Damned if you do; damned if you don’t

That’s what Arun, a friend of mine from my previous company, must have thought when he heard me complaining last evening. To cut a long story short, I had to attend a reception yesterday. But unfortunately, I assumed that the event was today and had planned my schedule accordingly.

Arun called me at 7:50 PM and checked my plans. When he found out that I was at home he reminded me about the reception. I initially suspected this call from him to be an elaborate prank, since he and a few of my friends in this group are quite capable of pulling my leg. But I finally understood the truth and dashed to the reception.

When he’d called, I was being admonished by my mother for not coming for supper, even after she’d been calling me for the past 5 minutes. So she was quite upset that I was now rushing out due to my absent-mindedness. And she didn’t lose the opportunity to check if this was a recurrence of a similar incident in my 12th standard board exam, when I assumed that date of the Chemistry practical exam to be one day later than the actual date! If Hari had not called me on the morning of the exam, I’d be history. (Thanks Hari).

Anyways, the venue was quite close to my house and since I had just bathed, I was able to leave my house quite quickly and be at the venue by 8:15. After I reached there, I was admonishing Arun for not calling me earlier. My whole point of contention was that he and my other friends SHOULD have called me at least on Saturday morning to find out when I’d be coming. More than just planning our entry at the venue, it would have helped serve a reminder to me.

Arun’s side of the tale was simple. It was a foregone conclusion that I’d be coming there. With respect to the time, it was perhaps going to be 7ish since that is the time that people usually start coming to wedding receptions. So there was no explicit need to call me!

Even though I was angry with him for not calling me earlier, I was obviously thankful that he’d called me at least that late. And from his side, I was chiding him for calling me that late and would have been blasted if he hadn’t called me at all. Ergo, Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Personalised gifts

When my parents had their wedding reception at Chennai in the recent past(!), they were given many gifts from their colleagues.

Needless to say, the gifts were varied in nature - some were useful stuff like cooking utensils, some were ornamental pieces, but some cannot really be classified anywhere.

Maybe your parents got similar things, but I don't know if they got a framed Vaazhthu-paa (poem praising a person or persons) from anyone. I guess this type of gift was in vogue in that era and is definitely one that requires some amount of customisation and personalisation. That way it is one to be cherished.

This particular item was lying in the paran all these years. I chanced to lay my hands on it when I was at home, during the house painting time.

I took a picture of it last week before it went back to its original place. Read it and have fun. But I seriously request you not to bring it up in front of them. Ever.

16-Feb 7:15PM to 18-Feb 4:30PM ::: Part 5 ::: Reception Food and Lime-Soda

We reached Nellaiappar kovil and due to paucity of time, we had to limit our darisanam/pradhakshanam etc to a very short duration. We made a whirlwind halt at Ganthimadhiamman kovil as well.

Once this was done, we stepped out of the temple and before boarding the van, we made an attempt to buy halwa at the famous Iruttu Kadai. This "Dark Shop" is one of the landmarks of T'veli. It was quite evident considering the number of people standing outside the shop.

If you haven't read about or experienced the Dark Shop, its a small shop that sells T'veli Halwa. In the town, its one of the better tasting ones. Also, its a shop that has not changed itself with the times. It still is a small looking shop with an entrance which doubles up as the shop window - i.e. you don't really enter the shop. Its like a potti kadai where only the shop-keeper enters it from the road and all transactions are carried out across the shop.

But contrary to popular urban legend, the shop is not running with a single light source. It is quite well lit up - thankfully. But net-net, it doesn't have any of the jazzy neon lights on a big name board. In fact it doesn't even have a name board.

We didn't buy anything there and returned to the Hotel. After what promised to be a quick shower and change of clothes, all of us set out after almost an hour. We boarded the van and by the time we actually settled properly into our seats, the driver took the van into a building, which turned out to be the Hotel where the reception was being held. It was practically a 4 minute walking distance and we went there by van!

The reception went on well. It had the usual light music, just that this time the singers also danced. (Talk of exceeding expectations...).

After talking to the groom's brother and a bunch of other relatives of common friends, we finally caught up with the couple as well. Exchange of pleasantries were done and all of quite literally ran to the food section.

Man, the food they served was AAAAWWWWWWEEEEEESSSSSSSSOOOOOOOMMMMMMEEEEEEE. By itself, it was very tasty and considering that we were quite exhausted, all of us had a very quiet dinner. It was a dinner where everyone had a 'hand to mouth' existence for close to 20 minutes.

All the fried rice (2 types), bisi bhela baath, cutlet, uthappan, idiyappam, poori, thayir saadham, halwa, kesar peda, chips, appalam and ice cream settled into all the empty pockets in the food canal.

So stuffed were we that we decided right there that we needed to send in a lime-soda so that we can at least start breathing after some time.

We then took leave and went back to the Hotel. Then, RG and I went out to buy halwa from the other good place that sells this dessert of Gods. The shop is called 'Lala kadai' and is near the bus stand. On the way, we spotted a road side tea kadai which also had some soft drink bottles.

We asked him if he had lime-soda and he gave a positive reply. An order for one apiece was placed. The guy then took the glasses on his counter and immersed them in a big container near his leg. There was some violent shaking of the hands and then he stood up with the two glasses.

Under normal circumstance, I would have run away from the shop - actually I wouldn't even have gone near it in the first place. Anyways, these were testing times with the intestines fighting a losing battle. So I didn't care and preferred to ignore what I saw.

The lime-soda was finally delivered to us and after doing a bottoms-up, we proceeded towards the halwa shop.

After buying 2.5 Kg of it for self (2 Kg was for distribution to my friends), it was finally time to go back to the room and sleep.

BTW, I forgot to mention that during the reception, RG and Sathya were deeply discussing the ways and means to go from T'veli to Madurai, since we had to catch the flight from Madurai to Chennai. The outcome was that a van from Madurai would come to T'veli, pick us up and take us to Madurai.

But we had to leave at 6.15 AM on Sunday. 'Sharp' - was the key word that was thrown into our conversation right throughout the evening.

So after watching a bit of TV, I finally dozed off around 10.30 PM with the alarm set to wake me up at 5.00 AM the next day.

Thank you Padmavathy

I attended Padmavthy's wedding reception this evening. She was in my team in the previous project and is overall a very good kid. Its sad that she had to quit, to join her husband in USA.

Her wedding was held outside Chennai last week and so she had a reception this evening. I'd marked my calendar a long while back for this. So much so, that I even skipped the reception of an old friend from Polaris this evening. But my father attended that on my behalf and I will drop in tomorrow morning during the wedding.

Anyways, I got a bit held up in traffic this evening while returning home. I planned to come home, change me clothes and then head off to the reception at Hotel Kanchi. But some accident near Kathipara Junction, threw the traffic haywire and there was a 45 minute delay when I reached home.

I quickly freshened up, changed to better attire, my mother did the gift wrapping to the best of her abilities and I rushed out at around 8.10 PM. The reception was supposed to start at 7 PM, so you can imagine how delayed I was.

When I reached there, the hall was nearly empty. The guests had already gone to the dining hall and there were only like 4 or 5 people waiting to greet the couple.

So, when I entered the hall, a lady came up to me and said "vaanga vaanga". First, I responded as was expected in civil society and assumed that it was a generic welcome. Please note that, other than Padma, I haven't met anyone in her family.

After this exchange of pleasantries, I realised that the lady who spoke to me resembled Padma a lot (its the other way around, but I met Padma first, so...). I safely assumed that it must have been her mother. So, I was a bit surprised when I noticed the mother talk to someone pointing towards me.

It clearly demonstrated that she knew who I was. Then I moved towards the line to give Padma her gift. Then a man came by and greeted me saying/asking that I was Padma's boss/manager. Introduced himself as Padma's father. I was really shocked. He even introduced his wife!

It was a bit overwhelming for me at that point. Meeting people for the first time, but they know who you are. Obviously this kid has talked about me at home. And must have shown the pictures from all our project parties.

But still, the parents knowing/remembering this, was quite flattering. I will even give a small chance that somehow Padma informed her parents about me, when I entered and I probably didn't notice it. But then, the events that unfolded after I met Padma were even more pleasant.

Her mother insisted that I go to the dining hall right away and dragged a poor kid to accompany me. The kid turned out to be Padma's brother and even he asked if I was her boss and if my name was Jawahar.

I kinda went gaga at that point. The kid then took me to the dining hall. Saw to it that the food was served to me on time. Insisted that I eat a lot. Looked genuinely upset when I refused the ice-cream (solely due to the sore throat I have now).

All in all, it was very different experience. Maybe her family is indeed this courteous and friendly to all guests. But having experienced it first hand, I will give them full credit for the near royal treatment meted out to me.

So, Padmavathy, many thanks to you and your family. Wishing you a very happy married life.