A Memorable Christmas Eve

Things started developing suddenly. After the Mekedatu trip (and it’s photos!), everyone else were also excited for another outing. And since the French source was running dry, so a project party seemed a dream. The guys were planning for a night-out in the jungles of Bannerghatta, but then the ladies also wanted to join in. But, there was this issue of alcohol theory, people got divided on the much debated topic: “Is alcohol necessary for party?”

After much quarrels and word-fight, the team decided on a house party on 24^th December night, that is the Christmas Eve. Most of the team was in, though a little bit of doubts were there. So finally the program was final. Eight persons from the team: Myself, Manish, Shalini and spouse, Prasiddhi, Syed and spouse and Satish (though he dropped off at the end since he got jaundice, poor guy). Vimal was missing since he was going to his home for Christmas (and he promised to get gifts for all of us and lots of plum cakes).

The venue was decided as Manish’s house, as he claimed his house is located centrally and he has a big hall. Well, he did have a big hall. Secret Santa was also decided. So everyone has to buy a gift for someone.

From 20^th December our planning started in full force. Manish, Prasiddhi and me were in a training together. And since the trainer was boring, we had enough time to argue and decide on the menu. We made a list on Monday, added few more items on Tuesday and finalized on Wednesday by the time the training was over. The training was interesting though, we learnt AJAX and how-not-to-insert-a-cd-in-a-cdrom! Every time Manish saw the list, his face darkened (since he was supposed to get all the ingredients), but I found the solution and consoled him with the hope that I will also be there when we go ingredient-shopping. Finally he was able to soak the chic-peas successfully the previous night and we were all set for the party.

On the day, 24^th that is, we left early from office (anyway there was no work), and got the remaining ingredients and the cake from Spar. By the time we reached Manish’s house it was about 7 pm and the ladies were already waiting outside. Two more people were to join, Manish’s roomies Deepesh and Jasprit. That made the total count to nine. Once inside his house, we immediately concentrated on the kitchen. The first accident that happened was Shalini trying to open a cupboard in the kitchen when the whole door came in her hands, no casualties though.

The menu was chole, bature, fried rice, and vegetable soup. Chole was Prasiddhi’s responsibility, fried-rice mine and the other two were Shalini’s. As we got busy in the kitchen, Manish and Deepesh were with the balloons and they did a good work with them. Mrs. Shalini went out with hubby and was nowhere to be seen. In the mean time, Syed also joined us. His kid was silent at first but slowly started to run around everywhere. He was enjoying like anything. We were almost done with the chole (it looked great) and the rice (it also looked good if not great), when Shalini came in, seems she did not get a single sweet shop in Koramangala (whatever!). Then Shalini started working on the soup, which turned out to be a disaster. Actually, it missed one of the main ingredient, soya sauce, and also few more herbs. But still a lot of white pepper and some sugar improved the taste. Then it was the time for the baturas; the baturas were a bigger disaster, not sure why, but they became so crisp that it hurt my gums when I tried to eat one! Thank God, I decided to make the rice!

Whatever it is, food is food, especially if it is made at home. There were continuous fights about which was best, the soup or the chole. For me, the chole were awesome, the soup could have been better. We were all done by about 11 pm. Everyone well fed and content, now since Shalini could not get sweets, I was the savior with the Toblerones my friend gifted to me yesterday. But everyone actually forgot about the cake!

Then started the party. Manish had to dance as he promised, and he kept it too. I think Katrina will feel ashamed of herself seeing Manish dance on “Sheila ki jawani”. Then everyone took turns dancing, I mean whatever movements we do, it that qualifies as a dance. My turn came too, and I really get nervous when everyone looks at me. I can’t just dance on stage, I can dance only at discos where there is less light and no one knows who is doing what. Still I made some moves, and it was fun. I guess I will start learning some steps.

Then after that the dumb-charade started and it was real fun. The way of representing and the representation both were awesomely funny. Few things that I remember are: Shalini: “Guest ka English?”, Shalini crawling on floor translating to “beda”, Shalini rocking a virtual baby on arms translating to “haatim taai”, and things like that. We were tired of laughing actually, and our stomachs were paining like anything.

It was about 2 am and no one seemed to be in any mood to sleep. Only the kid was asleep amongst all the noise, bless him! We took the 'cake break', the cake was awesome, lots of rum and raisins in it. Then our antakshari started. That was getting boring and so I started on the identify the song from music game. This was a success, 4 groups fighting to get the song right. I played the DJ and played the music, while the 8 others guessed. The funniest one was for one music the correct answer was “Ladki badi anjaani hain” and all the teams gave the wrong answer “hai hain re yeh ladka” even after seeing that the previous team was told the song was wrong. Then teams started changing names since it was a buzzer round and they had to shout the names. For few songs, Shalini kept saying “main main” in the excitement, and most of the songs were in her stomach but before it came to the mouth, someone else got the answer. Then we played one round of raja rani chor police, which was a old game which we forgot how to play. It is like poker face and bluff-master, but an easier version. This also started getting boring, and Manish arranged all the cushions on the floor of his hall. It was already 4 am and now people were tired.

Finally, we opened our gifts. Mine was amazing, a bathroom set, I knew it was Satish, but the choice was Shalini’s. Thanked both of them. By the time we hit the bed, it was 4:15 am. It has been ages since I enjoyed like this. Slept happily but with dreams of the same party. At the end of it, this was a successful party, except the baturas, everything was fine. The people were wonderful, three cheers for the spirit we have in the team, even though actually we are parts of different team. I guess that is what makes this team different from any other team at least in Capgemini.

Looking forward to our New Year trip to Alleppey. Guess it will be more fun as we are travelling to a beautiful place and the outing is for 3 days!

For more pictures visit my Facebook album here.