Waiting Game

On a depressingly dark and wet day, we decided to cheer up the ladies with a little game, while waiting for the rains to subside. This is typically a teaser school kids try on one another, in order to figure out a person’s character. You end up unconsciously revealing your priorities in life, given the following scenario:
You are at home and suddenly, like a Ramgopal Varma horror film, five things happen at the same time:
(A) The front door bell rings.
(B) The baby starts crying.
(C) It begins to rain and your clothes hung outside gets wet.
(D) This very moment, the telephone starts ringing.
(E) Also, the water is running in your kitchen tap.
What would you attend to first... then second, third, fourth and last?
According to Santosh-ji, this is not an unusual situation as she is well accustomed to multi-task between attending to a baby, answering the doorbell, rushing to the telephone, etc. etc. Razia-ji straightaway listed E, B, A, D and C as her order of priority. For Nahi Khan, it was B, E, C, D and A. Nafisa, in her own casual style, just could not be bothered: “My clothes are always getting wet outside”! “The front door of my house is open all the time...”
Now, what is your order of priority? Just click Comments below and post your reply. You have time till July 5, when we will tell you how your listing translates to the importance you attach to five key elements of your life: Money, Family, Friends, Work and Love. Until then, we are suspending this blog.
Have fun!
--Big Laaf

Bonding Time

As the intensity of the monsoon increases, attendance at the club decreases. Today, only five members showed up, dripping wet, fresh from the early morning showers: Shekhawat, Rane, Grover, Bose and Monthi. Later, Mumtaz, Bhatt and Kiran joined in. For the rest, the warm comfort of the bed was obviously more tempting than stepping out of home and getting dirty in the park.
After the exercises, Shekhawat (see pic) made a formal announcement about this blog. He invited everybody to visit the site and post their comments – the idea being to make this blog as interactive as possible. As these are early days still, we realize there is plenty of scope for its improvement. But in another fortnight, we should be up and running. This blog will become a regular feature – a kind of daily bulletin (with photographs) on whatever happens in the club, be it the constant scraps and pranks played between members or Santosh-ji’s narration of jokes, birthday celebrations or strange visitations of birds of passage. You would agree that a lot happens during that one hour in the park, much of it hilarious, which you'd like to share with your families and friends, wherever they are. Some of you might have children/grandchildren out of Mumbai (and/or settled overseas) who would like to know the kind of company you keep. Even you – for the mornings you miss coming to the club – will now be able to keep abreast of the happenings through this blog. Maybe, all this might not matter to you today. But six months later, or a year down the line, when you revisit these pages, you will realize its importance.
So please treat this as your own blog – like you treat the club your family. Just click on comments below and type whatever you like. Already, Arora-sah’b has sent in a lovely comment from Singapore in our previous page. Now we know what he is up to and likewise, he is able to keep track of us long-distance. This is what bonding is all about. And our blog is meant to only strengthen this bonding.
--Big Laaf

Picnic at KALYANI VILLAGE RESORT

What is a picnic without that special something to remember it by? But today, everything was near perfect. The weather was wonderful – cloudy, but not raining. The bus had plenty of extra seats (37 in the 50-seater were occupied) to relieve cramping. Most important, the resort was hardly crowded, since the vacations are over. The water of the pool was mercifully clean, food sumptuous, and for once, non-vegetarian dishes (chicken curry and pickled prawn) were on offer for lunch. Everybody had a swell time, barring of course Shekhawat-ji, who looked unusually pooped after all the organizing he had to do (single-handedly) for this day.
Shukla-ji got himself in a frazzle when he discovered somebody had flicked his white umbrella while he was fast asleep post-lunch in one of the cots. Actually, Sitaram-ji’s mobile was being targeted, but he was spared “lest he suffer a heart attack”. This was no revenge for his high-spirited songs – more so, when he has the Babani brothers, Kishore and Dilip to constantly egg him on with once mores. And as usual, Kishore, Bose and Arun-bhai walked away with the major spoils of Gita-ji’s housie.
At the end of the day, the star of the outing was Rehana – for the way she kept everybody in splits with her full-throated singing and uninhibited asides – particularly during the two-hour return journey from the resort. There can never be a dull moment with her around. And to imagine, this lady has just come out of a serious operation! As Renu was to comment, “her zest for life is simply amazing!”
Ultimately, she was the one to return Shukla-ji's umbrella.
COMMENTS
S.V.ARORA writes from Singapore:
Thank you very much for keeping us updated. Good to see most of the members of our club. I can see Mrs and Mr Sharma too in the photograph. How are they? When have they come back from Delhi?
We both r fine here and having a good time with our children and grandchildren. Since we have visited this place so many times, have not gone anywhere yet. The house is as good as any resort. So we hardly feel like going out. Morning as usual: Two hours walking and exercise at beachside and then swimming for some time. By 10 we are home and take our breakfast. Then with grand children for some games like carom and cards. Evening again we go down for swimming.
Kindly give my regards to all the members and thanks for the same in advance. Keep in touch. Bye for now.
Mrs & Mr Arora
June 23, 2010 12:02 AM

--Big Laaf

Merry Men of Lokhandwala

Life isn’t all Ha Ha Ho Ho for members of the laughter club at Lokhandwala Garden No 4. It’s a lot more. It’s all about shooting the breeze, playing the fool, poking fun at one another and of course, clearing the lungs.
For this motley group of senior citizens who gather here at the crack of dawn, it is also about sharing their health concerns, articulating their fears and aspirations and celebrating their joys and achievements. Above all, this is their chance to relive their youth.
“Ours is an extended family,” says Yusuf E. Rassiwala, a senior member of the club. “We welcome everybody here with open arms, irrespective of age, gender, community or class. There is no entry fee. True, as in every family, we have a few odd balls. But by and large, we have stuck together through thick and thin.”
“It is all about bonding,” adds S.V.Arora, another senior member, otherwise known as principal of the club. “Where else will you find such committed members? Being here every morning, come rain or sunshine, is more than a habit for us. It is an addiction.”
Little wonder, while most laughter clubs in the area last barely a year, this one has been going from strength to strength. Set up in 2003 by Madanmohan Pushkarna, it commands a formidable roster of around 50 members and the reputation of being the most friendly, disciplined and yet, carefree club of Lokhandwala.
Surely, there is more to all this than meets the eye. As Hari Singh Shekhawat, the de facto boss of the club, points out, laughter is no laughing matter. “From time to time, we need to remind members about the health benefits of laughing lest they take things for granted or drop out,” he informs.
The laughter session involves a series of well-orchestrated guffaws, followed by a chorus of slow-and-fast titters, giggles, suppressed chuckles, forced exhalation from the lungs and finally, raising a full-throated growl akin to a war cry.
That’s not all. The group settles for a round of free-hand exercises, part-calisthenics part-yogic, but with hilarious allusions: Hai Mera Dil, Butterfly, Nach Baliye, Kissa Kursi Ka… This constitutes the most important part of the regimen. And then, with another boisterous session of full-bellied laughter, followed by suryanamaskar, the members simply melt into the park.
It goes to Shekhawat’s credit that this hour-long routine is not allowed to turn into either a forced ritual or a farce. For he is the man behind celebrating every member’s birthday, organizing out-of-town picnics and herding members to free health check-ups. At one point in 2009, he went about distributing every week, nutritional supplements received complimentary from a reputed pharmaceutical company.
“These activities have only increased a sense of belonging in every member,” observes Dilip Babani, a club regular. “For me, this place has become almost like a second home where I can let my hair down without bothering about the consequences. We are family.”
The feeling extends to members taking liberties, particularly at giving nick names to one another. If someone is called “Qutb Minar” for his height, another is addressed as “Topiwaley Pandurang Baba” and a third, “Khadoos Budda”. A burqa-clad lady, doused one day in attar, promptly earned the sobriquet, “Agarbatti”!
Surprisingly enough, many of the nicknames are given by the ladies in the group (who often outnumber the men on some mornings). But nobody dare ask why one gentleman is named “Teda Sher”, while another is called “Chhota Sher”. Women have their own reasons. To be fair to them though, their presence has a sobering effect on the group – be it with Nahi Khan or Razia taking the initiative in conducting the exercises, Santosh’s sense of punctuality and propriety or Sunita’s hurried waste-no-time attitude, Ramila’s insistence on discipline or Gita’s propensity to all things religious, not to mention her wisecracks and Nafisa’s natural sense of humour.
But through all the bonhomie, mischief and madness, there are times when despair and confusion get the better of the group. Some might wear the scars of domestic neglect and humiliation to the park. An ailing octogenarian may suddenly stop showing up. Someone would have to relocate – as Sitaram Hivarkar must, to a bigger house in another locality. Rane has returned after “counting the mango trees” in his village. Tara Chand is visiting his son in Delhi. The Gargs are touring the U.S. on vacation.
Indeed, life must go on.
Extracted from My Times, a pull-out of The Times of India, Mumbai, dated May 28, 2010