So where were we? OK, Premlal and his mundu excuse.
I found a seat around a table at the back of the hall. It was easier for Prasantha and we had a table to rest our food and drinks. In addition to an unrestricted view of the stage it also meant that I could be as silly as I wanted to be and get away with it without getting noticed. So as Anuji burst into an old song which I haven’t heard since leaving college, ‘Bom bom bom bom Bombay meri Hai’, I had no choice but to join in. Santhosh kept the momentum going with his upbeat tempo songs, so did the Rafia/Roshan/Jose Chacko trio and the ‘Girls’ added spice by donning sunglasses and letting their hair down with their ‘Jimmiki Kammal’ flash mob dance. The ‘Boys’ needed space to show us their dance moves. Unfortunately for them and fortunately for us the limited space meant that they had to restrict their dancing.
As this was going on we had dinner and my friends joined us at the table and kept us company and made sure that I wasn’t short of a drink or two. It was almost midnight when Babuannan took to the stage and ended the show with his version of ‘ഉദ്ദിഷ്ടത ജാഗ്രത’ and the rest of our singers joined in and brought the function to a close.
It was still too early to call it quits. We sat and chatted near the landing and the rest of our friends joined in. Mohanan, who had been introducing the artistes during the evening along with Suma, joined us. Soon he was regaling us with funny stories. In between he kept saying that he was worried that whatever he says may end up in my message the next morning with an opening statement worded-‘during my medical college days……’
His story, however didn’t involve our medical school days but a get together with his friends. One day after such a gathering, one of his friends ended up in a semi-comatose state. They roughly knew where he lived but not his exact address. Anyway the clever group of friends, despite being in a similarly worse for wear state, came up with a bright idea. They drove around and went to a petrol pump in his neighbourhood and asked the guys where such and such a person lived. The guy was somebody who was very well known and in an important position. By the way there was a lot of name dropping in the conversations, Mohanan is such a show off, but in a fun way. The petrol pump guys pointed them in the right direction. It would have ended up well if it wasn’t for one of the eagle eyed men at the pump who saw this slumped man in the car and asked ‘isn’t that the guy whose address you just asked?’. It didn’t stop there.
When they got to his house, they propped their semi-conscious friend near the door and rang the doorbell. The wife brought a bucket of water and poured it over him. This woke him up, he turned around, bid his friends farewell and trotted off to bed.
Soon it was time to say goodbye to one of my friends and I walked with her to her car..
Conclusion tomorrow
Yes
