Gone are those days

This is for my friends in SG Gang. This is not poetic but emotional, spontaneous and chaotic.

Gone are the days when we used to talk for hours sitting together.
Now we don’t have time for that and meet only if there is an occasion.

Gone are the days when we played board games, badminton, bowling, snooker, volleyball etc.
Now we hardly have time to spend with each other during weekends.

Gone are the days when we used to download movies and wait for others to join to watch them together.
Now we see that everyone watch them separately in their own laptops or theatres.

Gone are the days when we partied hard at Khalsa.
Now we see it as a cliché.

Gone are the days when we accompanied friends to airport to eat at Anand Bhavan.
Now we see the same thing irrelevant and stupid.

Gone are the days when we knew everything about every one.
Now we have become alien to each other in some aspects.

Gone are the days where it used to be fun for all the stupid things done and said.
Now we are trying to think sense out of everything.

Gone are the days where we used to say "YES" to everything.
Now we start with a "NO".

Long Hiatus

Its been quite a while that I wrote anything here. You can blame it on Work, Laziness and travelling. After this hiatus what made me write this post is yet another weekend activity.

I & Surya was discussing during the week that we have to take a break from activities and rest at home. Everything was going as planned until Saturday evening when Nagaraj came home and asked us to get ready to chill out at Arab Street. Even though Surya was not keen in coming we somehow convinced him and left home by 8PM.

We have been to Arab Street the previous week too and we liked the Bazuka Cafe on Ophir Road. So we thought we shall go to the same place as some of the members were not available during the last visit. Before entering Bazuka Cafe, we thought we shall have some food.

We went to Haji lane and entered some random Turkish restaurant and ordered Lavash breads with Babaganush, Cacik, Humus, Saksuna, Ezme Salad and some Turkish drink. We entered Bazuka Cafe by 9.30PM.

Ordered Long Island Iced Tea (which is made of Tequila, Vodka, Gin, Rum and Contreau) and Margarita along with Green Apple Seesha. The music was awesome and we ordered multiple rounds of drinks along with some Chicken Wings and Chicken Shawarma. It was around 1AM that everyone was on high and we started dancing in that little bar for the wonderful dance music (LMAO mixes and Pitbul mixes) being played.

It was raining outside and we did not realise that the time was already 2.30AM. We need a signal from someone or somewhere to understand that its now time to leave. Right at that spot Praveen dropped the seesha and that became the point where we payed the bill and left the place.

As it was totally for Nagaraj that we were out today we went to Clarke Quay at that time (3AM) on his request. We entered Rupee Room and danced as if no one were looking at us. We all totally lost control and were enjoying all the songs and the stupid steps that we were doing on the dance floor. It was 5.15AM that I realised we have to leave and then we left the pub.

We got the taxi after a long wait and then as it was already 6AM, we went to Airport to have our breakfast. We had sumptuous breakfast at Anand Bhavan and came home at 7AM. Even though I slept for 6 hours I am still feeling very sleepy at 8PM in the night.

I hope you all had a great weekend and I wish you all have a great week ahead.

Busy Months

Its been busy two months on both personal and professional front and I was unable to write anything on my blog wall (Wall? .. Thanks to FB ). So what happened in last 2 months and what kept me busy .. Here we go:

Image Source

- Raghav (my elder bro) came to Singapore with his friends and stayed at my place. Even though the stay was just for the weekend, we had a great time.

- Hectic Project work getting on to my nerves. I have been kind of leading a project taking care of all the technical aspects. There have been some goof ups from my side and in return gifted me Late night working

- Nagaraj’s family was again in Singapore after almost a year. This time even though we did not travel anywhere we were quite busy in Singapore.

- I have been playing Regular cricket matches and attending practice sessions. I have been following all the IPL matches, even though they were less interesting this time.

- The new craze in town for our group is badminton. We have been playing badminton every weekend without fail and we are enjoying it.

- There is one surprise, I haven’t seen enough movies in last 2 months. I hardly saw any new movies as these activities kept me quite busy.
- Because of my bro, Nag’s family & birthdays almost all the weekends have turned to party nights.

- This summer, we have done lot of activities right from bowling, pool, wake boarding to ice skating.

- Oops last but not the least Swetha’s resigned. She is happy to leave the organisation and all those shifts which took a toll of her health.

2XU Compression Run 2011

This is the first run in year 2011 for me. I couldn’t run the ZOO run because of the rain and had to cancel my U-Run because of the Bintan trip. Even though I was not prepared well for this 12K run, I was determined to finish it. With lot of expectations on me I thought I should finish this 12K track in 1hr 30mins.

They gave me the below freebies for registering for the run.

2XU T-shirt
Fast T2 E-Lace
Calf Guard
Water Bottle

The most useful of them were the Calf Guard and the Water bottle. In the only 2 practice runs (5K Runs) I did before this run, I ran with my Calf Guard ON. Believe me, it did reduce fatigue and gave muscles the required relaxation as they promised.

Finally the day has come and I had a little problem in my ankle and was not fully prepared. Yesterday, I, Swetha, Amar, Mahesh & Praveen started off from home at 6AM to go to Marina Boulevard. We took the train and saw many many other runners who were all geared up and raring to go for the run.

We reached the start point at 7:05AM and we were late by almost 10 minutes. There were hundreds of participants already present at the START point. Most of them have already started their race and many others were stretching their muscles to start the run.

Swetha started off first and then I asked the others to also start while I go to the loo and come. I came back did very light stretching and I was skeptical about my performance. At 7:11AM in my iphone I started running. With the pumping music around and the electrifying atmosphere my start was quick and was racing with other pro runners.

Ran for around 1KM, then I realised that I should go on my own pace and not carry away with others. I took each step one at a time and went on with consistent pace. The calf guard was very well supporting my muscles and I was not feeling the pain. I was running at an easy pace with out any trouble until 5KM mark. I stopped for quick 30 seconds to have some water and immediately started off.

I was checking the time once every KM mark was shown. I just wanted to run 8KM in 1 hour to reach my target time. I saw the watch as soon as I saw 9KM mark and it was exact one hour. That gave me a boost as I was ahead of my target time. I started running from then with new energy and then came the unexpected steps where everyone was slow.

I climbed those steps by running across rather than straight as everyone was doing. Once we crossed those steps it was all slope for next 250 mts which I took advantage and ran very fast. When I saw the 11KM mark and was able to see the finish line, I said to myself that I should just carry for 6 or 7 more mins and I will definitely make it in a good time. I ran the last 500 mts very hard and was pretty sure I was finishing the race in less than the target time. As I crossed the FINISH line, I pumped my fist in the air and said YES I DID IT.

I was able to finish in 1 hour 18 mins. Wooohhhooo. I took the finishers medal and waited for others.

Praveen finished in 1 hour 30 mins

Amar finished in 1 hour 40 mins

Mahesh finished in 1 hour 45 mins

Swetha did it in 1 hour 50 mins

Thanks to Surya for coming all the way to cheer us.

I should start my preparation for my next run “Sundown Half Marathon” on May 28th.

Happy Marriage Anniversary

April 3rd is the date when my best buddy got married and this year he has successfully completed one year of marriage. May love between you both be one long sweet dream.

My Best Friends Wedding

As a child, I moved a lot because of dad getting transferred every now and then. I was never so comfortable making friends where ever I went. I always had one or two friends where ever I went. When I came to my high school, I came to Hyderabad and got settled there. It was in my +2 that I actually started making friends and socialising. It was day 1 at Special Coaching center where I met my best friend Kishore.

From there it is now a journey of 14 years of relationship. I still remember the day one in my college when I sat besides him and slept during the class. We quickly hit it off and our friendship grew into the odd man-love, that cant be explained, but just understood. There were many funny, sentimental, serious moments during these days.

I have planned many things for his marriage, right from when to go to Hyd to what to wear in the marriage. I was never interested in staying in the wedding for the whole time. But as this wedding is special and interesting for me, I wanted to experience each and every aspect of this marriage and be part of most of it.

The day has come and on April 3rd, Nandu got married. I will post the marriage details later. But right now I am very happy for the couple and just waiting for them to land in Singapore while they are on their honeymoon trip.