CHAPTER ONE
———————–
Me: “Let’s go to NH7, man.”
Dhruv: “No, shut up, leave me alone, get out of my room.”
Me: “Come on, it’ll be fun.”
Dhruv: “Don’t you not live here? Go back to your apartment.”
Me: “Come on, it’ll be fun.”
Dhruv: “I’ll let you know in a bit. Right now get out of my room.”
I made five different plans just like the one above.
Mehma
Psingh
Tuppy
Yudi
Vishal
Safe to say there was a lot of confusion in the end. Many phonecalls. Many “Dude, seriously?”, many “I’ll call you back’s”
I convinced Soma (My mother) to come along.
Dhruv decided last minute to drive there with Rifq, so Soma and I figured we’d hitch a ride with them.
Best day of Dhruv’s life.
Girlfriend. Sister. Mother …. and him.
In one car.
For 3 hours.
T-1
Living room, breakfast time.
Me: “Why do you spike your hair up like that?”
Dhruv: “Whats your problem?”
Me: “I don’t know. You look like Night Fury.”
Dhruv: “Juhi just *&$^&#$”
Me: ” AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH.”
T-0
Outside the car. Loading our bags.
Rifq: “What’s wrong with your hair?”
Dhruv: “What?!?”
Rifq: “Your hair. Something’s up with it. What’s this white stuff?”
Me: ” AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA”
Dhruv: *explode*
Safe to say that the first hour of the car ride was spent in absolute silence. Till I got hungry and started whining. Then after stuffing our faces with Chicken McGrill Value meals and comparing them to the kathi rolls we used to get in sector 25 in Noida, all was merry and happy again. A little bit of laughter ensued. But then, while cruising at 120 on the expressway, a white hot flash of automobile creamed us and whizzed past there was deathly silence. After making a lot of effort and catching up to it, all the while acting very nonchalant, and realizing that it was a ‘much inferior car’, the silence took complete, straight-jacketed control.
Apparently there was a lot of chaos on reaching Pune because I was the one with the directions but had managed to slip into a semi comatose state. But after 4 and a half hours of driving these guys figured it out. Good stuff.
End of Chapter One
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CHAPTER TWO
———————–
Mehma & Andy decided to FLY to Pune and stay at a fancy boutique hotel.
Why?
Because they wanted to make us feel poor.
Did they succeed?
Sure.
Except for the FLY bit.
We laughed at that. Even pointed fingers and had water come out of our noses.
So Mehma told us in no un-certain terms that she was staying at the O Hotel.
Seriously. She left no stone unturned when it came to communicating that bit to us.
“Hi Mimi, how goes?”
“I’m staying at the O hotel.
“Erm. ok.”
“Wasn’t Basement Jaxx fuckin’ brilliant?”
“I’m staying at the O hotel.”
“Wow. Sure. Ok.”
“You guys wanna get some dinner?”
“I’m staying at the O hotel.”
“…. .”
Psingh, Avyakta & I decided that the next day we’d go and hang out with Memz and Andy at their hotel (O hotel) and get some lunch and then head to the festival together.
We took the hotel car which charged us six thousand crores for a 15 minute ride to the O hotel.
“Mehma, what floor are you on?”
“14th.”
“Ok, see you in a bit.”
Enter elevator.
The elevator had blue curtains and blue lights. It was like a choked Moulin Rouge.
What did we do?
We started to laugh.
Psingh pulled out her camera and Avyakta and I struck a pose.
Unfortunately more people came into the elevator so we figured we’d have to punch a button.
1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.
What?
“Dude, did she say 14th floor?”
“Ya, this is weird. Call her.”
“Memz, there’s no 14th floor. It ends at 9.”
“Ya ya, they don’t have a 13th floor. So just hit 14.”
“What?”
“What?”
“Arre, Memz, it ends at 9.”
“You guys are retarded. I’ll come get you.”
“Ok, we’re waiting at the lobby.”
So after waiting at the lobby for 10 minutes we called her again.
“Ummm…. where are you? We’re in the lobby.”
“Dude. I’m in the lobby.”
“Where?”
“Right there. At the front desk.”
“Memz, this is the O hotel at Koregaon Park, right?”
“O hotel? Are you nuts? Psingh, I’m at the Ista Hotel. Who said anything about the O hotel.”
The auto ride to The Ista from the O hotel was fairly long, so we threw away our machetes enroute. And reached the Ista. There was some screaming. But hey…. what’s a saturday without screaming when you’re hanging out with deranged friends, right?
End Of Chapter Two.
I’d like to mention here that the festival was…. something else. And even if you squished all the fun in the world into 3 days, we would still win with the amount we had.
By a long shot.
