Diamonds Everywhere... and Olu's sister's marriage

Have you ever seen diamonds all round you? I have seen them. I am not sure if all could be as lucky as me. I am not even sure if I will ever be able to see that sight again.

We all (Bk, Arun Prasath, Arvind, Dm, Jagan & myself) left to Virudhunagar to attend Eshwari akka's (Olu's sister) wedding. Natty and Sk couldn't make it to VNR. In addition to this there was 12 other Trilogians who were coming to attend the marriage. The Chennai numbers were comparatively less with only 4 guys (DC, Mappy, MVS, Saby) joining us on Saturday (2nd July) morning. The others who joined us were, Prabu on Sun morning, Saravana Devi (Arun's sis) on Sat evening, G Arun Kumar on Sun morning, Thiru, Balakarunanithi on Monday morning.

Our plan for Saturday was to have breakfast in Olu's house and then visit Adhisayam water theme park (just outside Madhurai). Though it seemed slightly late we arrived in Athisayam at around 2 PM. It was quite empty and we had lots of fun in the water. The theme park though did not have many ppl visiting was really well maintained. The wave pool was especially great fun. Around 6 we left the place and got to Vnr. We all went to Burma kadai, a local parotta specialty hotel. The food was amazing. Once we filled our tummies, we hit the sac in my house. We had to wake up at 2:30 PM to get ready to go to Papanasam waterfall, so we took on the most logical approach, skip sleep. We had lost a new pack of UNO cards, so it was no more an option. We settled to playing Ass.

Amazingly we didn't miss our estimated time of departure by much, and we left for the waterfalls around 4 AM. The journey wasn't very comfortable, so I got only pockets of sleep. But we were properly entertained by the soundtrack of Anniyan, and lots of evergreen melodies of Illayaraja, thanks to DM's creative 30 GB mp3 playing monster and Jude's cassette adapter.

We reached the Papanasam dam, and took the boat to the waterfalls. It was a magnificent sight. Crystal clear water flowing out in huge quantities. The sight shows how small humans are compared to nature's forces. Though the falls was quite big, the places available for the public to take bath was pretty small. Also swimming was prohibited because it is risky. Though the bathing place was really crowded and a security with a stick was making sure no person stood there for a long time, a few of us took a bath there. This was my first peek at the diamonds. Well no one else could see them though, and the diamonds were just the blurred vision of the sun shining out of the crystal clear water all around. But the whole sight was so cool. I am planning to get Lasik surgery (laser eye correction) tomorrow, so I might no more get this wonderful sight, but on the positive side I would be able to identify who is there in a pool a couple of metres from me :).

We left Papanasam around 12 noon after filling ourselves with some locally catched delicious fishes and vadais. Our next destination was Manimutharu falls. This place was not as huge as Papanasam falls, but there was not a big crowd around. So we could take a good nice bath. Also the water force was good and it was like having our bodies massaged. We couldn't trek here due to lack of time and we started our return journey to Vnr. We stopped for food inbetween and reached Vnr around 7 PM. We attended the Nithchayathartham function then.

Though most of us were dead tired, there was a group of ppl who wanted to watch a night show movie. Well we went to watch Anniyan, but maybe a couple of ppl of the 10 or so saw the movie. Rest took a good nap.

After everyone got ready we left for the marriage hall. It must have been really auspicious, there was even some rain then. Most of the guys were amazed by the very different marriage. Our tradition is pretty different and is also shorter than other marriages. In the afternoon, there was a small cultural event in the mandapam. Olu's little niece danced really well for lots of songs. Also the function was graced by Thiru's voice. But to have a thrishti pottu, Olu insisted that I sing as well :). Well I made sure everyone laughed.

Our return journey was entertaining as we were playing Literature (a card game) with a couple of more Trilogians. It was pretty intellectually stimulating. Back to office on Tuesday.

-Palani