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EVENTS

Cinncinnati Trip Pictures
[June 15th, 2001]!

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This page seeks to track and re-live those wonderful moments that some of us had in each others' company. Read on....

What started as a casual evening call between two people in the bunch, snowballed into plans of a re-union flying back and forth with hectic fury. While there apparently was a plan to meet up among a few of us, it would not have matched the excitement of more of us meeting upo under the same roof. The venue was chosen as Cincinnati because it was equidistant from most places where the others resided, equally near by all modes of transit for different people, and also because Karthik is a great host!

A recap of who was where before making the trip.

Karthik, the host, Cincinnati

Sandesh & Sujatha, New York

Radhakrishnan & Vinod, Kansas City

Sangeeta, Minneapolis

Satish (& Kanthi), Boston

Abdul & Mohan, Toronto

Vinod subsequently pulled out due to work exigencies.

Radha, Sujatha, and Sangeeta who vied with one another to get to the place before anybody else got that part of their objective screwed in the shape of a freak storm that threw all flight schedules out of order! Rumour has it that Radha had 6 tickets at different times in the day to ensure that he was first. He was the last of the trio to arrive!

Sangeeta and Karthik, in their bid to locate each other were referencing similar landmarks on different levels in the airport, and took almost as much time finding each other as it took Sangeeta to fly down from Minneapolis!

Sandesh, Sangeeta and Sujatha were made to wait until Karthik could locate the map of the airport building in the maintenance room!

No sooner had they freshened up, the urge to hit the bar hit them harder than a McGuire home run shot, and what transpired later was lost in a mix of haziness, wooziness and fuzziness�ran out of synonyms there!

Meanwehile two twosomes were in diametrically opposite situations when it came to their relative velocities. Satish and Kanthi sweated it out on the runway, and had Murphy's law work on them cruelly, after being first in line to take off after a zillion-hour wait they turned aroundand the pilot nearly announced Boston was Cincinnati! Abdul and Mohan were pounding '60s Tamil music in an effort to coax the road to move faster underneath them. The car won the day over the plane that saw Abdul & Mohan arrive barely a minute before Satish & Kanthi. On a separate note, it's kinda appropriate that there was a Kanthi in the crowd, a name to perpetuate the memory of Chinmaya. Kanthi, to those who have amnesia, was our English teacher - so much a part of our times in Chinmaya.

Lunch was at a Mexican joint, where Mohan proceeded to catch a few (ghostly) images with his magic-cam. Everyone ordered food like they were ravenous (maybe a reaction to seeing their school buddies around - school-time was always a period of perennial hunger!) and most barely finished their stuff. A grand plan to bask in the sunshine on a hill overlooking a muddy river came to nought when ants started to use the confines of our clothes to protect themselves against the same sun that was searing our skin. Abdul thanked the ants as he felt incomplete (as a man?!) without his camera.

Apparently no trip is complete without chocolates or ice cream being consumed, or so the girls had us believe. So we drove through a beautiful wooded area into uh-ho, an ice-cream parlour, where some of us learnt that ice-creams could be consumed in those quantities consumed. Kanthi, took the prize for the most "kg hundred tonnes" of ice-cream consumed, and profusely apologized to Satish for not having offered him any...after the last molecule of the sinful stuff was cleaned out!!

The excessive beer flowing probably 'hit' Karthik, and he came up what must be described as a brilliant idea - play volleyball in a nearby arena. After all, we did have a tradition in the game. Most of the team that represented the school were right there, with a few wildcards (the girls) thrown in for good measure!

People still showed remarkable skill, with Satish still being the brightest star. The girls were given a handicap of an extra serve, and that kinda evened things out. They showed remarkable spirit and that prevented the game from being turned into a sham. Apart from a minor mishap, when the volleyball ricocheted off Satish's hand and smashed into the unsuspecting sunglass-shod face of Sangeeta (for which she took back the only souvenir of the whole trip - a teeny weeny blood clot on the nose), the game went exceedingly well.

Radha working on an athletic build, saw it fit that everyone else see it too! So he proceeded to play the game sans a t-shirt, and his childlike water-play with Sandesh after the game raised more than a few eyebrows in the neighborhood! Trudging back with muddy feet, the evening promised to be of a level of unknown excitement(except for Radha, who knew exactly what he wanted to do!), the cans of beer flowed with equal felicity as the water washing the mud off our feet and bodies.

With the designated drivers in place (Abdul & Satish), the spirit of wide abandon continued through a protracted dinner session that ate into the available time. A game of bowling ensued in the gloomy inside of an entertainment joint, with nothing much to note. Karthik seemed to have home court advantage and creamed the rest of us!

Radha, the entertainment advisor for the evening, collected everybody, cleaned out our belongings left there, and gulped down all and sundry beers he had ordered late, and set about to the place as if it were his place of calling - the discotheque! While the choice of disco wasn't discussed, sentiments were echoed later of the kind of music played there - something of very little academic value. Trance, played in the discotheque was kinda appropriate as it seemed that nine of us had a singular purpose and seemed to be moving in unison - as though in a trance!

Amidst the blaring horns of excited, stoned and pissed teenagers and revellers in America's Singles City, we made our way back to base and reminisced of our times at Chinmaya and the evening that seemed to have slipped by so quickly. Mohan came into his elements and provided a peerless mimic performance of all and sundry from Gopinath to the way Marwari cricketers play in Toronto! It was hilarious and enjoyed even by Kanthi, who had very little background of the events. A truly memorable part of the night.

One by one all of us drifted off to sleep in the nooks and crannies of Karthik's apartment. There were no "I am going to sleep now" statements. Everyone was around till their senses failed them.

Some of us guys were woken up by the sounds of the early morning gossiping by the girls. A photo session ensued with the most unkempt looks being frozen for posterity.

The time for the inevitable had come. Sandesh, Sangeeta, Mohan, Abdul, Kanthi, Satish, Sujatha and Radha left, and carried with them into their mundane lives the memories of an exquisite weekend!

WHAT THEY HAD TO SAY

Radha

Hello Everybody! THANKS for pulling this trip off and making it an eventful, memorable and a wonderful weekend. It was just too awesome and words are not enough to express the amount of fun we had. I haven't had so much fun and haven't laughed so much in a loooooooooong time. I hope everybody had a safe trip back home. Well, as for me, the bad luck continued and bad weather held me up in Chicago and I didn't get home until after 2:30 at night. Whew! Anyway, I am up early and here at work. Thought I will write before things get hectic. Once again, thanks for all the fun and the great time. Now, we will all wait for the folks with a camera to develop those pics and send it to the rest of us.

Sandesh

That's exactly what happened. I just read this e-mail after having a heck of a time with all of you folks. Man, I wish we could get together more often and drink like this- haven't had so much fun since I got out of RPI. Work life stinks. Anyway, my flight left on time and arrived in Newark on time. I and Ash went and watched the new hindi movie 'Lagaan' starring Amir Khan and a brand new female. We tried the 4:30 show and it got sold out. Can you guys belive it: an Indian movie getting sold out here! That's the number of Indians out here in NJ, they're all over the place like rats in a plague. We went for the 8:30 show. It was a 3 hr 45 min marathon movie and I had a lot of trouble opening my eyes this morning.

Abdul

Hi guys! Am not too sure if this is the best time to recap the events of the last couple of days, but from the woozy state I am in after the 7 hour drive back (yeah we made it back in seven hours!), I can tell you that it was the best 26 hours that I have spent in recent memory. Though I know it doesn't help, and I couldn't have done it, I wish I were able to take Friday off and been there for longer. Hey Karthik, needless to say you were an excellent host (as always, I should add) Sangeeta, u havent changed one bit, and we could use all that 'maami' advice you gave us!! Suja, your revelations startled most of us, and In case some of you don't know what I mean, maybe you werent meant to!! J hey, nothing serious there.....just a jab in jolly jest! Sandesh, you need to improve on your volleyball skills, and I guess it has to be before we all resemble one! Radha, what the hell is that laughter of yours man�even after a seven hour journey filled with the loud sound of the rubber on the road, it is still ringing in my ears!!! I am sure that vinod laughs the same way too! Kanthi, you fitted in beautifully, and we should profusely apologize for the trash you had to put up with�. Though I am guessing that you can now figure out why Satish acts as weird as he does�thanks to us!! Kidding, of course! Me, I have to stop passing my judgements on the rest of you!

Sujatha

How's everyone's manic Monday going? That was undeniably one incredibly amazing weekend. To see the sunrise two days in a row and wake up in time for breakfast -- not bad, eh. And well worth the agony my creaking bones and aching muscles went through to wake up this morning (effects of volley ball and an uncontrolled 2 days of laughing hysterically are just hitting home). Fortunately, my flight despite the announced delay took off by 8:00. Lucky for you Karthik! Even luckier for me, my boss has not returned from his trip! So Sangeeta, guessing all went well with your flight and that the house was reasonably OK after 2 days without u, Abdul - hope you stayed awake throughout the drive, and that Mohan kept u entertained. Radhakrishnan, hope you managed to get home at some reasonably human hour and that u had interesting company en route. I gave dirty looks to very eager chatty looking people on either side of me, and slept soundly -- one of those mouth open and loud snore-- kind of deep sleeps. OK pasangla, have to get back to work despite the missing boss. Once again, that was a dream weekend - and Abdul/Mohan great job with the site, please send the link. Just read Radhakrishnan's adn Sandeshs' mails. Talking of movies, we went to see the "Animal" after Sandesh/Sangeeta/Mohan/Abdul left. Keeping eyes open was definitely difficult "Sariyaana Kadi" is the word that comes to mind. Once again, I think I've developed cheek and stomach muscles from laughing so much! Dying to see teh pix. keep in touch guys.

Karthik

At the risk of sounding sappy and corny...I'd say this was one of my best weekends EVER! All said and done, I guess the degree of that lasted a decade is quite amazing...even without much contact! It was quite amazing. Further, we have something special: a group that has lasted 2 decades almost.....so this weeekend better be a sign of things to come! Abdul...it's in your hands...haha! The website was quite awesome ......Abdul & Mohan: Get a life! haha! kidding. Thanks for trashing my house everyone! Your respective damage bills are in the mail. Example: I'd like a new patio door! Sat: get Kanthi on the list. As said before, you have done well for urself.....her social skills compensate for yours...hahah! kidding! Radha: the less said the better. See a doctor about that laugh!

Satish/Kanthi

At the risk of repeating all the emails before me- We(Kanthi and I) had one great weekend. It was the best weekend I have ever had. The return trip was quite uneventful compared to the trip to Cincinatti. Except for the 15 minute delay at the start ever other leg was on time. It didnt seem that was a decade between this last weekend and the last time when we were all together. I was surprised by the details that we could bring back from incidents that happened in school. I still laugh out thinking about all the jokes from this weekend. (Mohan's classic - 'OK Rakhal!' stands out the most!!!) Karthik you were one helluva host. Heres to many more weekend like this last one.

Sangeeta

Hi Everybody, Seems like I'm am the last one to contribute my two cents about the weekend. I just managed to get some quiet time after having the two little ones hanging onto my skirts all day. Seems like they did fine without me. Its hard to find the right words to describe this past weekend. It was awesome - seeing all of you and laughing my guts out. I have to admit that I was a little apprehensive as to what a decade could have done to the Chinmaya rowdy bunch. However, right from the time I found our dashing host at the airport till the time I said goodbye to all of you, the years in between just melted away. Karthik, thanks for letting us trash your place and for being such a great host. F.Y.I your screen door may be salvageable. Usually, with a little maneuvering, you can get it back on the runners. I tried calling your home number a couple of times after I got home and didn't get any answer, so I left you a message on your cell. Now, which movie did you guys go to? My flight home was right on time and this time, my co-passenger left me alone. Thank God for that! Suja, I think I made the same picture as you on the flight home-mouth open, head lolling to one side. I was pretty useless even after I reached home- went to bed at the same time as the kids (8:00 P.M) and still had a hard time waking up this morning. Here's my take on the decade older chinmaya bunch: Suja, liar- in terrific shape and no grey hair- am so jealous. Great being able to sit and chat with you. Karthik- taller, broader and more manly face - generous host and perfect gentleman. Volleyball and bowling were great ideas even though I sucked at it-Thanx for putting up with me guys. Raju- aha! what can I say about the ladies man? You haven't changed at all.(in a good way). Mo'gun'- still the same funny guy- you certainly kept us all in splits- And I must mention your amazing memory-all the little anecdotes from school. Abdul- still look the same except for the banker glasses. you were a surprise, coach-quite the riot. Geat job with the reunion and the web page. Satish- Absolutely the same- the soft spoken gentleman. You have a beautiful wife- hope the rowdy bunch didn't shock her too much. Kanthi- It was great to meet you. Wish we had a little more time to relax and get to know each other better. Satish and you make a great couple. Keep in touch with all of us. I'm sure that we all would like to hear your take on last weekend. Sandesh- dude, you had quite a few interesting things to tell us. I would have had to look at you real close to associate Mr.Distinguished with the Sandesh from school. On the whole, it seems like we all had a blast- So maybe we should start planning next years reunion- keep the anticipation building. How about it, Abdul?