Making merry at Puducherry

It was a beginning of an end. Our project is coming to an end and for me a journey of close to 5 years is coming to an end. As I write this blog, our team is literally disintegrating. This was a team outing but even had people who had left out project long back, people who just left our project previous day and people who are about move to different projects. This might be our last outing and our last chance to have fun together. I subconsciously have a ‘out of sight, out of mind’ policy. I am not good with maintaining contact with people. Out of all the people with whom I have worked in the past, I am in touch with hardly few people I can count in my right hand. So far, it’s only with few people that my relation goes beyond being professional barrier.

It was an out of the blue idea and everybody was surprised on how quickly things got organised and how well the numbers increased. Everything fell into places and finally we 12 people set out on a Saturday morning.

We had tea near EC and started on our journey. With first stop at some hotel for breakfast our first point destination was Gingee fort.  Gingee was fun. This was the first time on our journey we got a taste of the humidity and the unforgiving sun. Everybody was dripping from sweat but since this was still the start, everybody had enthu to try and trek till the top. We stopped at a granary to listen to some soothing flute from some stranger. We started our journey back to pondy at around 3 and had lunch at some hotel.

We finally reached Pondy and went directly to a rocky beach. This scene reminded me so much of the pebble beach in Brighton. It was a similar architecture around of the buildings. It was a nice rocky beach with a nice road alongside the shore. We sat there for a long time and had nice masala tea on the beach. Having tea on beach has been my new found favourite thing.

We headed to the resort and checked in at 18:30. We all were more than happy to see the resort, we were in total awe seeing the empty private beach and the plush interiors only added to the liking. The corridor in between the rooms led to a very spacious portico facing the beach and more than ideal to sit idle all evening. We all freshened up in an hour and only now the fun began. The resort had a private beach and we thought of arranging a bonfire and to spend most of the night on beach. We took all the beverage’s to the beach and emptied almost everything in a matter of minutes. We spent a bit more than an hour on the beach and while walking back to the hotel we realised that only few ppl were able to walk in straight lines.  Little did we know that this will be the night that most ppl involved will never forget their entire life. It all started with San sobbing and telling some sad tales. He was honestly disheartened that the project was coming to an end and we were all heading separate ways. It was fun to watch Venu cry for no reason but only cause he was not able to see San cry. Sudhi looked promising with a big brother attitude towards San and taking care of him for major part of the night. Ramesh was as sane as ever and Kulk was swaying from dizzy to sanity. Venkat was visibly shocked by seeing all this. He was maintaining a good distance from San who looked the person most out of control. Throughout the night… San was sane… He gave out some gems that most of the people will never forget. We all headed back to our rooms by mid-night but it was far from over.  Sudhi who was looking very stable till now and taking good care of San till then came to our pad. The night got dragged till 3 in the morning.

My Sunday morning was a memorable one. Sitting on the spacious portico sipping a delicious masala tea facing awe-inspiring waves while enjoying the lovely breeze. I was not sure which was the best thing I was liking about that moment. I have a snap of that very moment which I have imprinted permanently in my mind.

 

The plan for the day was to be on beach all morning and then visit Auroville and to head back home. The beach being private was mostly empty but was very shallow. We were only able to go down few meters from the shore and then it was dangerously deep. We had fun for major part of the day at beach and after much discussion made it to auroville in the evening.

All in all it’s a trip that none of us will forget. As I write this blog, we same set of people are planning a trip to Coorg and I hope that the plans materialises. Each person on this trip has traversed a new path in his professional life now which may never cross with any other person again. This trip was a perfect ending for a long journey that we have had together.