Water Fantasy

Sailing? Eh, what? Ok.
I had more adventures in one year outside the country than all the years being here in India. Every weekend was a vacation. Here, Saturdays are sleepy and lazy days to catch up with friends or go shopping. And Sundays are purely home-sweet-home time. What best can you do when someone asks you if you want to go sailing in the Chennai beach, than to jump at the opportunity and make the best of it?! Well, I thought it would be some workshop; then added some water activity; when the final mailer came, it was a little more confusing. Anyways I let the day dawn than to break my head thinking!
It was all Consumer-Goods folks, still, all were new faces except the gang of BAs. Morning started with hunting for fastest routes, packing stuff and race against time.. I set off to Deepak’s house, and we both made it to the train station. We found Gate5; we need to get to 8. There is a general rule with Chennai folks – everyone except you knows the way to where you need to go.. even if they don’t know the way, they direct you to the closest place. Most of the time, it’s useful.. and when you are in a hurry, its always wrong! And yes, you are right.. the friendly traffic cop on the road told us to walk straight ahead. We both were quite proud of our sense of directions! And lol, Deepak gave the same directions to his friend, Vikram! And after a long walk, we still dint see the “bridge”; so stopped for re-confirmation. Autowalas dint know. The gateman at a complex told us we are heading wrong! A good morning walk in the morning for 20mins. We jumped onto the first auto, bargained for the trip; in between we saw Vikram also giving the same directions to Balaji and walking at full speed towards the same “bridge”. At last the Gate8!
We weren’t late. We still follow IST, and of course, we are entering a government maintained place! No offence meant, people. I just saw reality!

I would consider splitting this topic for the length of the writing.I hate to summarize. But if you are patient, I really dont mind :)
We had a 30+min wait for entry and then ran into the conference room to cool our heads! Next 1hr was intro and lectures. Then another trip in the sun to see the different sails and boats. We put our bags away and got into a trawler kind of motor boat for a harbor “cruise”. Well, it was not bad at all, we covered all of the Chennai harbor – coast guards, cargo and containers, iron ore and oil place until the end of the artificial harbor boundary. It was hot and our sunscreens evaporated! Time for lunch! Bon apetite!

We were split into 4 groups for the main event – sailing. One “volunteer” was all eyes on the group. The first one by height is the team lead..and by default it is me! All I had to do is count the heads and know the names. This volunteer happened to be a restless soul, and made me sit next to him to “balance” the boat! Well, he is Mr. Know All, and all he dint know was the group members. So went a elaborate intro. All guys looked pissed off as soon as they got in. I was thinking what the reason could be! I learnt it late that they all could sense the air of Mr K A in seconds, and I was the dumbo who kept answering all his stupid-enous questions. Grrr.. there was no escape. All you can do is jump into the water. And wow, KA let one or two get away from him at a time. Deepak found it a good chance. But who would go before him? Well. My chance is getting hot! And here you go..blup..into the water.
After a 20min cooling off I thought its ok to get back to the boat. I knew there were no sharks. Forget them, no fish or turtles or anything slimy and creepy. Water looked hard yet transparent. I had a month’s doze of salt. Deepak’s life jacket was loose and not fit to enjoy the water. Poor he, got back into the boat asap. No one wanted trials until I returned. After a few coaxing, two others went swimming. By then Sooraj returned from his sailing and the others were distracted from jumping into the water. We tried our best to get Balaji into water. I have no idea, why you would be scared of water-water-everywhere.. I made my second escape from KA by jumping into the blue sea again, this time for a longer time in water. My now, all my sunscreens have gone, had more salt water, felt more happy than ever!
Mr. KA knew indecent enough to ask useless questions to me, making all others bored to the core. Am sure all of them felt like jumping off..or for the better, push him into the water. If they had thought or at least let me know, I wouldn’t have been so much troubled..to the point he offered to carry my footwear. Yuck. What the.
Poor fella. I don’t want to murder a guy jobless and just out of college. Let me get into work. He will be hung by his colleagues for his nonstop nonsense.
If the boat was motorized or at least did not have to wait for the sails to rise to move ahead, am sure his partner in the boat would have raced to escape his jokes rather than to win the competition!
Anyways, I got myself tanned like a tar-boy and dirty. Got to the train by the shortest route by walk; did I say walk. Yes, the gate 8 was just a few mins away from the station, on the other side.
I don’t want to exaggerate a lot of things. Given a chance to get into water, I would again and again. I would prefer learn to swim. And of course, I will never fail to sense the stale air. At least follow the others. Or grow my at least 2 more inches to escape the fantasy of “team-lead”!