The Wet Pants Journey

"Oh! C'mon now, you dont have to capture this", I was shouting at the top of my voice when pavi was trying to catch me on camera while I was drying my trousers. "Dude, it is not funny, I know. But this pic would give a huge laughter some day", said she. I had to do it. Som, Raj, Raju, Vam were already out there playing "maram-peeti" in the river. Hasty yes/no desicion and bit of all the mature thought had made me not to carry any extra pants or swim wear to the trip. Uh! Well, I wanted to swim along with them. So I did it. I jumped into the river with the only pants I had with me (on me actually) at that time.

Destination Raju's house. It was a bright day. Chaos set in when the plan changed from the resort to the Dam. We were planning on a one day outing to a resort on the outskirts of hyd. Well plans changed somehow and we changed the itinerary. Nagarjun Sagar Dam, it was going to be. I hadnt slept the night before the trip, so was feeling a bit clumsy. I definately did not know that I was going to have a great day. The damned qualis was late by an hour. And so guess what? Foto session number 1. We set off finally at 10.45 or so.

"Run along with your pants ra", sahi was trying to help, sarcastic obviously. The towel thing was disgusting. I was cursing the moment that I felt like swimming. "Swimming, my ass!" I thought. These guys were still in the river having fun. I had intentionally come out so that my pants could dry by the time these guys are done with the game. I was on a towel desperately waiting for some dry breeze to dry my pants. It was too much to ask on a river bank. Raju, meanwhile was all done with the water and wanted to comeout. But the galeez (dirty) instincts in him took over and he started dancing to the song "Maar Dala" from the movie Devdas on the river shore. All was done when the guys changed into regulars from their swim-wear. It was a tough time convincing sravvi and sahi, when they refused to come to the water-fall that was just around the corner. They were apparently getting "late" (whatever that meant!). Nevertheless, there was I, told them about the beauty of the little cataract. They had to concur. Right then, after a little ice-cone treat, we set off to Ethipothala. And my pants were wet (no pun intended).

"Awara Bhavre....Jo Holle Holle Gayein...", girls were singing at the top of their voices (no, no it was awesome! I mean it). Everybody was singing. Was around 12.30. It all started off with the popular stunt of raju's vocal talents. His style of singing the song "Kannulu Neeve, Reppalu Neeve" from the telugu version of RHTDM, just cracks anybody into paroxisms of laughter. Vam and I, sitting next to the driver were relating on many "contemporary" plights (girls....what else?). We swore not to sing and add to the phoney-ness that was already brimming. But its music. We were pulled right in. We sang Aadat by Jal. That was fun. My school friends hadn't heard me in years. They were awestruck by the singing duo. All this while, a funny thing was happenning. The driver was playing a spoil sport. He was bringing down the volume on the deck. He was asking us not to shout, vow etc. But Raj and Som did what they were best at. They bullied the driver and scared the shit out of him, through the car-owner contacts (ofcourse!). First glimpse of the dam had left us breathless. The gargantuan reservoir shimmering with the sun rays was a treat to the eyes. We landed there at around 1.00. Unfortunately taxis werent allowed onto the dam. We had taken a seven-seater to get to the other side of the dam. The auto guy knew the place well. We stopped at a place where we could get a clear picture of the dam. We let down our hair a bit on that road. Foto session number 2. We gave all sorts of poses (bhangimalu, in our lingo) on the edge of the road. Then he took us to a desolate bridge. It was half torn down. We were able to see the dried river bed from the edge of it. More clicks and we had an appatizer. We found a mobile juice-shop. The senile vendor started serving the sweet-lime with some words of thought. We were laughing alright, but he was talking facts.

It was 6.00 already. I had to sit along with the driver again. But I swore I wont do that in the return journey. Well, I dint have anything other than app to talk to suddi about. We were discussing her specialisation and stuff when some one at the back definately passed a sarcastic remark about my obssessive compulsive disorder to bring in acads into the picure. Well, the journey was too short to change the topic. I was not very up-beat because of the sticky pants, to talk about something exciting. It was drizzling when we got down at Ethipothala. Everybody was excited about the much talked-about location. People talked about the lighting and music and what not at the waterfall. There was no lighting, neither was there any music. But none of us thought that it was hyped up. The beauty of the location just overtook everything. It conquered our conscious and lulled us into a trance. Foto session (god knows the number). Click, Click, Click we went on for 20 odd mins. All of us were off to rest-rooms and then we parked in the garden near-by for a while. Galeez boys (raju,raj and som) starting shooting a tree that had yellow flowers all over it. It was a beautiful sight. We wanted to stay there a little longer, but it was sravvi's call. We had to move on and start off on the return journey.

We were hungry. No lunch yet and it was 3.30. The auto guy then took us to a nice resort. We had our lunch there. The food was alright. People liked the curd-rice. I did too. The best part of the trip was to come now. Vam caught hold of a guy who promised a boat ride in the reservoir. We set off along with him to the river bank. Believe me, that was no boat. It was a round vessel. I was shit scared initially, but I thought I'll give it a try. It was a popular ride. 15 bucks per ride per person. It was quite cheap. Then I made the biggest blunder of my life. I went into the boat along with sravvi, sahi, suddi and arc. arc was not scared at all. She was as concerted as I was. But I could see that sahi and sravvi were going to have a nervous break-down. The ride was bumpy, icky, swaying, swining and what not. Sravvi and sahi started shouting for help when the boat-walah made the vessel rotate in the water. Suddi gave the poor guy a lecture in english. He dint understand but he got the picture. He turned back and rode to the shore. I wanted to stay for some more time. The other boat, the one with vam, pav, som, raj and raju set off into the deep. They were not gonna come back so soon. We thought we would get bored until they'd come. But guess what we found an old stone wall that was once a katcha-dam on the river. We walked onto the edge of the wall until the point where the stones were all covered with water. It was like walking on water. Ill-luck made a gaurd see us. He drove us away from the wall. We would have had a great foto session there if it were not upto him.

It was 7.15 when we started to return. What did we do in the return journey? Take a wild guess. We sang, Sang our asses off. Everybody sang. All kindsa songs. Some old classics, new ones. We were planning to sleep-over at som's place. But suddenly everybody started to fall-back. The sleep-over constrained finally to vam, som, raj and raju. I dint want to miss the footer. Gilrs had their own stories. It was 10.30 when we reached raju's place. End of a wonderful day. To re-live that day is something that is not possible. som was leaving the next day to mysore for his job. Everybody is leaving. By the end of this month, only the appers remain. :(. Hardtimes, farewell times. But they are sweet.

Right after the boat ride, we decided to go to the pushkar bank and have some fun in the river. I just thought I will bring my pants upto the knees and have fun. But guess what these guys were already changing into half pants and were dancing in the river. Girls were getting bored for sure. They dint have an option. Guys were having too much fun. I wanted to get into the river too. But I dint have extra pants. It was funny. I desperately wanted to swim and play "maaram-peeti". But then what about the pants? I started getting deep into the thought process when people started yelling "let go and have fun in life, else when will u have fun?". And so I did it. I decided to wet my pants.