Minuta Scriptura;a day with MCC

I wonder how many of Manhattanites know about MCC (Manhattan Cricket Club) including me untill I saw first match’s videos & photos on Face book posted by Ananth. Being ardent fan of cricket, I decided to be present at the next match as a cheer boyJ along with Amit; he Okayed it as he badly wanted the attendance bcoz he is seriously trying for a place in the team; if he start appearing at every venue from now on, one day MA selectors may consider him for sureJ.

                As gap between match to match is too long (close to three weeks), I completely forgot about it but Amit; Friday evening he walked into my cubicle and asked “Mr. Sandra, are you up for the game on Sunday?”; “I’m game for the game” said I and called off my day, ten minutes early, at office to avert the monstrous Bangalore traffic on outer ring road. Next day i.e. Saturday, Amit called up to brief me about the directions to reach St. Johns’ school ground, which is 20 minutes drive away from my home; we decided to be present at the venue by 10AM Sunday, half an hour before the match time;

Sunday: After reaching St.Johns hospital’s stop I’ve called Amit to ask about directions to reach the ground from the place where I’m but he disconnected my call thrice; I just waited for a while where I was before Amit called me back and reasoned with me why he has disconnected my calls; you guess why?? He was busy giving poses for photos along with the team; Only God knows what happens after the match, so team had done photo session before match commences; which I missedJ

Match is in progress by the time I made my entry onto the ground; our team is fielding stridently to restrict SONY team to lower score whatever possible. Sunil has opened the innings with new ball but couldn’t stop them going for big hits and I heard (after match) from him that “It’s very difficult to control the length with new ball as the fur on the tennis ball makes you to lose the grip on it“. Sony’s score card is catching up faster than petrol priceJ; every batsman did his contribution by smacking the cricket ball to keep score board ticking up, though we got their wickets at regular intervals; besides this our bowlers also tried their bit to add runs in the form of extrasJ; actually Sony team size was 13(11+2 umpiresJ); One couldn’t say that Umpires played fair role after witnessing one sided decisions while calling wide balls in our bowling though they were not wide enough. Extra players and audience (only Amit & IJ) got chances to shout, at the height of our lungs, here and there when our guys got the wickets though batsmen were going hard on ball to move it over the fence to get 6 runs many a times. Finally Sony guys concluded their innings throwing at us a tough to crack kind of target with 93 runs in 10 Overs.

MA team had to make maximum out of each ball to lock horns with the rival team under intense pressure of chasing the target with net run rate of 9.3 per over. Ananth & Shameer went onto the field to open the innings with the batting strategy of arranging as many boundary trips as possible to the ball & Sony fielders; but reality on the ground was at odds with our strategy; though Ananth could find some gaps in the fielding fortress, his batting partner failed to gulp down the pressure in chasing the target; Openers could stand the bowling close to  two overs; Our first wicket was fallen in the form of Ananth while he has going hard to move the ball out of boundary followed by couple of wickets in succession with tepid performance before adding almost no runs to the score card; It might be exaggerated to say  that we could hear pin drop sound in our pavilion but  crowd went mum as thought of entering next round of tourney  going to be dilapidated;

As top order faltered in no time, Guru entered the field to settle the things in our favour; he went for big shots whenever possible while taking the right call in defending dragon balls and maintained his equanimity throughout his stay on the field to keep the hopes of win alive though there was little bit of sledging from fielders in inner circle before ending his captaincy knock; Again our hopes of win are back to square one (in fact square zeroJ). Finally we had entered a situation where in our target were 36 runs in 6 balls but we’ve no Yuvaraj Singh in our teamJ and ended up losing to Sony team by some runs (I couldn’t recollect exact numberJJ);

After exchanging handshakes with winning team, team prepared to leave the ground with the thoughts of serious preparation for next tourney; Amit and I shambled our feet towards bus stop to catch bus towards Silk board but withdrawn that idea to the idea of walking all the way down till his apartment as we were seriously busy in discussing office matters (politicsJ)…..

A journey to remember..

Day has come, finally, after postponing twice, once by us and later by Elephants; bcoz they’ve taken precedence over our booking slots as it’s their territoryJ.After all arrangements, Kiran e-mailed us trip plan & pick up timings. My pick up was around 6:35AM Sharp @ CCD HSR Layout; So I was ready by 6AM and kept waiting for call ;there came an intimation call from Saravanan, trademark dancer in our team, @ 6:39AM that they are @ bellandur and requested me to come to my stop quickly as they might reach there in another 5 minuts. I started running, in the mist of dawn, to reach my stop before bus reaches there.  As I was waiting for bus, one motorist stopped in front of me to answer his phone but only after noticeable trouble to pull out phone from one of his denim jacket’s pockets. After finishing his call, he offered me a drop but I denied it politely though I didn’t need one, saying that I’m waiting for office bus; then he asked me “Where is your office?”; to which I said “White field!!”. With this, his face had shinned (like the one in center fresh addJ)  as if CBI got a great clue in 2G scam & immediately his question was “If your office is in White field then why are going towards BTM Layout?? J”;  Ha, What a Question SirJi!!!  Then I saw our bus descending Agara flyover & went on to catch it by leaving motorist’s question unanswered.  Yoga was ready with his camera to capture photo of each entrant into bus. Aisle in the bus was little congested, will tell u later why it’s congested, though seats are comfortable for day trip. Bus reached Amit’s stop, Fernhill Apartment HSR Layout; to everyone’s surprise he was there waiting for us with bike & without INVENTORY J; Later we were learned that as there was no autorikshaw available at that time he had come to us with bike to take back a guy to transport all the bottlevathies ,which he has guarded from consuming by his roommates, safely to last seats in the bus. After Amit & Badari left on bike to get the inventory; Saravanan said, almost loudly, that “we should have taken bus inside HSR Layout, instead of their shuttling on bike”. Yogesh, Ananth & I tried to convince Saravanan why it’s not possible to take bus inside HSR Layout though we knew how difficult it was to convince him but had given a tryJ; To prove Saravanan’s point, destiny made us to take bus inside HSR layout to pick up the inventory as it’s time consuming to shuttle on bike;

While we were safely executing put to active task of bottlevathies with outmost care, Sanjay called up Rohitava to inform him that “we would reach your stop anytime”; Bus moved on from Amit’s stop to pick up Rohitava and then Vamsi.  As bus was stead pasting through HP petrol bunk, JP Nagar,  Biswajit started shouting “Deepak, Deepak!!”; somehow we missed calling up(to pick up) Deepak before we reach his stop & were thinking about next pick up , Kiran;  by the time bus stopped after everyone’s shouting “stop,stop,stop…”, Deepak had to shed 200 calories(to be precise ,no idea about exact numberJ) to run 500 meters to cover the distance; As bus moving through , we picked up Kiran & then last but not least, Hemnath!!! As bus was passing through outskirts of Bangalore on Kanakapura road, there came a request from members shouting “Music on, music on!!”. Nishant already told us to collect some good dance numbers from Hindi,Tamil, Telugh & Kannada. Kirthika has collected Tamil songs, I did my contribution by collecting Telugu songs and Badari had collected Hindi numbers but forgot about Kannada songs, particularly my favourite (in fact everyone’s) “Pankaja” song from movie HudugaruJ.   Here I should mention one point, people forgot about music as tour operators started distributing water cans as token of memoriam of trip. Water cans were in two colours, blue & maroon; maroon coloured bottles are less in number and everyone liked maroon coloured bottles. I got maroon colored bottle but exchanged by blue one with Ananth as Ananth & Kirthika (only couple in our team) got two same, blue,  coloured bottles. Deepak, you should excuse me for thisJJ.  While people started settling in their seats after dumping the gift in their back packs, there came “You are my Chammak challo” followed by several other songs; here too, Raa.one failed to get team’s attention [off the gift];  

As music getting considerable local touch, people got off their seats and started shaking their legs to the tunes in Aisle which is hardly wide enough for people little over size-zero but this didn’t dampen our spirit of dancing. When we heard one Tamil song, everyone started shouting “Saravanan, Saravanan…”; for which Saravanan reciprocated in same spirit with his trade mark dance; which was mimicked, to be precisely, by Milap; and I was blowing vigil through out Saravanan’s dance to the fullest of my voice; Probably it would be bcoz of heavy dance or early wake up in the morning, butterflies started making whirlpools in our stomachs and  we were pretty much aware that breakfast would be provided @Bheemeshwari Sanctuary; then suddenly we remembered bread & fruit jam which we are carrying along with other eateries;  Swathi & Reshma started dressing up bread slices with fruit jam which were passed on to everyone along  with chips,chikki & some other munching items; Everyone is enjoying the snacks break but RohitavaJ. Ask me why?? His worry was “what if all munching items get over before reaching the spot!!”. As and when this came on his mind, he started stuffing his back pack with some spicy peanut & moong dhall packets along with his branded soda bottleJ. Soon after snacks break, Nishant came up with concept called “Dance by all”; he started this by dancing himself and then pulled everyone’s leg, from L1 to L5. As we were nearing Bheemeshwari Sanctuary, we were welcomed by natural habitants of the place, monkeys; people started giving them names of their fellow team members’;

Finally we arrived @ Bheemeshwari , which is a forest range  across the Kavari river bank with mountains spread all around. Thrilled with picturesque landscape, facebook profile photographers started zooming their CamerasJ while we were seriously posing in groups next to wild currents of river Kavari. As photographers are seriously worried about the battery backup of cameras, we concluded phase 1 photo session and headed straight into our designated room only to find big queue in front of rest room as there is only one available in room; that’s why I always like Stack (last come first serve) to queue when I’m lastJ. After this entire stunt we were asked to break our fasting. As the dining area was crowded with other team, from Keen soft; we preferred to wait for a while instead of joining the queue by looking at the mission impossible stint of monkeys to grab whatever possible from breakfast buffet; While we were waiting, Swati told me that “they already started Jumering”; I thought she is talking about keen’s people started zooming at our team and I replied “we’ll also zoom our cameras to their team”; later I realized she didn’t mean Zoomering but Jumering;J After passing compliments about breakfast; though Sanjay and I were little lucky not to avoid chewing pepper in Pongal, our team got split into two small teams for better organization of day out events and I was part of team 1 along with Sanjay, Jos, Milap, Raa.one (Rohitava), Rashmi, Surendra, Ananth,  Vamsi, Swathi, Reshma..etc.  OMG, forgot to mention, Saravanan, he was also part of my team. First time Saravanan & I are playing in same team; Kiran, Hemanath, Krishna, Sunil, Deepak, Kirthika, Pallavi, Badari,Amit..etc are part of team 2.

Team 1 was asked to go for river crossing (really not river crossing, but still water crossing may best suit) and team 2 headed to Jumering; to instill the feeling of hardness to harness the ropes, mentor made us to pull the rope to tighten it with our full strength; Then came fun part of it, event volunteers started preparing us for river crossing by equipping us with full safety measures like putting shelmet (no typo, they don’t call it helmet) on our heads. Rohitava started and ended the event by requesting event manager to do it again as he wants to live the river crossing while he forgot to live it first time bcoz of heavy photo shootingJ; but other team members lived the game first time itself!! As the river crossing is not much physical tiresome job ,most of the work would be done by pulley (thanks to Archimedes for his invention) tied to the ropes,we’ve completed it within an hour; By filling our cameras with enough of photos and hearts with good memories, we headed to Jumering to just to wait till team 2 completes their turn; Jumering is strenuous job as one has to climb up the hanging rope by using jumers; so it takes more time than river crossing and some of our team members not even attempted this. After team 2 finished Jumering, they moved on to river crossing and we started Jumering; this time I opened the game as Raa.one (Rohitava) seems bit tired; and completed it well, though it’s little tougher than river crossing; fun part of the game is descent of the rope, in which you were made to fall freely;(Still I remember the screaming of Yoga in his descent, how scary it was). Then came Raa.one’s turn, though he was full enthu in the beginning, he has done it half complete and looked drowsy; Everyone wondered about this and we had no clue at that time; (later I was told that while everyone was busy at games, Rohitava, Rashmi & Surendra went to room and out of temptation by looking at Chilled beers they couldn’t stop from tasting them by bolting the room from inside). While team 1 was half way through Jumering, team 2 joined us back after completing their river crossing task. As both the teams are joined at one place, we decided to open the bar; most important part of day out; everyone of us should thank Kiran for this & thanked then and thereJ.

Ananth, Amit, Bardi & I labored to move all the cartons full of liquid and solid inventory with the same care, which we took while boarding them on to the bus in the morning, from room to camping place which is under shade of wide tamarind tree; Everyone started to taste drink of their type; I opened Maaza and Saravanan reserved his Maaza bottle to have it after lunch; Those, who didn’t take hot drinks ( Here, hot doesn’t mean coffee or teaJ), were served with soft drinks; I wonder Rohitava was not seen @ the spot; bcoz we forgot to get soda from his back pack so he went back to room and returned full equipped to empty his bottle which is very little in size; but I don’t know what it’s; Then came a call for lunch and all of us headed to eat; again confronted with a queue(but not big enough as it was @ rest room)  and again filled with Keen’s people; somehow always there were ahead of us @ food. Food was  simple and delicious in both verities, veg & non-veg; People, who had extra rounds of drinks, took less food than usual; While we were having food, our bodies almost half sleep and were expecting a nap soon after lunch; then a came surprising call from outing organizers for team building activites; Though we felt team building activities are not necessary for our team as ours is very welt built team with almost no or negligible attrition and good performance,  we dragged our drowsy bodies to team building activities camp; again got split into same two teams; this time it’s competition between two teams;  our  team was, always consistent at flunking , beaten by team 2 with 2-3 score which means out of 5 different games team 2 has won three games and we two; but the games’ which we won were  very tough and we only could winJ and I still wonder how our team lost easy ones’; While we were about to finish team building activities, Nishant proposed idea of taking dip in river water; to which Sanjay replied “currents are so wild and don’t get carried away with confidence of knowing to swim, even I myself know swimming but I prefer not to swim here”; and Jos told to Nishanth that “if you carry away with your idea of swimming in river; we might end up carrying youJJ”; Kiran added “Muttati is notorious place for accidental deaths in river”;

Call has come for tea and  evening snacks; I wonder, first time in whole day there was no queue for tea & also there was no tea in kettleJ as it wasfinished by keen’s team; kitchen staff were about to replenish it. So some of boys headed down to the river; we got our feet wet as Nishant and Ananth took dip in river water; I felt like having tea (only drink which I like to death) while my feet touching river water; but I had to come back to dining area to take back tea; Luckily, I saw people coming towards us to have feel of the river; so I shouted “Tea, tea,  tea …” waving my hand towards them; my wish fulfilled as I got my tea there to river bed and enjoyed like Rohitava enjoyed his branded drinkJJ. Before we call our day at Bheemeshwari , Kiran has called all of us to pose for group photo; after couple of clicks for group photo by Noor (Thrillophilia's guy), we shambled towards our bus which slowly widened our gap with Bheemeshwari camp by moving towards Bangalore.While bus was speeding up, people seated at rear end started singing with jeer tones as nobody worried to mind the lyrics or music but loudness; later everyone was made to sing a song. Two things still remain secret to me; one is Nishant’s sahyaari, I felt it difficult to follow hi-fi hindi and second is Pallavi’s song;  Didn’t remember exactly who proposed , somebody has come up with idea of Anthyakshari but different concept; All southies has to sing South Indian songs where as northies has to lend their voices for hindi numbers by drawing very crystal clear line across the India; As I had been shouting “I’m Indian, I’m Indian”, Gagan pushed me into south Indian team; there started the kick and the trick; trick is there would be same song in Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil & Telugu but its starts with different alphabet, so we didn’t find much difficult though we were less in number; moreover most of the northies didn’t seem to understand what we were singing except some known item songs; so I was singing, whatever It comes to my mind  but rhythmicallyJ; no one noticed this but Sunil & Krishna as both of them were doing fair play between teams by prompting songs and they knew south Indian languages along with HindiJ; As competition at its high, there came voting call to give/not to give stop  for dinner; as everyone opted not stop; bus headed straight away to Bangalore and just to lengthen the serpentine traffic queue at Metro, kanakapura road; there onwards people started getting off the bus as and when their stop comes; Gagan & I got down again @ CCD, HSR layout and waved off the bus till it goes out of our sight & we dragged our feet towards homes just to prepare our self to join Rat race again on Monday;