Here's the low down on the build-up to Poovar, Poovar itself and post-Poovar! Somebody said 'theres never a dull moment with Georgians' - well there really couldn't be a more apt statement! The action started within minutes of us boarding the train for Poovar!! As the train pulled out of Chennai Vinoo had his pre-mix suitably camouflaged in Coke and was taking his regular swigs, he wouldn't put his bottle down and I think thats what attracted that Railway Protection Force policeman to Vinoo - he tugged the bottle out of Vinoo's hands, breathed deeply with his nose over the mouth of the bottle and motioned to Vinoo to see him outside the A/C compartment!! We didn't even notice what was happening until Vinoo was seen stepping out of the air conditioned area! Outside, Vinoo was told that it would be a 3000 buck fine and he would be de-trained at the next station for drinking on board the train!! After a little bit of pleading and coaxing the policeman settled for a bribe of 200 bucks and gave Vinoo his bottle back and told him to go into the loo and finish it!! Which ofcourse, Vinoo did without a whimper, glad that he got his vodka and coke back!! Soon it was time to hit the sack - I was billeted in the next coach while Sattar, Jen, Sudha, Kevin Lewis, Mary and Vinoo were in one area. I headed off and went to sleep - around 1030pm my phone (which was with Sudha) rings and Paan comes on the line almost desperately pleading with Sudha to put me on the line! She finds her way to my bogie and wakes me and puts Paan on the line - the man was charged with collecting 40 bottles of booze from the Naval Base in Kochi and ferry it to Poovar. It turns out he got busted by the cops the previous day - it is a non bailable offence to carry commercial quantites of booze without a licence in Kerala so Paan was about to go in to the cooler and be the guest of the Kerala Government!! He somehow worms his way out of that situation and calls me and says he cannot take the booze down to Poovar because it is too risky! His exact words were ' if you can ferry it please do so, I'm outahere'!! Now, our train would be passing through Kochi but we were to head straight to Poovar so how was this problem to be solved?!! The decision was taken that Vinoo and I would hop off at 0600hrs on 27th morning at Kochi and find Paan and the booze and find a way to get it to Poovar! Imagine a reunion without the hooch!! The thought was worrisome for every OG out there!! I called Sanil to see if he could arrange some police protection! He insists that we should not ferry the booze in a Tourist vehicle (Yellow number plates) and must do so only in a white number plated vehicle - he would try and arrange one for us but it would be past 10am when we have some news on that! It turns out that the Manager of the hotel that Paan was parked in was the husband of one of Sudha's 60 cousins! We latched on to the man who very helpfully offered to let us use his car to ferry the booze - that was very brave of him because if we did get caught, the car would never ply the roads again! But an ex-Army officer knows that some risks are worth taking! So Paan, Vinoo and I set off in a Maruti Esteem stacked to the roof with booze, headed to Trivandrum some 160 km south of Kochi. We smiled at every cop enroute so as not to look like a trio of boot leggers ferrying our booty! As luck would have it we got to Trivandrum without incident and headed for my cousin's home where Sattar, Jen, Kevin, and Sudha were parked. It was lunch at my cousin's place and Vinoo and Paan then took over and ferried the booze across to Poovar from Trivandrum! That evening all of us Chennai folks headed out to Poovar to check out the place for the games and other action that Sattar had planned. At dinner at the resort I get a call from Sanil saying that Ivan Jacob boarded a train from Calicut to Trivandrum with a ticket dated 26th October instead of 26th Nov!! Poor guy almost got thrown out but the TTE took him under his wings and provided him place to sleep - the train gets in at 0500hrs and the vehicles booked to ferry folks from Trivandrum station to Poovar wouldn't leave till 10am! So at 0530hrs in the morning my cousin's husband and I went and fetched Ivan! Now we were too many to fit in the car we were to bum from my cousin to get to Poovar!! Soon that was sorted out by arranging for Ivan to head back to the station to catch the vans ferrying folks to Poovar! In the mean time we hear that our man for all seasons - Thamilarasu was in Chennai on 26th instead of being in Poovar, so he was to fly to Madurai that evening and drive to Tuticorin, pick up his man Friday Vivek and drive out the same night to Poovar!! Mr Gardner and wife and Mr Wood and his wife were arriving with the Coimbatore gang next morning. There was another Chennai gang arriving at Trivandrum Station by another train - all these mind boggling logistics were beautifully handled by the Organising Committee consisting of NRK, Bhagee, Narayan, Singappa Raja, Rathinashekhar, Babu and a dedicated bunch of guys who worked their butts off to pull off the Poovar reunion. The Isola Di Cocco resort is a beautiful sprawling campus - we needed cell phones to pull in the foks to get the reunion going - which mercifully happened as per plan, under the shade of coconut trees on the backwaters of the Poovar river. Speeches done - Sattar took over in his own inimitable way with all the games and had the crowd buzzing in no time. The Treasure hu
nt for the kids was a terrific hit as also the other games arranged for the adults. It was quite hot and sultry by then which meant that beer could never taste better!! Lunch followed and what a spread that turned out to be - the mango fish curry was awesome as was the roast chicken curry! The EC Meeting was next - it was surprisingly well attended and the participation in the discussions was excellent. That was where the goody bags were distributed - super stuff - there was even a beautifully mounted Seashell with an individually personalised brass plaque! Ofcourse, there was lots of other goodies too - branded Sugar, Salt, Matches, Beedies, Curry masala and even a packet of condoms for good measure!! The beautifully personalised Appreciation Scrolls were also presented to those who helped put Poovar together. Hats off to the Organisers for the details they looked into. The highlight of the Poovar Reunion was the Banquet and Poolside Ball on 28th evening!! As usual Sattar had the crowd in party mood very early in the evening. The Live Band was fantastic - those guys deserve a big hand - they played on till 2am that night!! Because of the openness and large spread of the resort the music didn't affect any of the folks who wanted to call it a day early! The next morning folks were woken up by the Resort staff and told that the boat rides to the beach would begin at 0630hrs!! Many actually made it for the boat ride only to learn that the boat man had gone to church! So we hailed a boatman who was poling his way through the backwater and some hitched a ride in the boat which is actually used to ferry ducks about and it sure smelled that way!! By 1030hrs that morning it was time to start bidding goodbye to the 95 OGs and families who had shown up for Poovar 2009. Soon we discovered that a Mallu movie shooting was to take place in the resort and they needed some of us OGs in the movie! Paul and JC actually feature in one of the scenes of the movie - don't ask me the name of the movie - am sure one of those who attended will remember! The Valedictory address by Mr Gardner was short and sweet and basically focused on all the organising that had gone into the Reunion and terrific bonding that was on display. To put it in a nutshell - a great time was had by all! Click on the link below to check out some of the photos of our trip to Treasure Island Poovar 2009http://picasaweb.google.co.in/
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