One night at Airport

Though not as interesting as Chetan's "One night @ call centre", this post is all about my experience at the Delhi airport between 20:45, 14th October 2008 to 09:45, 15th October 2008. Wondering what I was doing the whole night at the Delhi airport? Well, even am wondering why? I had gone to Noida for a project work and stayed in a guest house at Noida sector 55, for about 10 days. After finishing my work, I deliberately wanted to return home and have some curd rice. I really missed the south Indian food there. Though, somehow I managed with fruits and little of the north Indain food for nearly 2 weeks. On sunday, the 12th of October, I suddenly fell ill, definitely only because of the water that I drank in the guest house. I took some medicines and proceeded to the office on monday morning to handover the completed work. I couldn't manage to stay there till night. So my TL asked me to leave back home and take rest. He also told that my return ticket would me mailed to my office mail id. I was waiting for a call from him the next day and was very curious about my return to Chennai. But I didn't get any call till evening, since he was very busy with some meetings. Even I couldn't contact him on his mobile because the International outgoing call from my mobile was barred on roaming. Then he called me by about 4 Pm and informed that he has asked the traveldesk to book my return ticket as soon as possible. After many discussions and calls from my office, and considering my health issue, they have booked my return ticket for 14th October 2008, 20:15 flight. By the time I received the confirmation about my ticket, it was 6:30Pm and I just had 1 hour and 45 minutes to catch the flight. I had called up the cab driver and informed him to be at the guest house before 6:45Pm. I caught a rickshaw and went to the nearest browsing centre to take a printout of my e-ticket and came back to the guest house in 10 minutes. I took my baggages and was waiting outside for the cab driver to come. But he came there only by 7:00Pm. I didn't even had time to argue with him. I just got into the car and asked him to go to the airport. Even though I knew that I could not make it to the airport in time, I had a belief that I would atleast reach there by 8:00Pm. But it was only red signal, not only to my belief but also throughout my journey to the airport.

My TL called me and asked whether I could catch the flight in time. I said that its impossible and asked him if he could cancel the ticket. He said that its not possible to cancel the ticket as everyone would have left the office by 6:45 itself and now the time was 7:30Pm. But he didn't give up trying to contact the travel desk at offshore. Finally I got a call by 7:45 Pm saying that the ticket has been re-scheduled for the next day morning 9:30 flight. It was a great sigh of relief. But wait, where will I stay tonight? I have checked out from the guest house. I made up my mind and decided to stay in the airport the whole night. Till then the time which was running fast began to crawl. I reached the airport and got permission from the airport security to stay there till morning. I went inside the airport and walked towards the kingfisher counter. I asked them if there was any waiting room available so that I could wait till the next day. But to my surprise, there was nothing called a waiting room available there. Even the chennai central and egmore railway station has retiring rooms which can be paid and used. I sat on the chair and began to watch all the passengers moving in and out of the airport. I couldn't sleep because I didn't have my dinner :(

Since it was a domestic airport, there were no flights after 11pm. My only time pass came to an end. All the workers had left the airport except for few policemen, sweeper and the coffee day shop guy. The main lights in the airport were switched off, but it was still bright inside. I kept on looking at my watch and wondered if the time moves faster only when we sleep. I could hear the noise of the aeroplanes landing at the international airport which is about 4 kms from the domestic airport. A maruti suzuki SX4 car was kept on display inside the airport. I even thought of opening the door and lying on the car seat and sleep till morning. The chair was so uncomfortable that I could not even sleep for 10 minutes. I was walking from one end to the other, sat in different places, watched the automatic floor cleaner mechanism, drank water, but nothing seemed to help me push the time.
Somehow I managed till 4:30 am and went to the rest room to wash my face. I was stunned on seeing my eyes at the mirror. Only then I remembered that I had fever the previous day. I didnt care about it because my only intention was to go back home. The first flight at morning was at 5:30am. People began to walk in the airport. I was looking at the tv for the check-in time for my flight. I could not find my flight in the list, because the time was only 5:15am. I refreshed myself and went to have a coffee. The shop keeper didnt have change even for Rs100. I didnt have the coffee.

I proceeded to the ticket counter to collect my ticket and handed over my baggage for check-in. I was waiting for the security check-in announcement for my flight. There was no sign of announcement for my flight. I was really annoyed and asked the Kingfisher staff regarding this. He said that there was some delay because the flight has not yet arrived from chennai(Naasama pochu). The same flight was to fly back to chennai at 9:30am. I couldn't do anything but smile at him and say a fake Thankyou(Podaaaa).
Atlast I heard an announcement requesting all passengers travelling to chennai by Kingfisher airlines to proceed for boarding. Thank God. I ran and joined the queue, got my ticket verified and got into the bus which took us to the flight which was waiting about half a kilometer from the airport. I was so tired that I could not even enjoy the in-flight entertainment and the take-off. I just closed my eyes and sat for sometime after which the brunch was served. I had the food and began to sleep again. The journey time to chennai was about 2 and a half hours. I was peeping throught the window and shot a few snaps. Then heard the announcement from the pilot asking us to fasten our seatbelts because we were nearing the chennai airport. I was the first person to get off the flight as soon as it landed at chennai airport. I rushed to collect my baggage and called up my dad to inform that I have arrived.

It was all like a dream. I could not believe whether it was me who was spending a whole sleepless night at the airport. I was recollecting everything on my way back to home. It was a different experience and I would never forget it.

Old wine in new bottle

After a long hibernation, I decided to do something new to my blog. Didn't get any topic to post, so I thought of re-skinning my page. Tried a lot of different templates and finally arrived at this one. Pour in your suggestions if any, regarding the ambiance, font and also anything more that can be added to this page.

Well I couldn't stop myself from telling something about Dasavatharam. Though this page is not enough to explain about a master-piece. The beautiful screenplay and the way in which all the characters are interlinked is simply amazing. Coming to the story, a subtle and easy way of explaining the 'butterfly effect' and 'chaos theory'. A story base-line of how the Tsunami was caused because of the disturbance caused to the Tectonic plates, a many hundred years ago, by the huge idol of Ranganathan. Beautifully mixing it with the story of how the Tsunami saves tamilnadu, from a even more big disaster that was to be caused by the bio-weapon, with the Sodium Chloride(NaCl) present in sea water.

Story, screenplay, thriller, action, stunt, etc etc, Dasavatharam has it all. In short, Dasavatharam is a movie for everyone.

PS: The title given to this post is only for the re-skinning part . It does not hold good for the Dasavatharam film review.

Beggar in disguise

I was waiting in the bus stop along with my friend. Vijay had come to my home that day. After roaming around for quite a long time, we were feeling a bit hungry. So we decided to have something. We went to a nearby shop and ordered for chenna masala and were waiting for it. Suddenly we heard a voice shouting at the shop keeper saying "where is my tea?". We thought that someone had ordered a tea and were waiting for it for a long time. But it was not so. A man with Kakhi dress holding a lathi in one had and his cycle on the other hand was standing behind us.

The shop keeper hurried near him with a cup of tea and some cash and handed them over to him. We were really annoyed on seeing it. After getting paid for the tea, the man proceeded with his cycle and went to a fruit shop near the bus stop and scared the old lady to remove the shop from near the bus stop. The old lady stood helpless and handed over a pack of grapes to him. The man took the pack of grapes and shouted back at her saying "the shop must be moved to some other place by tomorrow morning"

I have seen many beggars in the bus stop and railway stations. But this man was very unique. He gets paid for his undone job and also receives such incentives from roadside shops and auto drivers. Such beggars are found in many places in this singara chennai, wearing uniforms and spoiling the name of his very few colleagues who consider their job as GOD and respect it truly.

Disclaimer: The above mentioned story about the beggar is (un) real. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.