Last week i took leave for 2 days to enjoy a trip to chennai/Pondicherry apart from attending Udaya's marriage with my wipro colleagues Varma, Sameer, Karun, Kiran and Pavan. Our gang in wipro is notoriously called "Mullahs", a special name coined by Udaya. We all left on a thursday evening from wipro office to catch MMTS at lingampally to Secbad station. Catching MMTS being new to me, i felt the feasibility of travelling through MMTS is too good considering less travel time, no pollution. After having reached secbad station, we had light meal at Swathi Tiffins so that rat's in our stomach wont wake up during our journey :). Since there was some more time for Charminar Express to start, i thought of buying water bottles and by the time i went to buy it, the train already started. So i did some running and catched the train. Thank God, i was finally in !
We were chit chatting and pavan took out his laptop. We are suprised to see the Net Connectivity using Reliance DataCard on transit ! It was good and we checked the score for 4th match between India and Pakistan. Later Pavan has given presentation on his Confidential Networking Business which put most of us into interesting discussion, both good and bad of it. After having nice meal, we pulled our covers to sleep.
Next morning when we woke up, the train was at Gudur and still around 2 1/2 hrs of journey is left to reach chennai. Some of us had early morning Tea/coffe and we reached Chennai Central by 9.00 AM. We felt hungry and saw "Saravana Bhavan" where people are thronging. So we thought to have breakfast there. A Special menu called "button Idli" is the one we found interesting and we ordered. After we started eating, we were like, Oh my God, So good taste..so lets order for some more :). After having heavy breakfast, we left to "Royal Paris Hotel" which is very near to Chennai station. One more good/humourous/naught mullah Revan joined us in the hotel.Refreshened ourselves and rented out a cab (Tavera) to roam around in the city. Since it was around 12.30, we thought why dont we have our lunch at some Saravana Bhavan and then go. So we found one at pondy bazar and we got a buffet there. The menu was so delicious that we were unable to get up from our chairs !! we spent for more than 1 1/2 hr and tried hard to come out of the Bhavan. This is the time when we got attached to "Saravana Bhavan". Then we shopped in "Saravana Stores" :) to buy a gift for our most "useless fellow on earth, Uday alias Ajay Devgan".
From there we went to VGP Golden Beach and here the fun starts. Without looking any further, we reached to beach! The ravishing, scenic beach, the breeze, the evening sun-light and the friends beside us, made such a wonderful evening that we spent almost 3 hours idling near the beach. We took almost a 150 snaps there giving different poses, doing Yoga, Ganapathi pappa, shooting someone, stopping the waves, kicking Revan from front, back, top and bottom.
After sweating out all the energy in our souls, we left to our Hotel and got refreshened to attend useless Udaya's Reception at VijayPark Hotel. The moment we entered the Reception Hall, useless fellow udaya already starting dancing on the stage by showing the "T" signs (i hope only Mullahs can understand this). He was nicely clad in a black suite with a white hanky in his front pocket and he was looking handsome. We quickly gave a pose for snaps/video shoot and then small jerks, tickling to Udaya. The costumes for both bride aka Udaya's Wife, Rathiga, and Udaya were good and they looked like a gr8 pair !! Congrats Udaya for starting your 2nd innings in your life ! We left off the place by 10 to our hotel to sleep and get ready for the next days trip, Pondy!
We started bit late as we were tired by last nights hectic schedule. We catched an ECR (East Coast Ride) bus to Pondy from MMDA bus station and the travel was amazingly beautiful. This bus goes through the Coastal ride parallel to the Bay of the Bengal coast. The road is sorrounded by water on both sides with a gap of 1/2 km width and it looked as if we are sailing in a ship ! After reaching pondy, we rushed to a hotel to have quick lunch and booked a hotel for a day's stay at Pondy. We all got ready by 3.30 in the evening and left off to visit Arabindo Ashram, Tip of Bay of Bengal beach and other things. Arabindo ashram was utterly quiet with samadhi of both arabindho and mother meera! Then we went to beach which was covered with thick black hard stones all through the coast. So we didnt find the beach that interesting and then we passed through side by shops to buy DVD which are very cheaper (25/- per dvd) and a garden where "Pondicherry's emblem" was present. with usual dinner and other stuff we ended the night.
Next day morning, we booked autos and we planned to go to Aroville which is about 10-12 kms from pondy. Aroville is a place where a Globe is being built to accomodate around 2000-3000 ppl to do meditation at the same time with sun beam directly flashing in between your eyebrows (the place where the third eye resides). This Globe is covered by lush green plants, lotus pond, and banyan trees. On the way, we found few French citizens roaming on the bikes and pondy being union territory, we believed they have come here to study, work and live ! We return at noon to pondy and felt happy for we found "saravana bhavan" there too! without wasting much time, we had our lunch and then packed our bags to return to chennai. On the way, revan tried a hell lot to impress a girl sitting beside lane of the bus. He nearly stared at her for 100 times but poor revan was unlucky this time as he had to part her after getting down the bus ! We reached the central station about an hour before and so we thought why dont we finish the trip with "Saravana Bhavan" as that is the place where we started off :)). So we had light tiffins/snacks/sweets there . We bid good bye to revan who was about to catch another train. We continued our journey in charminar express with discussions related to trains/routes/MLAs/locations/project etc. When the train reached nellor, Sam's father/brother came to meet us and gave us the parcel's for night supper. The non-veg food was good and after filling our tummies with biryani, curd rice, 'we called it a day' ! Next day morning, we reached hyd around 8.30 and dispersed to our destination by saying good bye! All in all, we enjoyed every moment of the trip! The most unforgettable things in the trip are "Saravana Bhavan" :), East Coast Ride to Pondy, Aroville and ofcourse our evergreen comedian Revan's non stop comments !
For exhaustive pics of this trip, visit: http://picasaweb.google.com/pnvarma/ChennaiTrip
