perspire and grow thin

Just when it felt like life was mostly about scratched bumper to scratched bumper traffic and the endless 'religiously approved' traffic snarls with bunches of people going into epileptic fits of ecstacy accompanied by 15000 watts and jet-engine decibel music. The only distinction between those scenes and any seedy dance bar being the idol in tow that supposedly makes the whole exercise a worthy one. Bloody annoying if nothing else.

Coming back to the point, had the firm's annual 'offsite' gathering in Lonavla this weekend. So brilliantly located is this resort 'Upper Deck' (www.upperdeckresort.com), that you can't complete the last leg of the journey in your own vehicles but have to get into the resort's four-wheeled Scorpios to get up the stream-bed that doubles as the 'off the beaten path' path. The discomfort of the bone-jarring ride up the slope disappeared the moment the vehicle rounded the final turn. It was that orgasmic feeling you get when you bite into a morsel of minced lamb with sauteed onions where the flavors seem to explode in your mouth. except, it was all visual...the term panoramic has seldom been as breathtakingly justified as that view did. Miles and miles of rolling green hills, not so steep as to look threatening, all covered with what looked like a velvet green tablecloth with the odd outcropping of trees. The glint of reflected sunlight made you wonder if there were ropes of tiny diamonds hanging in different places, mini-waterfalls created as a result of the monsoons. If ever there's been a risk of moi lapsing into ridiculous poetry, this was it.

Fairly chilled out weekend with table-tennis sessions, long breakfast/lunch/dinner sessions with lotsa anecdotes, gyaan sessions, treasure hunts and the awards for the year being handed out to be followed by loud music and dancing...oh haan..and booze..kinda slipped my mind there...