Prijesh’s Wedding @ Kannur – Prelude (Part 1)!!!!!!!

Now who the hell is Prijesh and why am I writing about his wedding??

Prijesh Thylekandy (Priju / PJes /Pre & Post Jesh for WebExians) is a colleague of mine in the sales team. A very amicable guy, who has a great sense of humor. His sense of comic timing is just perfect and most of us in the WebEx Sales Team @ Bangalore can vouch for it. I would want to cite here a few examples:

1. May Bash – We had launched a promotional offer for majority of our services in the Month of May. Prijesh’s take on it: “May Bash – It May or May not bash”. It was an instant response from him, which had the team in ruptures.
   

2. Target – We had a meeting with our directors in the beginning of Q3 (JAS). Kiran (MD) was asking us to think big and achieve just not 100% of the target but overachieve by doing 150% of the target. He asked a simple question: “Who amongst you would do 150% of the target” and gave his customary glance at the whole team. Up went Prijesh’s hand. Now at the end of Q3 Prijesh achieved 50% of his stifling target. We started pulling his legs on what happened to the 150% he had committed. Out came his reply “I achieved 1- 50% of the target”. Needless to say, we still pull his legs!!!!
   

We were all pretty pleased the Prijesh found an equally amicable and smiling Shajila as his life partner.

The Engagement (04/06/06) – Our Journey to Kannur (02/06/06 – 03/06/06)

Prijesh invited us to his engagement. He was game to pool in for our travel and had assured us for arranging for our accommodation too. We hired a “Toyota Qualis” to ferry us to Kannur (Prijesh’s home town). I had never visited Kerala before and was keen to see “The Gods Own Country”.

I had missed a chance to visit Kerala for Arvind’s Engagement and had felt a bit low. Arvind, being such a good friend of mine, made the feeling a bit sour for me. I was doubly keen not to miss out on the opportunity this time and have a great time with my colleagues. I must admit, this is the best set of colleagues I have worked with. The reason might be, that most of us fall in the same age group and have similar interests. The whole of Sales Team @ Bangalore is fun loving. We share each other’s sorrows and rejoice in each other’s moments of happiness. To sum it up, we are there for each other at all times, be it for professional or personal reasons. There is a sense of bonding and unity in the team that I am proud of.

We were supposed to leave Bangalore by 1400 hours on 02/06/06, so that we reached Bandipur Forest Reserves sometime in the evening. We had planned to stay the night in Bandipur. As usual, we were late in leaving Bangalore. We left Bangalore around 1630 hours and the climate did not help. It had been cloudy all the while and started pouring down, when we hit the Bangalore – Mysore Express way. This did dampen our spirits only a bit I suppose. We had an expert driver (Yashu) with us, who made it a point to drive down with great zeal and take us to our destination at the earliest. We did stop at the outskirts of Mysore (Opposite to Ganapati Sachidananda Ashrama) for some tea and snacks.

We were running against time to reach Bandipur at the earliest. We finally did reach Bandipur and were looking for the Forest Resorts. Either the resorts were full or were damn expensive. Now this was turning out to be a challenge to most of us. We did a good bargain in one of the resorts and got 2 rooms to camp in. I, Arvind & Sachin got into one. Rejenish, Ravi, Anurag & Nithin got into the other room. We had a sumptuous dinner, with Ravi getting some home made chicken from Bangalore. The food tasted bad, but we were dead hungry. With the Vodkas and Whiskies & Cigarettes that we had got with us, the food started tasting better!!! Now that’s what you can call “Booze Effect”. It was left to me to check the bill for dinner. I was the odd man out – No Booze you see!!!! The dinner was followed with a lengthy discussion which went on till late in the night. That discussion cleared a lot of misconceptions and cleared the air for greater fun to be had in the next few days.

03/06/06 – The day started off pretty early for me. We had plans of vacating the resort at the earliest. This would enable us to visit the Bandipur Forest Reserve on a Safari. We wanted to reach Kannur, before dark. None of us knew the route to Kannur – Now this is what I call adventure. We were dependent on Nithin’s (the lone Mallu and an Ex WebEx Colleague) knowledge of the place. He is also a native of Kannur but settled in Mangalore.

All of us got ready and visited Bandipur Forest Reserve. It was a huge disappointment. Apart from spotting a few dears and a few monkeys and a peacock, we hardly spotted any wildlife. It was as though the whole of wildlife had taken off on weekend, maybe to visit their neighbors & relatives in the adjoining Waynad Forest!!!!

We drove down from Bandipur back towards Gundlupet. On the way I suppose we had a great and sumptuous breakfast. We were all hungry to the limits. Our next stop was “Himvad Gopalaswamy Betta”. How could you miss a temple visit, when you are with Ravi? Ravi an eternal temple man will always make sure, that we visit a minimum of a temple on any journey that we embark on. This temple is special for a specific reason – it is perennially covered with mist and is at altitude that makes your lungs feel so fresh, given the polluted air that we take in day in day out in Bangalore. Our sense of timing could not have been better. We entered, as the abhisheka and pooja were about to begin. We took the front seats, for a change. Swarms of devotees followed us and in no time the temple had was full. I must admit, it is a spiritual delight, sitting there in the temple, singing praises of the lord. There was so much of harmony in the recital that most of us joined in the chorus. I judge the temples that I visit on the levels of sanctity it maintains, the sense of absolute purity and calm that I feel, when I enter the sanctum sanctorum and obviously the prasadam that is disbursed at the end of the pooja. I rate this temple 10/10 and I strongly recommend to people to visit this place. I am sure, you will come out of the place refreshed in mind and body. As is our wont, we took great pictures of the scenic beauty surrounding the place.

After feasting the prasadam, we got going towards Kannur. It was high time we did so. Our route would take us through the Waynad Forest Range. We knew we had to hit Sulthan Bathery en route to Kannur. The road leading to Kerala border was all but fabulous. We again picked up a few snaps, as we made rapid progress towards the Kerala Border. The air just got a bit nippier as we crossed the Kerala Border. The moment we crossed the check post, we saw the poster of now the world famous “Shakila” and film featuring her. This was the first sight of Shakila in her homeland and we all just could not but let out a laughter talking about her. I fell in love with the scenic surroundings at the first sight. I must admit, it had been ages, since I had seen such greenery. Now I knew why, this place was called “The Gods Own Country”. We hit Sulthan Bathery and then sought direction for Mananthavady. We reached Sulthan Bathery somewhere around 12 noon. We were very pleased with the progress we made. Nithin was using his Malayalam to good effect, we thought. How wrong were we, hit us, after we had lunch at a roadside restaurant. We had missed a detour and had to go back 15 kilo meters to get the detour. The lunch that we had, was the spiciest I have had for a few years. I knew for a fact that Keralites love to have their foods spicy, given the fact that I had a few colleagues of mine in Abu Dhabi, who were from Kerala. I would never venture into the kitchen, the day they would take the turn to cook lunch instead of our trusted cook. The food seems to have settled well, as most of us decided to take a drink, before hand. Ravi, seemed to have taken a bit more. He was on a perpetual high, just brandishing the rest of us with rare display of contempt.

We reached Mananthavady and then again enquired for Kannur. We had left the enquiry job again to Nithin, knowing very well his limited knowledge of the terrain, but trusting his Malayalam speaking skills. We made good progress and reached Mananthavady and again took a detour to Kannur. I suppose we were on track, as we hit the lovely Ghat Sections. All along the way, there was one thing that stuck me the most. There were no deserted places. There was human habitation all along the road we had taken. Now Nithin has this great eye for beauty. The moment, he would see women or girls, he would shriek out “Babbyy”. I was surprised, to hear this shriek from Nithin on quite regular basis. I must admit, the natural scenic beauty was well complimented by the beauty of the women folk there.

Yashu, according to me was as professional as they come. Despite, we enticing him to have a peg or two, he bluntly refrained from doing so. He knew, we were banking on his driving skills and experience for a safe journey to Kannur and back to Bangalore. The ghat sections were well negotiated and we reached Kannur, without any further lapses in direction by around 1830 hours in the evening. The ghat sections had great roads, given the nature and frequency of downpour these areas encounter. Apart from a few stretches, where it got bad, we had a fairly comfortable journey. Hats off to the Kerala government for maintaining these roads in supreme condition!!!!

We were to check into a hotel by the name “PalmGrove”. Our accommodation was arranged here. We again had to rely on Nithin’s knowledge on the place. With a few glitches here and there, we reached our destination. We were pleased to have finally reached Kannur. Sachin, Arvind & I checked into the same room. The remaining folks checked into the other rooms that were booked for us.

I and Sachin decided to cool our heels in our rooms. The remainder of the folks decided to do a Kannur Darshan. Prijesh announced his arrival in the traditional Kerala wear (A white Shirt and a Mundu). Mundu is equivalent to Dhoti.

We ordered the dinner from the restaurant just besides PalmGrove. The tables were set in our room and the bottles of Vodka & Whisky along with the supplements arranged well. We had a gala time drinking (apart from me – odd man out again) and savouring the dinner. We were indeed hungry and were munching ourselves to glory. The party got over late in the night and we all decided to hit the sack at the earliest. We needed to get up early in the morning to get ready to attend the engagement.

Now here was a catch for me and Arvind. Sharing room with Sachin is fine till Sachin hits the sack. He is a sound sleeper in every sense of it. True to his reputation he snored himself to glory. The AC was getting colder as we all had settled in to our bed. Chilling AC and a snoring Sachin, made sure that I had a few hours of quality sleep.

04/06/06 – This day in itself was something that we in years will never forget. It needs to be dealt in detail. I am sure, the prelude can go into a Part – 2. I will post it in a day or so.