The road trip – Sunday. One day at a time! – III

Road trip to Dubare:
Part I – Friday
Part II – Saturday
The Photos.

And Sunday:

Sunday morning we woke up at 6:00 and the plan was to leave the Inn at 6:30 but as we all know that the plans are easily made and hard to be kept. We went to check out and the manager was not there. He had gone home and we had wait till he came back.

The other four

We couldn’t just wait. We had a bike and three guys (Andy, Deepak and me) stupid/brave enough to try some stunts with the bike. We tried to ride the bike up the stairs.

After we did all that, we were not only alive but we even “killed” time (poor pun joke! pls excuse ). The manager came, we settled the bill and left to Kushalnagar where we were supposed to have breakfast with Deepak’s cousin. That done, we pushed off to B’lore. We started by 8:30 AM. On the way to B’lore we stopped at Cafe coffee day for a quick snack and reached B’lore by 1:00 PM.

We went to Andy’s place as he had to pack and come to Chennai with us. We started from Andy’s place by 1:30 and went to McD to grab lunch. We dropped off the sleeping beauty “Saravana” at his place in B’lore and by the time we were out of B’lore it was 2:00 PM.

On the way we also hit up on the logic behind Chinese reverse engineering. How easily they are able to copy any design and mass produce it. The logic behind it as one of us put it was “that’s the way even they are made, they all look the same!”

Deepak was to drive from B’lore to Vellore and I was to take over the wheel from Vellore. We reached Vellore by 5:30. Deepak and Murali had to buy some sweets for the family. We started from Vellore at 5:40 and reached Chennai at 7:00 PM – me driving .

That’s all folks!
We are planning for another road trip in some month’s time. Will be glad to update that when it happens.

Cheers
Sam Jayanth

The other end!

Please read “deceiving looks” before you read the following, if you want to enjoy this! This is an alternate ending to that story (deceiving looks).

As I shifted gears, my hand rubbed against Kumar’s thighs and I could feel a metal object and I instinctively stared at it. And Manoj caught my stare and stared at Kumar’s pant pocket. There it was, the black shining muzzle of a gun. I caught my breath and I’m sure the poor chap sitting behind me skipped a heartbeat. I could hear his heartbeat, and so I could hear it skip too.

Manoj: I Hope the moron of the driver does not ask anything about that gun.

And I asked Kumar “Is that a gun?”

Kumar: Dam! Shouldn’t have let it slip out.

Kumar: I’m working under cover, I’m a cop. Here is my ID.

And he flashed his ID. I was happy. This was the first time I’m taking an undercover cop in my car. Wait till my client hears about this.

Manoj was quiet and thinking Ya right! as if we know what an ID of an Indian cop looks like. Just then Kumar had taken the pistol out in one quick motion and was pointing it towards Manoj and shouted “Don’t even try to move, I’ll shoot you. What do you have inside the bag?”

That was the point when I started thinking if Manoj was really the killer. But I couldn’t just convince myself that a guy like Manoj could murder anyone and I could hear my head scream “THE MEETING”. The cop checked the bag and found some money, nothing more. Manoj was shivering and almost in tears. By now the cop realized the mistake, apologized and asked to be dropped off. I obliged. I told Manoj to relax and dropped him off at the Guindy bus stop. As I dropped off Manoj I gave him my business card and told him to call me if he needed any help in town.

I had 10 more minutes to meet with the client. And I reached in time. The client was there. The one hour meeting went on for two hours as I narrated the whole “car episode” to the clients. They were impressed that I maintained my calm even after such an ordeal. They congratulated me and the deal was mine. As I sat in my car and about to turn on the ignition, my mobile rang. It was the client. He called me inside to show me the news on the TV about the murder I told him about. I went inside, not that I wanted to, but had to. “Customer is the boss” rule no.1 in corporate culture. As I watched the news, the sketch of the suspect came on the screen. I couldn’t stand anymore. My knees went weak with the thought of how close I had come in contact with the killer. I was still shocked when I got a call. I saw the number and unable to recognize it, I picked the call. It was Manoj on the call ( I almost forgot about the business card I had given him). He said “Did you see the news?! Seems like he was not a cop after all!”

Sam Jayanth