Flight to Paris (Part II)

I asked Santosh, my buddy in Mumbai, to come to airport so that I can spend the 3 hrs of transit chatting with him. But the airport folks told that I’d not be allowed to go out. I sat there, all alone, blinking into the darkness outside. My thoughts were lingering around the girl, my missed opportunity to meet Santosh etc.
Slowly, the darkness was thrown away, and so were my blank thoughts and petty disappointments, with rays of the glorious sun in front of my eyes and inside my mind…

And soon I heard the final call for my flight… I ran briskly towards the gate uttering in myself, “Huh..final call...When am I going to get rid of this last minute catching ups??” I was just sitting in the waiting hall doing nothing and was still late in boarding the flight!! I was also quick in consoling myself, “Okay, what happened now?? After all, you are a proud product of REC Warangal… not your fault you see” Hahahaaa…

As I entered the flight, I was soon searching for beautiful gals in the flight, very sure that my seat would be next to one of them!! The airhostess showed my seat. Alas… beside an old couple, in their eighties, with a suspicious look at me as if I came there to disturb their privacy!! With the balloon of my dreams busted, I took a deep sigh and laughed at myself wryly. As I settled in my seat with a broken heart, I remembered that I didn’t do something that I am so good at…sleeping!! I was soon into deep sleep. May be, in a way, I must be actually happy… had I been sitting beside a pretty woman I would have had to postpone my sleep by another 9hrs!! hahahaaa…

I must mention about the take off at the Mumbai airport. It’s an awesome sight and experience, at least for the first time flier… As you fly into the skies, you’d soon be over the Arabian sea within a few minutes.

There I was, stepping my foot on the foreign land for the first time… welcomed by a cool breeze at 10 Deg.C at 1.30 p.m local time. Exchanged my travellers’ cheques, took a phone card and went to a booth to call parents. But as I lifted the phone, everything was displayed and read in French. I went to the next booth to try my luck if it would be in English. But I came back like a ball hit to a wall… a young couple were deeply engaged in a lip-lock. Cough.. cough… so there I was, not taking too long to get the feel of “the most romantic city on the planet”. I quit my idea of calling home then and proceeded to the taxi stand.

“Residency Grand Arche”, I said. The taxi driver nodded in agreement, reluctant to see the route map to my hotel that I brought. And my eyes stuck to the window again for around an hour, until the driver stopped and signaled that we reached the destination. I was wondering how that place could be a hotel!! But I thought that fellow dropped me at the parking lot of the hotel. Paid him and as I asked for bill, he gave me a strange look meaning, “From which planet are you bloke??”. And zzzooooom.. he left. I stood there for a few minutes looking for my onsite colleagues. After a few more minutes I started searching for human beings!! Nowhere could I find anyone atleast to ask where I was, nor could I find any phone booth. I understood that I was lost… ha.. can anything get better?? Yes indeed… only in movies did I see rains at moments of truth!! And there I was, lost in alien land and standing in rain…

I saw some people walking on an over bridge, but I could not find how to reach there. I decided I should make a move and with all my baggage I crossed the speedway, jumped over the divider and climbed up the bridge. (Huh… that was an arduous task with all my luggage!!). All this while, the vehicle riders and the overbridge pedestrians were gazing at me strangely and I didn’t understand the meaning then!! After a 15mins walk, I felt I reached a place where I can give a clue about where I was to my mates. And after 30mins of waiting, there came Srinivas and Mayank. I could see the twinkling of their teeth from far across… and as they reached me, they rolled over laughter!!

Later I learnt that the place where the driver dropped me is the basement of The Grand Arche, a monumental structure in Paris, while my hotel was also named after it!! (Like in Hyderabad we have Golconda fort and Hotel Golconda..hahaha). And that we should say “ticket” instead of “bill” to the taxi driver(I lost 50euros for not knowing this) and that we have to cross the roads only on zebra crossings (such a rule exists in India too, but who cares about that??), and that too, only when there is green light for pedestrians!! All these realizations evoke laughter whenever I think about that…
What is so special, after all, going abroad without experiences like this?? :-)
I wonder about one thing though... While I was thinking all the while about what to do next, why did I not get frightened for having been lost in an alien land?? Hmm... another result of being a product of REC?? :))

Flight to Paris (part I )

It was my first trip to abroad, and is memorable in all possible ways…
… including how the travel agent played hide and seek with my visa until the day of travel.

Yeah, I was sent for a month-long stay in Paris on a Business-Visa. So, according to the rule book, I was not supposed to work!! Okay, let me be clearer, I should not do any work that is supposed to be done by a salaried employee… So, I was given a tour by my manager about different ways of bluffing the emigration n the immigration authorities ( Aah, how nice of my mgr… I had thus far seen only mgrs preaching honesty n sincerety!!). And can you find any other specimen in this world who can better me in bluffing?? ;-)

My flight to Mumbai was at 3.30 a.m, and I reached the Bangalore airport by 12.30 a.m accompanied by Pradeep and thoughts of my family (they were very anxious for me, and even angry on me for not allowing them to come to Bangalore and send me off!!). Pradeep, having come back from Paris just the previous day, convinced me that it’s waste of 100bucks to take an entry ticket into airport for non-travelers. I entered the airport, for the first time in my life as a passenger, all alone and looking back at Pradeep as he was waving his hand from outside (I later realized how correct he was, Bangalore airport is one stupid airport of its kind!! In Vizag airport, you can see and wave at ur friends even as they are boarding the flight…).

After I checked-in my baggage and collected my boarding pass, I met the interviewer… the inspector of emigration dept.
“What r u?”
“I’m a software engineer with Infosys”
“Can I check your company id card?”
“Yeah sure…here it’s”
“You said you are working for Infosys Bangalore, but your id is of Infosys Hyderabad?”
“Yeah, I’m from Hyderabad.. but now working in Bangalore”
“You are from Hyd? But your passport says you are from Vizag??”
“Aaah… my home-city is Vizag, I’m an employee of Hyderabad Infy and now working in Bangalore!!”
“Ok..it’s so simple, why do u get confused??” (Huh.. so he declared it’s me who got confused… as u say sir!!)

“Why are you going to Paris?”
“To meet our client… on a project purpose”
“What is the purpose?” (Yesss… here’s my chance… go ahead Suddu, u r unstoppable!!)
“Actually, you see.. eh… we have an agreement with our client for phase one of the project. I’m now going to show a detailed presentation on how well we did in phase one and discuss with them the business we can have with them for phase two of the project…” ( Isn’t it the heights?? A mere software developer beating the role of a business manager?? But hold on… the big one is yet to come..)

“Then why do u want to stay for one month for just a presentation?”
“Because, my meeting with the client could well end up with signing the contract for phase two of the project…I need to discuss the logistics!!” (Gosh… can anything get better???)
Probably, he had had enough… he just asked me to proceed to the security check.

Done with the formalities, as I proceeded to board the flight… I saw a gracious gal walking in front of me, along with her parents in the aisle. I was sure she would sit beside her mom and leave her poker-faced dad beside me. But to my pleasant surprise, she showed the seats to her parents and sat next to me… we just exchanged a pleasantry look, and I’d be lying now if I say I could hide the smile, rather a grin, on my face!! It’s an odd time of the night (3.30 in the morning), she has fallen asleep. As I was amused at the tiny objects through the window… I felt some weight on my shoulder. For a fraction of second, I thought it’s the hand of the gal’s father!! But as my luck would have it, it’s the gal herself, deep in her sleep (or pretending to be so…) leaning her head on my shoulder!! Aaaaah… eureka kasa misa rasa basa… I was on clouds, both literally and even otherwise!! :))

But, as is it’s always, all good things end up so quickly!! And so was our journey… we reached Mumbai in an hour. We again exchanged the same looks and smile, only then I could realize how sweet a “hi” and a “bye” could be just with a look… And my thoughts were lingering, “if a flight to Mumbai could provide me with such a pleasant experience, how good the flight to Paris is going to be!!”

Stay tuned to know how good my flight to Paris actually was…

Yaadein.. my memories to cherish!! (part I)

Hi friends... here's my first posting... about one incident for which I must have laughed at myself countless no. of times by now!!

This is such a cherished memory in my life... that I am making this my first post in my blog!!

I was in my 2nd standard when this happened...
I was busy in making the class room very noisy, of course along with all my other friends, when Ms M.Shakunthala entered the class with a bunch of green coloured cards which eventually put a red light to my noise. They were our Report cards or what you call the "Progress cards" for our quarterly exams!!!

I don't really remember who was the first ranker then... it must be Vijay, I'm not sure. But I remember only two boys failing... one, Mr.X and two... hahaha... none other than yours truly!! :))
Yeah... I failed in English, not by a whisker but by a few miles!! To be precise, I scored 11 out of 100...!!! I don't really remember how I gave the exam, but I remember the eleven, underlined with a red ink pen, in my report card...
And that was not the end of it... Shakuntala madam was very popular for the way she punishes... And I'm the one, along with my friend X, to share the limelight in that "moment of glory"!! She hanged a placard around our necks. I don't know in which subject X has failed... but my placard read " I FAILED IN ENGLISH... I'M A DONKEY". She made both of us go into each class in that corridor and made people (of course, other kids...) mock at us... So shyless creature I was, that I didn't even realize then that it was the time when I have to feel ashamed... instead, I was enjoying all the attention I was getting!! And that puzzled our teacher even more!! ;-)

But the real tough time came when I had to ask my dad to sign the report card that evening!! My elder brother, who got a high grade in his class, just managed to satisfy my dad to sign his report card.. When my turn came, my dad's face went colorless!! I can't help rolling over laughter whenever I think of my dad's expression then!!Actually he felt shameful to sign under Shankuntala teacher's remarks, which said, "Very poor. Hopeless performance"!! And once my brother told my dad all that had happened in the school that morning, he threw the card and told me that he was not going to sign that... it was the only time ever in my school life when my mom signed my report card!! :)) I love you mom!! :))

And the irony is, I was thinking to myself... "Why are all these people making a big mess of it?? Infact, I did quite well to reach 11 !!!" hahahaha......

PS: I was the topper of our school in Xclass, creating a new record by aggregating 93% while my friend successfully failed to pass the exams!! [Hey.. don't conclude that I'm being rude to him.. coz he's now a leading businessman in his own proffession, all b'coz his dad didn't encourage his further studies!! :-) ] And Shakuntala madam's kiss on my forehead after the results is something I can't forget ever... Thank you ma'm!!