Destination Miami - Part-I

This is the time of year when my company makes a sincere effort to care about their employees company performance award, which determines which project team will be the champion of the entire organisation, except for the part of the world located outside the United States and southeastern Canada.

This is precisely the time when we (9 people) decided to make a tour to Miami and have an enjoyable weekend at the place where everyone wants to keep their footprints imprinted in time immemorial. This decision was taken well before I was even considered as an invitee. Nevertheless to make the names as anonymous as possible I have found a very effective way of appending “zh” before every name. Hence we can retain the anonymity in them. (Remember that I flunked in my Coding Theory class)

The itinerary was framed by zhsenthil, which had in the available time of 48 hrs for us, a way where we could cover more then 70% of the North American Continent and weather providing a short stay of 70 seconds in the North Pole. The places and attractions were marked in such a way that the MAP for us now represented only as a tool to get lost easily. Zhanbu and zhsuren the two most oldest team members in the crowd (a combined age of these two though less than zhnacha who alone tallies more then 4560 Gregorian calendar yrs) decided that in order to maintain the schedule that had been planned, we had to prepare food for the complete duration of the trip and then start the journey.

Hence, on the D-Day half the population of mainland China was involved in preparing chapattis for our trip. We had estimated to make 4 million of them though we ended up making enough to feed the African continent for the next 45 years even after our consumption. Though the idea was good, but the estimation lacked a bit of practicality like any other software development project. The idea was to make chappathis that were soft so that we can consume it even while coming back to Tampa Bay. The implementation with the help of the experienced “chapatti maker” zhrams, we created soft chappathis, which unfortunately was soft only for 7 nanoseconds from the time we took it from the stove. Then it was transformed into the third hardest known materials in the world and second in the Andromeda Galaxy. (Source NASA Mars Path Finder)

So when this dinner preparation chaos was underway, I entered and add a pinch of salt to the bruises by making curd rice with what ever was remaining in the kitchen. Though many don’t know what went into the making of it, but it turned out to be palatable. Here is a sample of the ingredients … a few ounces of TNT, methanol and some ginger oil to provide the taste. This may also be used as rocket fuel after 3 days of fermentation. Now with all the food ready we packed our bags and got us all loaded into the car carefully folded and placed between the food packets which occupied more than 80% of the car space, 10% was occupied with CD that contained songs which were possibly recorded during the signing of the American Independence.

There are a few people for whom FORD made cars as a sleep inducing medicine, one such person is zhnacha. All she needed was the sound of the gear shifting to go into a sleep mode. Like Newton’s First law, she will continue to be in the same state unless acted upon by an external force … Smell of food. Like zhnacha, there was another guy named zhsathish who also had the same syndrome. So we placed both of them in separate cars hence both the cars could have the Dolby Surround Sound of …. Yes … Snoring.

Snoring is a series problem for all car travelers in the US, one that affects more than shark attacks and Vadivellu jokes combined. Yet many people - here I am in now way referring to zhancha - refuse to admit that they snore a lot. Coming back to our drive … there was nothing much happening expect that we kept calling from our cell phones to the other car asking the precise location where we will have our Dinner … the prima motive for zhmuthu and zhkanagu. (I had to somehow introduce them into the story too.)

After roughly 3 hours of travel, we decided to take a break and wake up zhnacha. So I got out of the car and opened the boot to let zhmuthu and zhkanagu some air and also take out the dinner. We had chappathis, chappathis and more chappathis until 2% of the total chappathis were consumed by the 9 of us. After that the car that I was traveling felt that zhnacha was a danger to our lives since she started to induce sleep into the driver and thereby to all the others in the car. It went so bad that even the truck driver following us was in a state of drowsiness due to Zhnacha. Hence, a unanimous decision (I was not included in this for some reason … I am not making this up) was taken and I was pushed into the front seat to help the driver from not getting distracted – distraction such as zhnacha sleeping in the back seat.

Zhanbu requested me to remind him about filling up gas at some point before we hit Miami Beaches… hence I was on guard looking out for the possible GAS station in the middle of a Marshy forest. I failed to look at a rather insignificant board which said “Last Gas station on Plant Earth here … No Gas station for the next 32 billion Light years” or something equivalent like that. Since there were no figurative signs such as a Gas Station and a RED cross across it, I felt I better ignore it. All this while, zhanbu the driver felt that cars are better flying rather than rolling on the roads. So we were (I am not making this up also) not going too fast but literally flying too low. We got several air control messages to fly a little high since many clock towers were on our direct path.

Zhanbu, on my small piece of advice, disregarded all the warnings coming from the back seat and was pressing high on the GAS until Newton’s third law came into effect … the car started to land and we hit the road and the engines looked like stopping … reason … NO G-A-S … the indicator lights started flashing and it looked like there was no sign of a station anywhere nearby. By this time, zhanbu became tensed and so was I… but I was for a different reason. The AC blower was so fine tuned to hit the navigators abdominal region that his bladder was becoming FULL at an alarming rate … the irony was seen, his bladder is FULL while the petrol tank was hitting rock bottom. The situation went on for about 35 min and 30 miles went by still NO sign of the station nor did Zhanbu have any intentions of letting me (the navigator) answer to Nature’s call.

Destination Miami - Part-II

As we felt perhaps that we are going to spend the rest of the 48 hrs on the high way waiting for some re-fuelling guy to come and help us and this was when Zhanbhus eyes met a Gas station but since our Kinetic energy was so high (1.2 Giga Miles/Hour) we were not in a position to stop here and hence proceeded until the last drop of gas in our tank was consumed and our car luckily stopped right in front of a open gas station … we were saved … more than that I was saved, the station had a nice rest room. Since we were at such speed … we had come nearly 90% of the destination and so we started to put on the landing gears and decided to drive like normal Miami driver – Not obeying any RED signals on the way. All this while, zhnacha was not aware that we flew, the tank became empty and we have halted just for refueling asked if Miami had come. She was glad to get the answer from me that we have another 30 min to reach there at the current velocity or 180 days if the cops caught us for over speeding – precisely driving at the speed of light.

Nothing untoward happened and we reached the destination (thanks to the non-helping ness of zhnacha and zhmuthu in navigating) according to the planned time. In fact we had gained roughly 22 days due to our speed. All this was to be washed down the drain due to the latest technology in the accommodation industry … e-booking. Never trust the web and we had to sit outside in the parking lot for the next 34 days waiting for the attendants to even look at you, leave alone search for a booking under the name “Jaivel Surenderan Ramakrishnan”. So, all in all, we were still maintaining on time schedule. So after a few number of months we got into the room and hit the bed straight. None of us had the enthusiasm to have a bath and leave early for sight-seeing, BED was our answer. None of us could even resist the INERTIA calling us to enjoy the next 4 hours of sleep in freedom. (Except for zhnacha and zhsatish who had their lifetime span of sleep while traveling).

We heard the crack of dawn much pretty late and hence our scheduled itinerary was put to the place where it belonged … in the trash can and all of us decided to go with our instincts. We reached for the Chappathis for breakfast and then made our way to the most famous South Beach. We went and took a few snaps to justify our decision to go to the beach. By this time, our man zhsenthil decided to take matters into this hand and led us all to a place called Miami Secaquarium. This is a place where we get to meet all the SEA animals except the Mermaid which probably was having a bath in South Beach.

For the next 4 hours we were walking from theater to theater looking at Miami Dolphins and Killer whales dancing to the tune of their ring-master (who was exceptionally good looking) while we were dancing to the tune of zhsenthil, who was also exceptionally good in ogling at exceptionally good looking females. The 4 hours went as though we were made to sit in those compulsory extra classes for Physic lab during our 12th STD in school. The only consolation in this place was that the most beautiful looking females at least smiled at me and recognized that I was a living being on this planet. Apart from this, we had also taken roughly 12 million snaps of the Killer whale and other dolphins. I would have recovered the entrance fee money had I mailed a few million snaps to the discovery channel.

The sun was also traveling at a certain speed, which I am not sure, but the evening was already there before we came out of this Secaquarium. Hence, on unanimous decision, probably ignoring zhsenthil’s plausible explanation, we headed back to South beach for a dip in the water. There weren’t much of people … probably around 50-60 of them. Most of them would have just been freed from the Secaquarium after finishing their term of 6 hours of captivity like us. The highlight of the bathing that we had was the best dive in the water, which was 7mm deep by zhnacha.

She had come out like a failed look-alike model of “Bay Watch” star Pamela Anderson but certainly gave us a much need laughter. She came running from the shores and just went the wave came, she jumped right into the water, which was merely 7 mm in depth. T-H-U-G … she landed on the shore itself and then claimed that she was preparing for the dive in the deep … probably about 19 cm depth. We again missed our chance to earn a few bucks by not taking the video of this dive ... we could have easily won $1000 for this clip in America’s Funniest Home Videos. We were unfortunate since zhrams and zhsurens handy cam batteries had run down just while shooting the whales and dolphin diving in depths greater than 40 feet.

After 2 hours of water games, which included zhrams and zhsathish drinking the salty water in the name of swimming and zhmuthu, zhsuren trying to catch each other in the game of catch the leader while swimming in the depth of 3 feet water. We were all exhausted that we returned to the car for some refreshments and then decided to get in to the groove of Miami … get the taste of the night life. As the mention of the word night life came, zhsenthil burst with such zeal that he would have lit the whole of Las Vegas city for one whole month. We are talking in the tune of 1600 Mega watts of energy from his face alone leaving the other anatomy for the moment … if you can catch my drift.

There were 5 of us who were wise and decided to go for shopping and have a peaceful dinner and some much wanted break from the chappathis. So went shopping to Bayshore Mall, shopped heavily in the “Dollar Tree” shop and took a customary snap in front of “The Hooters”. This was pretty much what we did in the early night though we were circling Miami for quiet sometime looking for the entrance to the Mall. The entrance was so full of mazes that even the parking lot attendants would take 12 years to find the way if they left the premises.

The other 4 had quiet a life I suppose … probably more mazes than we encountered since the pubs in Miami were built by the Egyptians, just like the way they built the entrance to the Pyramid Ghiza. So I can’t elaborate on their night life trip but one thing was sure that they returned to the room only around 5:30AM the following day while the 5 of us were having a whale of a time sleeping comfortably in the room, which could easily accommodate 2 people at the maximum.

The next day was not so adventurous since we just drove in the car miles without stopping and then stopping for each mile … this was the regular pattern for all tourists who go to Key West from Miami. The “Key West” was intended for those who love to drive 12000 miles just to see a Rock that says “The End Point of Planet Earth – Only 90 miles to Saturn” and have a snap taken there for memorabilia.

Anyway, we all made it till Jupiter before we ran out of steam and hence decided to take the Glass bottom boat where they show you variety of fishes which can be seen easily and more comfortably in a glass bottom TV. We enjoyed the ride, which lasted the same time as the Second World War and was equally drooling. After the ride, you guessed it right, we had chappathis for lunch, dinner, tea, no special reason, driving and left for Tampa and reached Tampa safely with still 1.4 Million chappathis left untouched.

This concludes our trip … until the next one …, which will be planned by none other than me … It’s me signing off … Bye