another picnic another year and so shall we wait for the next picnic the next year.

so we had our picnic. Friday 19th February 2010. an interesting picnic but boring. an exciting picnic but tame. a picnic with a lot of people but no much participation. a bar open from morning but failing to rock. lot of group activities but isolated happenings. a non-stop servicing kitchen but a silent one. new faces new entrants new guests and less of old faces old guests. a lot of hoi-hullor but less of bonhomie. the day outside was hot and inside it was frigid. an exuberant picnic but less on spontaneous content. there was warmth but cloaked by responsibility implementation with precision. but on the whole we had a nice day if not a great day. unfortunately 2009 picnic was miles ahead in all parameters.

i am sure the time frames were maintained since by the time the Al-Sohar gang reached at half past ten breakfast was well on its way. can any one educate me as to why all picnics which have luchi/ puri on the menu is always generously oil-soaked.i am sure if the luchis of this picnic were dehydrated then the oil generated would have been enough to cook for the entire garrison of fauji-bhais guarding our borders. the breakfast spread was pretty impressive and all went about it as a true bangali would love to do when they see food.

the studs immediately got down to their games. beer can in one hand, cricket bat in the other and the-world-in-my-pocket grade battting skiils on their lips. yours truly was duped into umpiring a game of which he has absolutely no clue about. my umpiring decisions reminded me of exams in J.U. " hall-collections". some where down the game the score keeping went haywire and the discussions were more on if the team batting scored 78 or 36.

but boys will remain boys and the adrenalin needs to rush more so when its catalyzed by spirits. the game continued only the size of the ball changed. i still think if it was not for the dada effect we the bongs would have stayed loyal to our football. the game got on well. i am sure this match was not FIFA accredited or else the goal post width would not have started altering with such alarming regularity.the game was fun with pinaki manna creating a buffoon of himself and biplob using both his hands and legs with equal dexterity.

the kids games and the women;s brigade yap-yap-yap went on parallel. and then came the mach-bhaja. bongs show their true colors when confronted with fish and today was no different either. mach-bhaja laced with vodka and frequent discussions by the kids who in their game of treasure hunt were pestering for all sorts of things from the banal Toyota car keys and credit cards to the absurd 200 baiza notes and neem leaves. why and how we got conned by sanjoy for another round of football under the glaring sun till beats me. a small round of an audio visual quiz cave way to lunch. muri-ghonto being the special attraction.done every enthusiastically and well accepted.

then it all went to mute mode. a weekly holiday. late lunch and most of the bongo sontans wanted to get home and sleep. kallol did a painstakingly slow prize distribution and then a photo session with the sun right on our faces, the picnic ended.

but comrades where was the fun? where were the group happenings ? isolated events how ever spectacular make a picnic but not a great picnic. does one remember last year when post lunch all sat down and had great singing sessions. the picnic this year was nice and fun but a common denominator binding the entire proceedings as a single unit was missing. possibly next year we we shall re-evolve.


(the views posted by the author is his own and has no links to any feelings of any other alumni.... the writer stands by his views)