The Fear Factor

A recent office picnic to Kolad was planned out to be an adventurous one – we deliberately kept it that way and did not want it to be yet another of those pose-at-the-various-points-in-a-hill station-and-return-back kind of a thing. And Voila, several of the to-do activities in my bucket list - river rafting, rapelling, rock climbing, burma bridge got knocked off at one go. But, the experience also brought back those age-old, scary memories of the past. Memories of fear of several things, people, activities, that engulfed me as a kid and since then till date!

The Fear factor aside, the picnic itself was loads of fun. Yours truly was secretly feeling like an MTV Roadie and trying to overcome the evident F factor by diverting the mind onto more inspiring things like watching others perform tasks and joining in the fun to the extent possible.

The 12 km long river-rafting (Level 2 rapids) to begin with was just perfect for non-swimmers like me with frequent roller coasters of the raft and aqua splashes on us. We followed it up with attempts at rappelling which looked formidable before I had tried my hand at it and seemed surprisingly simple once I was done :D. Rock-climbing ensured that we all got into our tribal avatars and make it look like we were born as climbers and do it daily for a living. Next came the Burma Bridge which was walking on a high, loosened up, thin rope - quite literally! My mom, if she were around, would have typically commented – ‘what a kazha kooothadi velai’ :P. Personally, rafting was the most fun thing to have done. The experience of staying overnight in a tent house which opened out to lush green terrain was quite novel too!

Throughout the string of adventures that I was testing myself at, the F factor would keep peeping through often and reminding me that I aint no Jhansi Ki Rani after all – even the harness and other equipments tied on to us to protect from any mishaps were not of much help.  So much so that I had to resort to other modes of consolation like –

•  Look Aparna, even a 11 year old kid does it so fearlessly-so why can’t you?  
•  If its not today, U may never get this opportunity again and u would regret it for life.
•  You are almost done baby, its just one more activity to go.
•  If u do not try these to begin with, how are u going to even think of Sky diving and Scuba diving which u want to do some day in ur life.
•  Would’nt u want to flaunt such brave pics of yours to the 390 odd FB friends, imagine the high it would give..:D...

      .....

...and so on......

But, No, my mind – being its own – held on, and the F factor kept playing its role. Somewhere, mid way, I went into a self-introspection mode and started to think of all the sundry things that I was always phobic to in my life - Pets (Dogs n Cats alike), Lizards, Diwali crackers, Roller Coaster rides at a theme park as a kid, Water sports, In-flight turbulence, etc. Of course, there are more serious things that also scare me quite often – like losing my loved ones in life, breaking down in public and embarrassing myself, having to live in a world without the internet, and a few more. For all the brave and Independent girl that I claim to be, I even wondered whether it was very human to be afraid of certain things or is it just with me!....and further wondered if I would qualify for an award for the F factor..:p. My one-line bio which reads “girly plus gritty combo” is, indeed, very candidly written!

By the end of it, I did perform all but the jump-into-the-water-from-the-raft thingy, albeit with an initial bout of uneasiness which did vanish subsequently; and I must say I stretched my borders far above by my standards. Atleast, I had made a beginning.

What, then, should be the way forward – Well, last read in a Lonely Planet magazine, the rafting at Rishikesh had Level 5 rapids and if you haven’t sky dived at Kiwiland, u have’nt lived.

Game, any one????!!!????...:D

LWD 2011

Circa October 2007, my memories when my Maruti Swift had arrived are ever green.  After buying a brand new vehicle, I was even so scared to take it out and drive in the jammed peak hour highway traffic to reach my office which is just about 15 kms away from home. Comparing that to the Lavasa Women’s Drive (LWD 2011), I have indeed come a long way. Thanks to VT, who was instrumental in motivating me in coming out of the shell and start vrooming in the roads – sometimes, even I am (and probably he is, too) amazed at myself at the progress I have made in pursuing my passion for full-throttle driving!

So, came the rally day. To be chosen as one of the short-listed participants was itself no small task, considering the number of contestants. I was obviously over the moon (or should I say geared up..:D) when I knew that I was on for the rally. Firstly, to convince my mom that it was a rally and not a race was something. Knowing my temperament, it was no surprise that she was feeling edgy when she came to know that I was participating in it. Be that as it may, and after a series of last minute glitches due to a change of partner and consequent anxious moments , I was on, all set to be flagged off in the early hours of 27^th Feb, 2011.

I and Maninder (my navigator/team mate) reached the assembling point dot on time and took in the atmosphere as much as we could. Around 350 plus cars from Mumbai, another 200 approx from Pune, we all had just a single point agenda – Destination Lavasa. Several cars, all decked up in varying colourful avatars, with posters, sketches and designs on them, conveying a message which their respective drivers/navigators wanted to communicate. The entire event was conducted in a truly professional manner - well spelt out rules and regulations and a clear adherence to the same. Cars were flagged off from 7.00 am onwards on rally day by a few celebs. Each of us were given a route card and time chart just a minute before being flagged off. We were to go through the route given in the map to us with a halt at the Time Controls (TCs) at various points on the way. We were also required to stick to the speed and time restrictions – reaching a TC before time meant penalised severely in the net tally of points.

In our case, in our typical over-enthu spirits, we simply went zip zapping from the minute we were flagged off. By the time we realised we had missed the initial TC near the starting point itself, we were almost on the outskirts of Mumbai. And following yet another decked up LWD rally car was our second folly – little did we realise that odd and even numbered cars were given different route maps. :P :D. This adventure was at Khopoli, just about the end of Mumbai-Pune express way. Instead of taking a halt at the Food Mall in the highway, we went exploring places interior in Khopoli and Pen, and as a result took nice 40 mts. to get back on track!!. By now, it was fairly clear that we had atleast missed 2 of the marshals/TCs. That was the realisation! Remembering damn very well that we would not get a rank if we’d missed the route, we decided to throw all caution to winds and drive @ a speed that was worthy of a NH drive J. Personally, I enjoyed the hair pin bends and the hilly terrain - things that are non-existent in my typical home-office-home drive.

It is usually said that one must enjoy the drive as much as the destination itself. So very apt in this case. Lavasa, honestly, is an over-hyped destination. Most of it, thanks to Mr. Jairam Ramesh’s ministry, is only work-in-progress. The thought of converting plain hills and nothing else to a self-contained township is definitely praise-worthy. But then, most of these are still at the stage of conception. Around 2011 women (drivers plus navigators plus co-participants seated at the rear) all assembled at one place, let their hair down for a couple of hours at destination Lavasa with some typically girly activities which the organisers had arranged over there – tattoo counters, hair braiding, flea market stalls, chaat counters and a rock band to make us groove.

After a bit of hanging out at the place and a sumptuous lunch at the convention hall, it was time to head home. What was interesting was that we noticed that a few rally cars were still on their way to the destination while we were already on our way back – little did we know that they were the wiser ones of the lot who, after missing their way en-route, had bothered to go back to the correct routes and got themselves marked by the TCs. 

For someone who had never crossed the limits of Thane before, I was indeed impressed with myself for clocking about 500+ kms in a day. Probably, the most critical lesson learnt in my inaugural attempt @ car rallies is that going through the correct route is more important than reaching the destination on time. It is a promise that we made to ourselves.

See you soon Lavasa, next time around – we will take the route that we are supposed to drive through!! J

SEBI ka Tempo High hai!!

SEBI Premier League  

The past 10 days or so at my office had almost taken me back to my college days, thanks to the SEBI Premier League. Being in the organising team of the SPL reminded me so much of how we used to conduct inter-collegiate management meets way back then. Once the idea of SEBI Premier League was conceived, all the subsequent work in terms of finalising the formats and fixtures for the various league matches, grouping the 6 teams that were in the fray, working out the logistics with the MIG Club which was the venue of the tournament, etc. followed. The kind of enthusiasm, high energy levels and spirit that I had witnessed at various levels across the organisation was something that I had not witnessed before at SEBI.

The tournament was conceived as a 3 day long sports meet across SEBI comprising of various games – Cricket, Badminton, Table Tennis and Carrom. The 6 teams – Equities, Bonds, Swaps, Futures, Options and Index – with representation from various departments – were put in 2 groups (A – Futures, Index and Option and B – Bonds, Equities and Swaps) in the league matches with the winner of one group playing against the winner of the second group.

The mood for the tournament had set in a week before the actual matches, with the poster war across the 7 floors at SEBI Bhavan. There were posters and there were counter-posters and there were counter counter posters (yes, a few attempts at sledging and taking a dig at the other teams too!!) ; of course, I must confess the walls of our office have never been more colourful and interesting before.

As for the actual matches, the ‘Futures’ hit it off from Day 1 by winning both their league matches against the ‘Index’ and ‘Options’. The ‘Swaps’ did the same on Day-2 by winning over the ‘Bonds’ and ‘Equities’ to firm up their grand finale with the ‘Futures’. The last day of the tournament that got concluded today saw some excellent cricketing action from the four teams that played today. The morning match between the Equities and Options who were both playing for the 3^rd slot was won handsomely by Options. The finals between the ‘Futures’ and ‘Swaps’ was a fairly high scoring match too like some of the league matches. At the end of it, the Swaps could not defend what looked like a formidable target for the Finals – 112 in 15 overs. The ‘Futures’ team, aided by some huge hits from its top order (Sanchit and Nitin), were home effortlessly with an over to spare.

The games for the ladies (Badminton/TT/Carrom) was more or less dominated by the Swaps who had kind of swept through the matches in this segment, both in Singles as well as doubles.

Some of the key highlights of the tournament were clearly the star batsmen from some of the teams who entertained the crowd with some huge shots (Sanchit and Nitin for ‘Futures’, Sagar for ‘Options’, Peter for ‘Swaps’), some good fielding by even the not so young players,  some witty and interesting commentary by Vikas and Mukul (trust him to talk about afternoon siesta of a few colleagues in the Pavilion and cricketing specifics with equal aplomb!), some of the early exit team members who were seen cheering the other teams during the finals and the ‘never-low’ enthu of our ED Mr. Vaidyanathan who made this entire event happen and saw it through smoothly.

The event ended on a positive note with all the trophies and Man of the Match/Series being given away, photograph session with the big man himself (Yes, Our Chairman and a Board Member were at the Presentation ceremony to do the honours) and promises to hold such SEBI family events more often than now – whether the promise would materialise or not is something that only time can tell. Be that as it may, what really shone through was the adage that ED(KNV) had coined for us at the event – SEBI Ka Tempo High Hai!!!