Adbhuta anubhav

It's been a li'l more than a fortnight since the last blog, but it felt like ages. I guess I have lots of things still going inside my brain that need an outlet. Or it could simply be a consequence of the fact that I have been spending more sleepless nights in office than snugly sleeping at home. And I need a break badly. But, I guess this is just the beginning (the night outs). My MS Research course at IIT has just started to take off. And I will have to spend several more nights @ office to compensate for office work and also keep up with the course load. I guess this is something that I will have to live with, until I dont consider it as "something" or I stop to live. So lets move on to something more interesting.

The month from mid December '07 to mid January '08 had been quite exciting. I underwent a lot of experiences; both good and bad. Infact if allowed to put it a bit dramatically, it was like living a Bollywood film. Of course, there was no romance, as I first need to get out of office to be able to find a girl. But yes, it had all the other elements of a movie. Humble beginnings, sweat and toil, betrayal, a sad turn and then a new beginning. Quite a deal, right! So lets get started.

As you might have guessed, I am the central character (no, not the hero) of the whole episode. Why? Because all these ideas originated in my head and since I am the writing right now. It all started, not in December, but back in June-July'07. August was approaching and members of KalaKriti, the cultural club at office, were trying to figure out what to perform on the Annual Day. Since I am good with the pen, or consider myself to be so, I penned a short skit. The theme of the skit was Marriage. Most of us @ office are bachelors and for many, marriage is just round the corner. The skit focussed on how people's outlook differs before and after marriage. To give due credit, Atul had suggested that a play, if executed, should be such that there is not much movement involved and is mostly discussion oriented. Also, Piyush was the one who came up with the idea of a play around the Marriage theme. It was me who combined both the ideas and came up with a skit.

Ofcourse, the skit was silently vetoed by KalaKriti members. It was only when I asked Phani, did he tell me that the skit appeared to be performance oriented and due to lack of time was difficult to enact. Was not sure whether I should take this as a complement or not! Instead, Akhilesh performed a standup comic act which was quite entertaining. Cant call it a play because other characters were just "fitted in" to make it look like a play! That was the very reason why I wrote the play in the first place.

Time moves on and so December came around. KalaKriti again started to conduct meetings to discuss on what to perform for New Year bash. Unaware of the details, I thought of giving another shot at skit writing. The skit was essentially based on interactions that happened in office. The central characters were Gaurav and me and in some ways the skit highlighted our nature and transformation. It was a light hearted pun and a symbol of my confidence in Gaurav; that he would take it in the right spirit. This time though KalaKriti did like the idea and I became an integral part of the team, at least for a short period. Copying the line from "Pursuit of Happyness", this period of my life is called "Humble beginning".

The original skit was modified as it was centred around Gaurav and my interactions. Instead the central theme was changed to importance of a girl in office. We depicted how office used to be when there was no girls. And then what changes came about once a girl joined. The play was spiced up. We decided to perform spoofs on all possible people at office. Preparations were near systematic. We used to have a meeting almost every alternate day. We started of by planning out the exact scenes and then the dialogues. Only place where we fell short of time was enacting out the scenes :-).

And now starts the period called "Sweat and toil". Thanks to motiviation of the entire team, we did that too in a flat 4 hours. We enlisted the characters that had to be enacted and the man/woman power available. We applied a conflict avoidance algorithm and then assigned roles as per skills. Shishir had been briefed a day before on on what the scenes were. We went through the narration script that he had penned and provided him inputs for further refinement. Rana and Rohit were also dragged into the play at the last minute, as we were short of people. We did 2-3 rehearsals of each scene and we were kinda ready. Everybody, Nehul, Piyush, Apurva, Gaurav and Phani improvised the scenes in those 4 hours. But it was Tarun who stole the show. His motivation levels and creativity were mind blowing. Even though I was a bit harsh on him for digressing or spoiling the focus, looking back, I cant help but admire his spirit. Sometimes I feel if he were not there, the play would have been abandoned or would have been a mess.

The next day we went to Fun and Food village. We had loads of fun taking the rides. I would take a break after each ride, because my stomach made me feel queasy; then get on with the next ride. It was great fun, shouting and more shouting !!! Then we had lunch, which was followed by tug of war and a cricket game. And finally it was time to perform. Best part, we had the background music for the skit on Phani's mobile and we did not have mikes. Luckily Kapil's laptop saved the day. After trying to get around the intricacies of Vista and Nehul applying his engineering skills, we were able to transer the songs, both for skit and a dance performance, into the laptop. We had the dance performance by Apurva, Anurag, Nehul, Piyush and Tarun. Unfortunately, the music was getting cut in between. But like true professional the dance team ignored these effects and performed.

Finally, it was time to perform the skit. We were not sure whether a disclaimer has to be made or not. So, we had not asked Shishir to prepare one. However, we decided to go with the disclaimer and so at the last minute, Piyush told Shishir on what to say. Poor Shishir, he said the reverse of what was to be said. But infact it was good, the mood had been appropriately set. Shishir then started of with his awesome narration, which was in shudh Hindi. The scenes started rolling one by one. There were deviations from what had been planned the night before but nothing major fell out of line. The audience were thoroughly enjoying themselves and it gave immense pleasure to see the hard work finally transcend into something meaningful.

In the play we spoofed Nishant(t) to the maximum. In effect, his character did not have any dialogues. Instead only his customary (I could add pathetically) funny liners were used. Also, he insists on having the girl in his team and then there is also a dance sequence. Meticulous preparation was put into identifying the song, dance steps and portrayal of Nishant(t) (credit to Nehul/Tarun and Apurva). Thus, it is Nishant(t)'s character who gets to have the girl and who is the most sad when she leaves (in the skit). Once the skit was over, an apology was tendered. Gaurav asked Nishant(t) to say something. I felt Nishant(t) was in a state of shock during and after the play, since he did not say anything for a minute or two. And then I got the shocker. He said that he was getting married and that too to Apurva. It was only after Apurva went and stood beside him that he was talking about our Apurva. It was a real surprise. Two minutes after the play ended, it was unfolding in reality.

And in quick succession follow the periods of "betrayal", "sad turn" and "new beginning". My surprise turned into horror within 10 minutes. Piyush announced that he knew long back that this was to happen and that is why the skit was directed in the manner it was. And Gaurav and Nehul were also party to the secret. It was now, Nishant(t)'s and Apurva's to be surprise as I think they had kept the news of their marriage under tight wraps. But as far as I was concerned, I felt cheated and manipulated. I would have been happier had I not been around when Piyush/Nehul and Gaurav were boasting of their knowledge. I felt like a fool; all the time spent in thinking what the scenes and dialogues would be, trying to come up with something different/creative. There was no point in expending so much effort when what was to be depicted was pre-decided.

I was extremely angry for the next two days and then sadness prevailed. I used to think that I was now part of the group. I never used to involve myself in the coffee outings or the senseless gossip that takes on a near daily purpose. But during the course of my interactions for the skit I started feeling as a part of the group. I used to feel that they would atleast let me know about any pranks that they were planning or had performed etc. In retrospection, thinking like this was quite foolish. I guess, the strong desire to be part of the group coupled with the betrayal that I percieved make me think so.

Anyways, it was a good lesson. There is no point getting upset about trivial issues like these. Of course, even today I would love to be involved. But if it is not meant to be so, then so be it. And with this new lesson, I have made a new beginning. I have stopped trying to decipher coded messages that keep flying around. If somebody wants to let me know of something, they could do so in plain simple language. If no, then it is none of my business to poke around. Hopefully, this new outlook will keep me sane for some time longer.