First & foremost, if you are living in Gulf, Eid is one of the very few long holidays that you would get. Especially, for Muslims, it is a holistic holiday to mark the end of Ramadan - the Islamic holy month of fasting. Eidis an Arabic word meaning "festivity", while Fiṭr means "conclusion of the fast"; and so the holiday celebrates the conclusion of the thirty days of dawn-to-sunset fasting during the entire month of Ramadan.
In fact, except Christmas (when some companies closed their business for few days), it is one of the two holidays which would last more than one day. Thus, there is no need to explain the level of anticipation. Since, it is not longer enough (maximum three days), there is very little chance to go out from the country. Hence, most of the residents use to travel within the country to unleash the enormous working stress.
All right, that is a short introduction of the Eid and the custom of UAE expatriates on Eid holidays.
Therefore, it was a custom of our guys to arrange a domestic trip and this time our batch rep Pumba, got in to the act early. He came up with some 5 or 6 ideas and was voted to select one. Eventually, we managed to finalise a place and was a bit quicker too. Riggians started the business early and event was carefully planned.
As always, time passed very quickly and the day was closing quickly. Wamsi, was brilliant in his graphics and came up with some magnificent postings throughout and I would say it set the tone early.
Even more surprisingly, we managed to reach the resort on time and as usual Cheka was the administrator of the hotel booking. It is fascinating to study that our batch is filled with vastly varied skilled people and it is more eminent when there is an event of this nature. Finally, we got some rooms and the goods were unloaded quickly. Meantime, the fun game team were on the move and could see a lot of preparation. Pattaya (the creative producer of the fun games) was in the beach early and was filling baloons while other members (Paska, Dagee, Mula and Waman) getting ready for the other fun stuff. After around half an hour, everything was ready for a quite lengthy playful game session. It started with the "filling water to a bottle" game. There were 6 players per team and altogether there were 3 teams. It was fantastic and was quite an activity too. It gave everybody a thought of how bad their stamina have gone down. It was won by the Jahuta & clans.
Then it was the "musical coin" time. It was also filled with loads of fun especially through the cheerful commentaries of Waman and the absolutely amazing and surprising topics to speak on.
Then, the time came for "catching of water baloons". Absolutely no words to express the fun and everybody got wet except very few. Won by DT and wife of Lapsi.
Next was the "tug of war" and Lapsi was the chief in command. There was no exception on the typical nature and was ended up by a win from Lokka & clans. Fun games lasted in that manner and although it was filled with fun the level of exercise it gave, driven everybody towards the pool.
Playing in the pool was another joyful event in itself. It lasted for around 2 hours and there were a lot of swimming classes went on including DT's rope swimming. It was amazing.
While, the pool playing went wild, there were some workhorses busy on the BBQ preparation. Although it may not be healthy, it is a change of dine, isn't it?? At the end, BBQ paved the way for the Padura. 
Padura was conducted by our musical maestro - Wamsi, and there were many artists came from no where eventually. There were all range of songs from classical to modern hip-hop. Milton, Clarence, Jothi, Kapuge, Victor were in the cards throughout.
All the guys & gals’ choosed to request their favorite songs and Padura was pretty generous to give all of them. It was good 4 hours of entertainment (well structured too) and then the ladies wanted to get some rest.
It was the high time and oh boy... was a beginning of all Baila, 6-8 beats, everything else, you name it. It was absolutely a replay of the “golden pavilion era” and seemed that everybody was waiting for that. I was amazed the way all of us treat our past in the same manner. This session also lasted for around another 2 hours and the clock was around 2.30a.m. Sleep time....
It concluded the Padura-a true recall of our golden memories. It was a very sad moment to end the event but the ultimate truth of the nature again became a fact.
It was the high time and oh boy... was a beginning of all Baila, 6-8 beats, everything else, you name it. It was absolutely a replay of the “golden pavilion era” and seemed that everybody was waiting for that. I was amazed the way all of us treat our past in the same manner. This session also lasted for around another 2 hours and the clock was around 2.30a.m. Sleep time....
It concluded the Padura-a true recall of our golden memories. It was a very sad moment to end the event but the ultimate truth of the nature again became a fact.
As you can preview, the half an hour after that was in the same caliber of the past and you know the particulars.
The next day was dedicated for some Bowling action. After the “light” breakfast gang got in to the boat to have a boat trip to a nearby flamingo island. Although the name is flamingo we could see very few flamingos. Some professional cameras were around and it was the high time for the guys to click some beautiful sceneries around.
At last everybody got in to the vehicles and started the journey back. There was that miserable cloud all over to leave such a wonderful event and place. This time DT was the leader and everybody was after him. Bata was also not far behind from DT and was a firm indication for the rest that we would go in the “meke yanna ona widiha”. Everything was fine and ride was smooth too although the road was bit tricky. We ride and ride and suddenly, there was a quite risky and thorough breaking from DT. It was truly a surprise which prompt me to look on the exactly overheaded sign board. As I remember it was to “Ras Al Khaimah”. O.k. story is loud and clear now and at last but not least we had found another "short cutter" J. There were no options but we managed to curb the problem by another well thought short cut and this time surprisingly from Bataaaa. Eventually we came back to the Emirates road and again the king was DT but this time around he managed to take us to the Dubai Bowling Center without any further hugger-mugger and again surprisingly on time. I need to highlight that this whole trip was on track with very small ups and downs.
Well, In terms of Bowling, the event started with a high level of energy and the veterans like Paska, Dagee, Cheka, Wamsi, Bata, Jima, Lokka, Jahut, Manta, Lapsi & Sanura were among the leading scorers early. However, all the others were up to the task and there was a very close contest throughout. DT was remarkable with a great performance on his debut and won the emerging player of the tournament. Ladies were also brilliant and Maduni was the best scorer. Well, not surprisingly at all, Dagee was the top scorer from men’s competition and it was the overall conclusion of another wonderful session. The lunch was followed by the Bowling session and was in the same tone. With that the marvelous trip was came to an end and a miserable feeling was across the board. :( :(
At last everybody got in to the vehicles and started the journey back. There was that miserable cloud all over to leave such a wonderful event and place. This time DT was the leader and everybody was after him. Bata was also not far behind from DT and was a firm indication for the rest that we would go in the “meke yanna ona widiha”. Everything was fine and ride was smooth too although the road was bit tricky. We ride and ride and suddenly, there was a quite risky and thorough breaking from DT. It was truly a surprise which prompt me to look on the exactly overheaded sign board. As I remember it was to “Ras Al Khaimah”. O.k. story is loud and clear now and at last but not least we had found another "short cutter" J. There were no options but we managed to curb the problem by another well thought short cut and this time surprisingly from Bataaaa. Eventually we came back to the Emirates road and again the king was DT but this time around he managed to take us to the Dubai Bowling Center without any further hugger-mugger and again surprisingly on time. I need to highlight that this whole trip was on track with very small ups and downs.
Well, In terms of Bowling, the event started with a high level of energy and the veterans like Paska, Dagee, Cheka, Wamsi, Bata, Jima, Lokka, Jahut, Manta, Lapsi & Sanura were among the leading scorers early. However, all the others were up to the task and there was a very close contest throughout. DT was remarkable with a great performance on his debut and won the emerging player of the tournament. Ladies were also brilliant and Maduni was the best scorer. Well, not surprisingly at all, Dagee was the top scorer from men’s competition and it was the overall conclusion of another wonderful session. The lunch was followed by the Bowling session and was in the same tone. With that the marvelous trip was came to an end and a miserable feeling was across the board. :( :(
Let me also do a small vote of thanks here. First and foremost, thanks a lot to Pumba for arranging such a wonderful trip and the rest of the Rigga boys also have to be thanked immensely. I think everybody would agree that they did around 75% of the hard work. Thanks a lot my dear bros. Ladies also done a lot of hard work by preparing a lot of delicious food items. The rest of the guys also done a great job by arranging the activities (this reminds me Deka) and altogether everybody played their role to the perfection.
Moreover, a special vote of thanks goes to Lokka for coming all the way from Qatar by spending money & time to meet us. That’s absolutely unbelievable and hats off for that beloved touch of friendship that you showed to us. Three cheers for Lokka.
Thanks everyone again for arranging such a marvelous trip.
Altogether, the trip was much needed and awaited from all of us and had been organized exceptionally to the finest detail you ever can imagine. Absolutely marvelous. I have been to many trips and can recall at least one shortfall of everyone of them but not in this. Remarkably brilliant experience and everybody was thoroughly enjoyed. This was in the calibre of our golden trips in the past and hopefully we would be able to arrange many more in the years to come..
