The Birthday Cruise

3 weeks have passed since our foraging into the forest...and yet we meet....AGAIN.

but this time, the occasion was different...this was no mere get-together, but rather the celebration of several 207 members' birthdays and their pending treats...namely, jency, jazim, irene, myself and zubin. and so we decided to mark the day we became legal for anything and everything with a grand houseboat trip. plus, this time we had the company of the goan-turned-tamil calvin....our (young) guest-star.

so that was day 1....the first highlight was predictably the cutting of the cake; a birthday tradition that we decided to follow. i had to hear several curses, for it was my hate for chocolate cake that prompted suthin to get us a fig&honey cake instead....but it looked chocolat-y in my eyes and my tongue nevertheless. however, we enjoyed it. and this paved the way eventually to the next birthday tradition....opening of the presents.

it was suthin's (evil) genius idea of giving a PAIR of presents to each of us...one is a practical gift, and the other a mocking funny one. i'm not gonna name the gifts that were handed out, but i can tell you that the practical gifts represented zubin's loyalty to the communists, handed jency a tool to look prettier and irene something "fluffy and cute" and myself a reason to say "why so serious?".

and on to the funny gifts...ahem. jency received something to remind her exactly how "tall" she is, jazim was mocked with his craziness for t-shirts with one that i'm sure he's never gonna wear, irene got a portrait of someone that was "close to her heart"(kudos to merin for her brilliant idea) and zubin was gifted with something that proved a physical trait not usually found in men. and i....sigh....was reminded of a small incident way back towards the end of school in which i did somethin inappropriate and girly.

having done that, we proceeded to fun activities....ass-charades,rounds of poker, a weird ass brain twisting game called ping-pong introduced by the NIT-ian jency and...........blindfold. yes, we played blindfold on a houseboat. and yes, we played it at night. and YES, someone DID fall off into the water.

the victim was none other than the daredevil monisha. as the blindfolded jazim pursued his targets near the edge of the boat, after a confusing series of shoving among ourselves, it was monisha who toppled off backwards into the dark abyss. it was grace from above that the boat wasnt moving and that she fell near land, where the depth wasn't too great. although completely submerged, she rose triumphantly with help and simply marvelled at her close shave with death("it was awesome!! simply awesome!!"). the rest of us were, understandably, much more closer towards a state of self induced coma than she was.

unanimously, we decided : no more games except a nice round of poker accompanied by some drinks. and thats how that unusual night ended. and oh did i not mention.......the big poker winner of the night was me ;)

by morning of day 2, the houseboat was vacated and we travelled to my family house to stay over....minus dilu and jersen and plus the one and only sreeja. she sure did bring my house down with that banshee laughter of hers that ran for hours and hours. fooling around was no.1 priority for us there, and we did that to the max.

the departing began by end of day 2 as zubin and jency left. morning of day 3 marked merin's departure and the rest 8 of us left for ekm town to explore more opportunites of fun....mainly gi joe and a heavy meal which poor fasting jazim couldn't savour except for his own watering mouth. during some barista, more departed and they were left to miss what rohin, suthin, monisha and i experienced at night : loungevity!

monisha's exit marked the end of this remarkable weekend. we celebrated turning 21 in style and are now left pondering just how many more "reunions" may be in store for us....only god knows, but boy they're something worth waiting for! ;)

vysh....signing out

The weekend's round-up

just thought i'll chip in a little but about recent happenings at 207. it's been a little quiet with the brothers gone home, but new activities are keeping myself, suthin and rohin very busy....namely the birthday present hunt.

the highly anticipated kumaragom reunion(i mean, union) has been spiced up by these presents for the 5 bday boys/girls, ie jazim, jency, irene, zubin and myself....but the hunting hasnt been a fun ride. all the same, the 3 of us have been well entertained at the mall on friday by sreeja, and by susan on saturday. kudos to them for that ;)

so far we have acquired quite some decent presents....ahem, of course the identity of mine remains top secret unless one of the others spills his/her big mouth. whatever the case, the upcoming weekend is one to wait for...at the moment however, suthin and i got exams to tackle. so i guess it's time i get over that hilarious memory of the teddy bears falling on sreeja, as well as get rid of this small emptiness left in my heart as a result of susan's departure to UAE......sigh, both these precious things are gonna be missed!

this is vysakh....signing out.

207's Jungle Riot

and riot we did.

day 1: after months of planning, we were finally ready to kickstart the much awaited trip to nelliyampathy forest. college hours down, the only thing left was to receive the guests at our humble abode 207. to make a long story short, the presence of nosy locals forced us to move our base of operations to hotel highway garden(a familiar place for most of us). maybe not the start we were hoping for, but it was fun nevertheless....shuttling between the 3 different rooms that we took for the night, repeatedly banging on the door of a particular room whose 2 residents just refused to grant entry,sreeja the ultimate producer of quality laughing gas(mainly for herself),group dinner and exclusively for 4 of us....tickets to mexico. amid the chaos, the camera did the talking as well. only the lord knows when exactly we hit the bed.

day 2: the tempo arrives. guys take their baths and get ready. women on the other hand...well, they did a lot more than just that, obviously.

the ride to nelliyampathy was long, but never boring...thats a word you dont come across in our dictionary. the music and the presence of loudmouth suthin just added to the lively atmosphere. but lets cut to the core of this story.

the tempo's final destination was the beginning of the journey for us. we teamed up with the tour organisers and made pairs within ourselves.and we did something else that seems so f***ing laughable to me at this point....apply anti-leech cream on ourselves.

and thus, the trekking began. jazim and doctor irene leading the bunch, followed by myself and monisha, then rohin and doctor susan(the docs were given high priority,but ultimately they turned out to be useless),suthin and the dwarf merin with zubin and jency completing the line-up. sreeja.....erm.....guess no "buddy" could satisfy her, so she varied her positions constantly.

during the start, we might have followed a path, but after a while the guides led us straight into the freaking jungle, where we werent following any bloody path but just cutting and slicing through branches and bushes! well...this is trekking...and it was fun ;) we climbed hills, got washed down by rain, spotted a deer, walked and walked and walked....for apparently a total of 10 km. it was an achievement by the end of it.....we had entered the jungle and come out of it unscathed...................................or so we hoped.

during the early preparations for this trip, we thought that the greatest fear that we might encounter in the forest could be a tiger or some similar beast. but we had tossed aside what we'd considered to be a minor threat, but turned out to be the greatest : leeches.

oh yes ladies and gentlemen, leeches. those bloody GoodKnight anti leech creams were to leeches as a safety pin to a hungry lion. the bloodsuckers bit and tore at every one of us. they penetrated through our shoes AND our socks. they climbed up our legs and sucked on happily. i was unfortunate enough have 2 of them settle between my toes!! they grew from the size of a grain of rice to a small rock. apparently, leeches release some substance that prevents the host from feeling its presence! moreover, they also release an anti-coagulant that prevents clotting of blood....which explained why our bleeding persisted throughout the day! and i thought mosquitos were the worst creations by god.....

but how can u define a worthy experience without a few obstacles?? and experience it was nonetheless, to come out of the jungle not-so-unscathed but with each of us writhing, trying to get rid of the little monsters(except for the fisherwoman, she deserves a medal for having warded off every leech attack....or perhaps they found no satisfactory amount of blood in her to suck away). feeling exhilarated, that phase of the trip ended with a ride to our accommodation.

after another walk(mercifully not INTO any forest) and a sight of the "booth bungalow", the night partying began. maybe the bonfire wasnt so big, but it was grand enough to gather around and make a toast to ourselves, and definitely big enough to heat a chicken ;) getting wasted was our next priority!! but the night wasnt over, not without THE night safari!!! allrite....i dont have any right to boast here, having slept off an hour into the safari, but it was a "wooohooooo" experience all the same.

after our return, i recall falling flat on the bed....and nothing more ;) ;)

day 3: woke up to discussions about the previous day...the hot topic was about one particularly wasted lady. my hats off to her for being such a great source of entertainment! the fun that was shared during that time just cant be typed down or told, but gotta be experienced with your own physical presence right there ;)

the guides had thankfully decided that we've had enough leech bites to last a lifetime, so they led us through relatively less leech-infected areas and onto the top of a HIGH mountain. and oh boy, it was beautiful. it was the perfect way to end our last trekking session...on the top of the world with the varying breeze against us accompanied by the breathtaking view.....the camera was out to do the talking again at this point ;) we had our own share of talking and endless laughter there....the feeling was bliss!

and thus, we returned, packed and got ready for the trip back home. it was a tiring weekend but thats the only negative aspect i can honestly point out. nelliyampathy offered itself to us and we exploited it to enjoy the hell out! but the icing on the cake was once again...the little things : suthin's loud ass humour, jazim's tendency to bring the group 2gether for his crazy snaps, irene's dumb jokes, jency's stern stare, susan's care and sweetness, rohin's "wazzzaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa", merin's constant reminder that "big things come in small packages", monisha's thurst for getting high and those freaking blue fingernails, zubin's never ending showing off and rolling up of sleeves and last but never least....the life of the party: sreeja and her gales of laughter that just never shuts up.

welcome to our life.

yours

vysh