Monday, November 29, 2010

Comedy of Hyderabadi errors!

It was an excellent experience at Hyderabad, but not the excellent-est(which exists in my dictonary) ! asking why ? read on :)

Harish announced his wedding well in advance, which was to be held at Hyderabad,
and i understanding that not many of my friends may make it, booked my own set of
tickets( let us call it set 1).

A few days later Harish himself forced my other friends to make it to Hyderabad,
and they finally gave in. I was glad they are making and asked them to book tickets
for me too along with them. They booked 2 set of tickets(call them set 2 and set
3). Set 2's train was a sleeper class one, and set 3's was a Seat-coach train(named
the Pune Super Fast- remember the name!). Also, i canceled the Set 1 onward
ticket. It was also decided that either Set 2 or Set 3 shall be chosen , and the other be
canceled.

All went well, as there were almost 2-3 weeks more to go, and i had a hell lot of
partying to do meanwhile with various friends!

A week before the departure to Hyderabad, i realised the set 2 and set 3 tickets'
train reached both only on saturday afternoon (Sunday being the wedding).

Hyderabad has our chacha(Nachiket, for ignorants) and vishwesh amongst other
friends, whom i will need to spend a good amount of time with. After all, they were
my final year wing mates, whom i had had an excellent time with.

So, Set 2 and Set 3 canceled ! Only the onward journey tickets were canceled.
(Fortunately, or later i doubted was it unfortunate that the return tickets were
not yet canceled).

Finally i decided to book a bus ticket on friday to spend a good amount of time
with hostel friends at Hyderabad. Call it Set 1, as i had already canceled my Set
1 onward tickets! [ Wrap Around condition ! :D ]

So all was set !
I told myself , "I am going to go by Set 1 (bus ) to Hyderabad, and return with the
Pune friends' (either set 2 or set 3)."

A day later i realised set 2 and set 3 tickets for returning were pretty quick
(afternoon tickets), hence i wanted to come back by Set 1 ticket (night train).

"OK", i told myself. "No more confusions anand." !

Then a BRAINWAVE struck me !
" Why the hell should i waste my set 2 and set 3 tickets ? "

Jaywardhan was the scape goat, and i asked him to go in my ticket(of Set2 or Set3)
to Hyderabad.

About 4 days to go for the journey.

My parties too came to and end, bringing to a start a stomach problem !
I was in dire-straits the next two days, and decided to cancel all the sets and
become a NULL SET !

Then hope came in a few hours, when i realised that my stomach started showing
signs of recovery.
"So the plan remains. Set 1 to go anand.. hey wait, what the hell ? it is a bus
journey ?? what if my stomach plays the fool again? "- now even my mind got upset
along with my stomach.

SOMEhow things got better and i decided to carry on with my journey.

2 days to go.

Another Brainwave struck me.
"Why not return in Set or Set 3 tickets? I will get time to rest at home before
coming coming to office on monday." [This is the TURNING POINT!! ]

I then realised that my scape-goat Jaywardhan turned a villain, as he agreed to go
on my tickets!! Then, as one would expect as happens on movies to Heroes like me, Jaywardhan
decided not to go ahead for some important reason.

So i was double happy, that i
would return home on sunday night itself.[MARK THESE WORDS!]

Hence i canceled my Set 1 return tickets.

So the final schedule was -

Anand will go by Set 1 (bus) tickets and return by Set 3 tickets
All other friends will go and return by Set 3 tickets.
Set 2 was cancelled, as they had yet remained on Waiting Lists!

DAY of JOURNEY -

I left by bus at 830PM on Friday. Chacha offered to pick me at Hi-Tech city in
Hyderabad at about 630AM on Saturday.
The bus was horrible! Much lesser seat space compared to other volvos, broken A/C
regulators at the top, the plastic board by side which keeps hitting your thigh
each time the bus crosses 30kmph!, n most importantly, an horrible guy behind your
seat, who aims his A/C on your head, because he feels cold!

630 AM, Saturday -

Chacha calls up and find out where the bus has come to. The bus driver's assistant,
who i all the while thought was a co-passenger, told me it would take about 20 mins
more.

7 AM Saturday -

Chacha - same question,
anand - same question to driver
driver same answer

7-30 Saturday -

SAME!!

8AM Saturday - SAMEE!!

Now a worst thing! Driver stopped for a coffee/tea "break" ! Another 15 mins
killed!

8-45 AM

MY stop came, and the driver showed a sense accomplishment in him !
Actually i should have had it, that my destination finally arrived! grr!

After getting ready quickly [ read 11AM ;) ], we left to the Ramoji Film City. The
lunch in between at DilSukhNagar re-activated my stomach pranks!!

There were no problems, just that every 3 hours i was fortunate to find decent
toilets!! :D

On a serious note, the overall day was an excellent one, as we friends got to
relive our hostel days, the pranks, the fun, the jokes, the mannerisms, and what
not!! This one factor helped me forget all the irritating things that had passed by during
this trip. :)

Then on our way back in the night we went to the Birla Mandir, and my stomach gave
me one more hike! hehe!

SUNDAY - WEDDING.

Stomach got better, thanks to some tablets that finally happened to work!
The highlight to me was Chiranjeevi's attending the wedding, AP's MegaStar, whose
movies i haven't seen but he is a human i have a great respect for(for his
humanitarian deeds).

As Vishwesh later told me " i am waiting for years! but u came just for one day to AP and u saw Chiru that very day and that too from a distance of 2-3 ft!!" :)

That apart, from Rosaiah to Chandrababu Naidu to MLAs and MPs to other famous personalities, the wedding became a super VIP Wedding!

NOW COME BACK TO THE COMEDY -
[recall all the things u were supposed to remember!]

As mentioned earlier, i was to return with my other friends in the set3 tickets, so
that i reach earlier!
That great train , which calls itself a Shatbdi, or i would rather call a
Shameless-Train-Body, virtually put us to all tortures in the world!

- Train arrives in the wrong platform.(as compared to earlier communication)
- No indication by the station systems.
- We found the train like how we find an auto on the roads! Asking porters, etc
about where which train is going to, etc!
- Train arrives an hour late.
- Train leaves an hour later!!!
- Train NEVER REACHED PUNE!! (hope it did !! )

We fortunately got down at 3AM at Hadapsar Village(a station very close to my house) , THANKS to some crossing! The train might have reached Pune an hour or so later, if it all it had!!

So the train which was supposed to reach at 11-30PM , so that i could have taken some "rest", only ended up reaching Hadapsar(forget Pune) at 3AM !! n IT WAS A SEATER TRAIN of all !


Well, you yourself, as a reader, tell me! WHICH SET of tickets SHOULD i have
chosen????

2 comments:

  1. Wow baba....How on earth did you survive all these turbulences....If it were me, they would have found my dead body at the last stop of the train journey to Pune !!

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  2. haha! :) at hindsight it makes me feel that it was a kick-ass experience! :D the best part thankfully was, each time i had a stomach pain, i would find a decent toilet! LOL!! and frankly speaking the pain was all in the mind, n GODWilling being with friends and enjoying at Hyd, my mind could not trouble me much :)

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