Theatre of the Absurd

A goat to break the Alibaug jinx

Banoo Apa wants to get hold of a black goat urgently. “This is the only way to counter the ill-effects of the evil eye cast on our Club,” she opined today. “We need to somehow break the jinx over the Alibaug picnic.”
Other ladies were more specific and named Bijoy Gupta for his evil eye

Banoo Apa distributes vada pao in the Garden

that has rendered the picnic a non-starter. They haven’t forgiven him for backing out of the trip (ref post of January 6) and for his “badduah” from which they are yet to recover.
Gupta of course, is least bothered and brushes aside the ladies' accusations. “How am I responsible for your failures?” he laughs. “You people must have done something wrong and now you are paying the price for it.”
The first attempt to Alibaug was made for January 8 when Bharat Bandh got into the

Laxmi Hadimani

way (ref post of January 7). Another attempt was made for today and quietly, unknown to many, the ladies regrouped yesterday to plan out the trip.
What they did not reckon though, was that the hotel booking made for Jaunary 8 was no longer valid. This being the week-end, the rooms (barring a couple of them) were all sold out. And the closest other hotel available was a good

Bijoy Gupta informs of his Alibaug property

11 kms away -- nowhere near any beach.
So in the course of the day, a joint decision was taken over the phone to call off the trip once again – just that it slipped Laxmi Hadiman’s mind. (Apparently, she was fast asleep in the afternoon yesterday when Nahid Khan woke her to convey the news.) This morning Laxmi was all packed and dressed, but with nowhere to go.
A similar faux pas was reported by Fahmida Khan as she waited in vain for a taxi to pick her up early morning. Banoo Apa, who ordered vada-pao for the boat ride to Alibaug, had to consume them with us in the Garden.
Amid all this, Bijoy Gupta informed that he owns a farmhouse in Alibaug and would be glad to host the Club there. He is in physical possession of the property, but due to financial constraints, has not been able to maintain it. “If you tell me in advance, I will get the place cleaned up and make it habitable,” he said. “Once you are there, you will not want to leave.”
Zarina Khan stood at a distance, silently watching this theatre of the absurd.

Bihari Milwani:
Today is lunar eclipse. Hence the picnic suffered some more hiccups. Does Bijoy Gupta have a farm house in Lonavala too? We can plan a trip there as it is just a three-hour drive.

Fixations

Shekhawat in his uniform

Of late, Shekhawat has been wearing his ‘favourite’ turquoise blue, full-sleeved shirt to the Garden – day-in, day-out. Since the onset of winter, he has discarded his t-shirts for this particular shirt, teamed with dark track pants and casual floaters.

Bijoy Gupta

Rather than calling it a dress code, Bijoy Gupta describes this as a misguided “guard’s uniform”, suggestive of the joy train Shekhawat loves to lead every morning at the end of the free-hand exercise round.
In order to drive home his point, Gupta once asked Shekhawat how he could manage to get hold of Raj Kapoor’s shirt. He answered the question himself by stating that Shekhawat must have picked it up at an auction of the late actor’s clothes. And the shoes he was sporting was purchased from a Sale where Shekhawat paid for one shoe and was rewarded by a pair!
This is just one instance of how fixated some of us can become with an article of clothing, food item, behaviour or belief. Without naming names, there have been occasions when even samosas can become a bone of contention. One member is known to obsess over a particular position while exercising.

Members try to dispel the fear of a rat's ghost! 

A blinking street light (visible from the Garden) had captured the imagination of the entire Club for days on end.
The latest is a dead rat found near our exercise circle yesterday morning. It was a huge, black freshly-killed creature that we felt should best be left to the Garden crows to feast on during the day. Sure enough the carcass disappeared this morning. But a casual remark by someone about the “ghost of the rat” haunting us took matters to an absolute bizarre level.
One lady simply could not get over the idea of being possessed by a rat’s ghost. She had taken the remark seriously, believing it to be gospel truth. So fixated was she that no amount of explaining by half a dozen members could dispel this grown up woman’s fear of sighting a dead rat’s ghost some day. She even recounted her encounters with assorted ghosts!
In the end, Banoo Apa gave her a piece of valuable advice: "Never fear the dead. Be afraid of living beings."

Bihari Milwani:
I find it rather strange how people who eat mutton and chicken and who have kept company with two 'lions' should now be scared of a dead rat.

Bharat Bandh

Rukhsana Khan (file photo)

The all-pervasive climate of fear and uncertainty took a toll on club attendance this morning. Banoo Apa, Bijoy Gupta, Razia Khan, Bihari Milwani and many others chose to stay indoors in view of the nationwide strike today. As Rukhsana Khan, a paraplegic, put it yesterday: “If something untoward happens, I won’t be able to even run for my life.”
She too did not turn up today.
Now this is not the first time a Bharat Bandh was called; nor would it be the last. But the fact that it led to calling off the Alibaug trip at the eleventh hour (ref yesterday’s post) played heavily

Lacklustre gathering at the Garden

on the minds of members. They were all very excited to be together for two days on this first ever all-women’s trip from the Club. And now, they find their plans to be suddenly short-circuited and being unable to do anything about it.
Still, some efforts were made in the past 24 hours to check if there was any hope of salvaging the trip. While phone calls to the hotel at Alibaug revealed that all was normal and peaceful out there, Rukhsana’s daughter, Afreen quoted some “friends” as saying that it “was unsafe to go there owing to a lot of garma-garmi in the area”. Geeta Latte also tapped her contacts in the police and informed all was quiet for the present, but nothing can be said of the future.
Thus prudence prevailed over valour and the Alibaug programme stays on hold.

Postponed Indefinitely

Deliberating on the  possibility of going to Alibaug

When Bijoy Gupta broke the "bad news" today morning

As surely as night follows the day, a postponement, if not cancellation, is sure to follow every time a picnic is announced. At least one hiccup has become the norm with our Club. And just as you cannot change the laws of nature, nothing can change this unwritten rule of Big Laaf!
The National General Strike called tomorrow in protest against the “anti-national policies of the government” has put a spanner in the works for those of us planning a two-day vacation at Alibaug, beginning January 8 (ref yesterday’s post).
“Even the banks are closed,” announced Bijoy Gupta, breaking the news this morning. “Shiv Sena has also joined the bandh. Chances are there will be no ferry service to Alibaug tomorrow. Why do you want risk going against the toofan (storm)? Better go later, on some other day.”
Having proved himself to be a spoilsport yesterday, Gupta was not taken seriously. Zarina Khan was particularly dismissive and insisted on paying her contribution for booking the hotel, as had been decided yesterday. Others came similarly prepared.
The general refrain was that “having made up our minds to go to Alibaug, there is no question of retracting now”. Otherwise the trip will never materialise. For some peculiar reason, Gupta wanted to scuttle the trip and that must not be allowed to happen.
The group members conceded that one handicap they suffered from was that there was no male travelling with them. “It does not mean that we ladies are incapable of dealing with a problem should it arise,” Zarina argued. “How are we any less than men? We shall cross the bridge when we come to it.”
The heightened sense of optimism received another jolt when news came in on the Gateway of India (from where the ferry services ply) being currently out of bounds. Thousands of protesters were gathered there since Sunday expressing solidarity with the students of JNU (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi) who were brutally assaulted by a gang of 'mysterious' goons.
This sealed the matter. Nobody wanted to take chances now. The general consensus was to “postpone the picnic” till the situation turns peaceful.

Bihari Milwani:
Thank God, the picnic is cancelled. Otherwise there would have been a two-day 'strike' at our club.

Misunderstanding

Heated discussions in the China Hut over the Alibaug picnic

In keeping with the glorious tradition of Big Laaf, the Alibaug excursion (ref post of January 4) was headed towards a first cancellation, were it not for some last-minute efforts at damage control by members of the Club.
Bijoy Gupta, who appeared gung-ho about the ‘picnic’ on Saturday, backed out this morning. His explanation was simple: “How was I to know that I’d have to pay for myself? I thought Zarina (Khan) is sponsoring the trip.”
Hearing her name mentioned, Zarina flared up. “Who does he think I am?” she said, storming out of the China Hut where group members were gathered this morning to finalise the trip. “I never said I will sponsor anybody’s expenses. Why should I? Why blame me? I would rather not go myself. Count me out!”
The sudden turn of events led everyone to conclude that the trip scheduled day-after tomorrow will have to be scrapped. “At this rate, forget about Alibaug,” Yusuf Rassiwala reasoned when Gupta also walked out of the meeting in a huff.

Bhaswati Bose records Bijoy Gupta's 'testimony' on Saturday

“This trip will not take off.”
An air of despondency hung over the group. Over the week-end, Bhaswati Bose had meticulously worked out the essentials of the two-day excursion, including suitable ferry timings, the logistics and costs and

Three versions of same exercise! Don't
miss the flowers in Shekhawat's hands.

even zeroed in on a well-located hotel offering luxury suites at fabulously discounted rates. Everybody was on the same page, except Gupta.
Somehow, the possibility of Gupta excusing himself at the eleventh hour had occurred to a few members on Saturday. At their insistence, Bhaswati recorded on her mobile an oral commitment from Gupta (in the presence of witnesses) not to withdraw from the trip, come what may.
In view of the changed circumstances, the options open were to either abandon the trip or else, salvage whatever was left of it. Fortunately, it did not take Zarina long to retrace her steps and eventually come around. In order to pre-empt any further drop-outs, everybody agreed to pay a token advance tomorrow morning to confirm their hotel bookings.
Significantly, this is turning out to be an all-women’s trip.