March 14th dawned bright and sunny, a perfect Bandh day (For reasons no one seemed to be sure of -was it telangana or rising oil prices or the new airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore ??) Coming from a state that accords highest respect and regard to Bandhs and Hartals, I was half expecting closed shops, deserted roads and semi deserted offices!!!!. Nobody seemed to be concerned or complaining anyway, except working mothers who suddenly needed to make plans for their little ones blissfully enjoying an unexpected holiday .

So, I set out to office with my five year old, who is thrilled to bits about this ‘Cool’ Birthday party at mamas office – Mamas office is now eight years old !!!! Ofcourse, I strictly adhere to the dress code, the black t-shirt proudly displaying our greatest achievement of the year 2007 – One of the TOP 100 Innovators, an honour conferred to us by Nasscom. And junior is wearing a black shirt too.

We reach the office and mama already earns some brownie points, because there is party written all over the place -balloons, decorations, danglers – the festive mood is there alright and in no time my son joins the junior brigade (who wants to miss a birthday party????) that has taken charge of the decorations. There is hustle and bustle in the otherwise calm and serene reception area – Rekha, our receptionist is animatedly talking to someone (I hope she is reconfirming the cake, I wouldn’t want to miss that) –Srinu and Shiva are trying to put up the TOP 100 Innovators t-shirt on the wall, Bharathi is overseeing all the decorations …I decide to take a peek at the other two floors as well – and as I climb up the stairs, Noor is coming down, looking so preoccupied that he doest even have the signature smile on his face. I guess being at the helm of affairs is not so easy after all – Organizing a birthday party is no joke.

First floor is into business as usual – they have already finished with the decorations Party or no party –WE CODE seems to be the slogan. I quietly withdraw and proceed to the next floor where the designers are decorating with a vengeance!!!! And they are adequately supported/disturbed by the junior brigade.

I hang around for a while, and then realizing that my services are not really needed by anybody, retire to my hole for some “serious work”. When I emerge out in a hour, the stage is almost set !!!! Dipesh, who has conceived and scripted the event is making sure that his Vision is executed to perfection. He has the fun committee to do the direction –The fun committee members Shovan, Pooja, Anil, Sridhar, Noor and Suresh (I am not sure if Suresh is a member of Fun committee, but he is fun personified anyway) have been on the job since the previous day coordinating everything with their counterparts in Dilli Durbar The plan is to have the celebrations begin simultaneously at Noida and Hyderabad, and Insha technology, be able to see and hear and feel the pulse of what is happening at the other end ..

While technology (webcam ,phone and lots of wires ….) is being put in place, I am instructed by one of the busy organizers to inform all that the party is about to begin. I am anyway curious to see how the decorations are progressing upstairs and proceed to 4th floor. Prita is still busy with the decorations(She is infact still on top of that chair, as she was an hour ago). The place is a riot of colors, proclaiming the aesthetic sense of the inhabitants J. CFO is in her cabin with a bunch of kids, very busy coloring sheets with ‘top 100 Innovators’ written on them. She patiently pins up these sheets on their dresses (I think this happens ONLY in iridium). The dress code –remember ??? I tell them its time to party.

We all quickly go down ….the cake the ready ,displayed at the center. Technology is in place, I can now see the Noida team, the webcam image is projected on the wall. It’s a little hazy, though. There is some discussion among Sriram, Dipesh (at Hyd) and Nawaz, Topes(at Noida) while all of us are impatiently waiting (for the cake ….). Not so soon, leadership decides ..we begin with some introductions …As recent joinees, Ram, Nagaram, Bidhan and myself -we all get an opportunity to sashay down the ramp (it has to be in slow motion, technology cant keep pace with usJ) and introduce ourselves to the Noida team. Then comes the news bulletin from Noida –the new guys are introduced, the very talented Janhavi has won an award …..

Ok finally, its cake cutting time – The first family of iridium is called upon and junior brigade joins them without any invitation. Topes (Pratap) is to do the honours in Noida – get, set, go …and there is applause and cheering everywhere. Well things cant always be perfect, the musical candle bought specially for the occasion has a sore throat …When lit,the expected behaviour of this flower shaped candle is that the petals open up one by one and sing a happy birthday song, unfortunately the candle didn’t appear to be in a mood to either open up or sing. The cake cutting is done and we are all relishing the cake and other snacks,but the CEO has better things to do. He is walking around with the laptop so that Noida people are not restricted to a single view of the festivities here !!!!

Time for some entertainment now. Noor is in incharge of this and looks every bit the man in control of the situation. He wishes to start the program with song that is close to his heart - Inspite of forgotten lyrics and commercial breaks while he referred to them , the song(or rather the recitationJ) is wholesome entertainment and sets the tempo for the rest of the party. There are a couple of songs from newly joined trainees Bhanu and Bhooshan and then Prita also sings some really melodious numbers. By then everyone wants to sing and we decide to have an antakshari – Ladies Vs Gents (We have Prita, so we are confident of Victory ). Initially restricted to Hindi Numbers only much to the delight of non telugu speakers like shovan, self, Pooja who are happily showing off our musical talent, we are in no time pushed to a corner by telugu brigade …Urmila, Prita, Spoorthy, Srikanth, Anil,Vikram, Suresh and all the others ..u just rocked

The antakshari goes on and on till hunger pangs started developing and we are forced to stop. All of us join Sriram in congratulating the fun committee for organizing a great party and as I am leaving, I put on the message board what comes first to my mind –“Proud to be part of the Team”

P.S-Another party is already being planned in another corner. March 14 being Srikanths’ Birthday also, can he be spared? We don’t let go any occasion for a celebration !!!!

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