening to the music played in the cab. We did stop at the same restaurant, where we had our breakfast during our journey from Bhopal to Indore, to have coffee. We also took Amit's friend and ex-colleague, Dev, along with us to the station. He had to catch some train, which was leaving one hour before the departure of our Hyderabad train. He was with us during the wedding ceremony as well. Must say, he too became my fan, when it comes to Hindi speaking;-)
After having lunch in the station restaurant, we caught our train to Hyderabad. We made an interesting observation soon after we got into our train compartment. We were accompanied by an old couple, who started playing cards soon after they boarded the train. It looked as if the lady was ripping apart in the game and the husband was all surrendering to her. Inspired by the oldies, we started playing Uno, which is a modern day card game. Shital, Prashant (Sivaprasad), Nitika and me started the luck cum little bit of brain game. I derived sadistic pleasure in seeing them lose and passed sarcastic comments specially to Nitika and Shital. So did they do on me, when I was losing. Pulling each others leg in a shrewd way was very much fun. I addressed them with various names like ghayal sherni, Shadyanthrikari aurath and kutilathanthr aurath. Seeing our game the old lady somewhat showed her interest towards the game. We pulled her in but were unsuccessful to pull her husband in. That smart lady picked up the game in no time. My communication with those old couple was in hindi, which by the way got appreciated like anywhere else. Shital and Nitika were so much not ready to hear from that lady describing hindi as rocking. Any way we continued with the game Uno, which turned out to be an ultimate source of entrainment; especially, when Nitika screwed up her own chances by unknowingly helping that old lady and also when Prasanth accused me of keeping extra card, which I called as conspiracy based out of jalousie. After a while, I took a break from the game and sat near the train door when the train was ripping at 140kmph. It was damn awesome to see the night sky and feel the gusty wind surging at the door. Vishal as well joined after he found me sitting alone doing nothing (read: enjoying solitude). We started talking about the trip before the train police warned us for violating the rules. Well, after that incidence it was pretty much like any other train journey; but I have to say that this train journey was one of the memorable train journey ever.
