Beat the Heat

Last heard, Sunita Jajodia was terribly ill at home. Santosh Tyagi too shall have to remain home-bound, for her grandchild. Bapu Rane is still counting mangoes in Ratnagiri. Hem Chand Jain has simply disappeared. Prakash Motwani too is absconding. Nahid Khan is away in Lucknow. Harbans Singh is in Ludhiana. Tara Chand Seth is attending weddings in Delhi. Ramila Mistry has taken off for Rajkot. Srichand Arora has escaped to Lonavala...
Given this scenario, it is hardly surprising that attendance should drop drastically at the Garden. Personal predilection apart, the sweltering Mumbai heat has been a huge deterrent factor, forcing many to give the morning exercises a go by. But then, as you lose some and gain some, there are many new faces (often, rank strangers) also showing up every day. Besides, old prodigals like Hari Naraiyani, Sandhya Narang and Nafisa Sayyad have started coming.
Meanwhile, Hari Singh Shekhawat finds himself in a fix on the Kashmir trip (yesterday's post). With no one yet in any mood to go, he conceded that 45K could be an “unaffordable” sum. But before calling off the trip, he would like to see whether Mumtaz Jahan can offer a "good bargain", especially on boarding and lodging at Srinagar. He would also like some clarity on the possibilities of train travel, failing which he suggested we settle for a day trip to Royal Garden Resort (once again) to beat the summer heat.
There was also some talk of visiting the hill-stations down South. Monthi Serrao offered to check on some muth (ashram) accommodation in Mangalore, from where we could perhaps move on to Munnar or Kumaragom in Kerala. Some even suggested the cooler climes of Mahabaleshwar as a weekend getaway. But all that would depend upon how Kashmir eventually pans out.