Humor
The saga of a multi-family trip
Don’t get swayed by the title. This article is not about that…
To ring in the New Year of 2020, a bunch of us friends and our respective families decided to go out to a hill station close by. We planned a 3-day trip. The final count was 10 families and 33 bodies. This included one guy who was visiting India from the US.
With so many men, women, and kids, we naturally had to take pandemonium also along. Pandemonium loves such big happy gatherings.
We had booked ourselves into a resort in Chikmagalur. One resort was apparently not enough to house all of us. A nearby resort had also been booked for this jolly party.
After a slow and steady bus ride where the driver refused to put his foot on the accelerator, we finally made it to the resort.
Room or Dorm?
After we entered, we tried to head straight to our rooms to freshen up and get some much needed coffee.
The family who had booked the resort and therefore knew the lay of the land had not yet arrived. They were driving down separately.
Mistake: We did not wait for the couple who had handled the bookings to arrive before we figured out our rooms.
In our angst to settle down, we rushed in the direction of the rooms. We found that there were three rooms with double beds, and one dorm-like room with almost 18 bunk beds.
But…but…how would this work? We were 33 bodies in all…
All the ladies got into a huddle and started discussing this very pressing problem.
Maybe all the ladies could sleep in the dorm? There were 9 ladies. We should be able to fit comfortably. And imagine the fun we could have!
Wait! Then what will happen to the kids? There were 14 kids with a mix of boys and girls ranging from 6 yrs to 18 years. How would that work? Where would they go?
And let us not forget the 10 men about whom no one was worrying right now.
By then someone panic-called the couple who had made the bookings.
We received two important bits of information.
- There was a big bungalow deeper in the resort, and there were a few rooms there too.
- We also had reservations in a nearby resort. There were some more rooms there.
Phew! At least the number of rooms was not an issue.
But…most of the ladies wanted to be together. We had had enough of our husbands. We wanted to get together and have some intellectually stimulating conversations revolving around healthy eating, world hunger, world peace, the state of affairs in the US and the rest of the world, and you know…such like.
By this time, one group of people had headed off to the big bungalow to check it out.
The bungalow was mind-blowing. It was set in the midst of greenery and was so tastefully done up. Suddenly everyone wanted to be in that bungalow, and to hell with intellectual conversations.
Time for Some Rapid Math
We found that the big bungalow had three rooms.
Now try to keep up and do the math.
What do we have so far? One dorm with several bunk beds. Three rooms next to that. And three rooms in the big bungalow. Assuming all kids slept in the dorm, and two people slept in each room, we covered 14 kids and 12 adults of mixed gender. That still left about 7 people out in the cold. Maybe not. Remember we had rooms in another resort?
Who would those 7 people be? Aha. As if that had a simple answer.
Now the crowd formed itself into two huddles. All the men in one, and all the women in another.
The kids had all wandered off to do the thing we were actually there for — have fun!!
The adults were left to solve the complex problem of who sleeps with whom and where!!
After some time, the women came up with a solution. One of the women was dispatched to the huddle of men to propose the solution. The solution was heard and vetoed, at great speed. After all, the men knew best!
Around that time, the couple who had made the bookings arrived on the scene.
Both huddles tried to get their word in with the couple, while the couple tried to explain their well-thought-out plan.
Somewhere in between this pandemonium, a bunch of women and kids flagged down a passing car and headed off to the other resort. After all, it was important to check all available options before any proposal was made.
This group came back armed with game-changing information. They were unanimous in their verdict. None of the women and kids wanted to be at the other resort. Well, at least that was settled.
The Final Results
After much coaxing, convincing, and arguing the men finally agreed to ‘allow’ all the kids to sleep in the dorm. As if there was a choice. The kids had already decided. The kids were ecstatic. They were going to have so much fun.
The ladies were a tad bit jealous. After all, that’s exactly what the ladies wanted to do.
Anyway, after this disappointment, the ladies were very clear that they would not be separated from each other. They put their foot down over the whole ‘married couples get one room each’ philosophy.
Three sets of ladies (6 ladies in all) quickly went ahead and laid claim to the three rooms next to the dorm.
If you are keeping track of numbers, you will wonder about the other 3 women. What happens to them?
More discussions followed. The 3 rooms were surveyed again, and it was found that one of the beds was large enough to accommodate 3 ladies.
That left two ladies.
Well, one of them was a tad under the weather. So she and her hubby were assigned a comfortable room in the big bungalow.
Another one was the mom of the youngest baby. He was already fast asleep on her lap. The baby, the mommy, and the hubby were assigned another room in the big bungalow.
Ok, now what about the hapless husbands whose wives had left them for the company of women?
All these men were politely asked to go to the other resort. The men put up a big show of reluctance and sadness at being separated from their better halves. However, reports that came in the next morning reveal otherwise. Apparently, the men had a rollicking time drinking themselves silly and engaging in an ear-numbing snore-fest later in the night. Such fun!
While all this was being settled, two of the older girls stole the opportunity to park themselves in the remaining room in the fancy big bungalow.
With that, all rooms were occupied. All bodies had beds.
Everyone seemed to be with the people they wanted to spend the night with.
We all made it a night to remember 😉
The next day was 31st December. We had a party that night. Lots of raucous singing, dancing, and drinking later, it was time to go to bed.
You would expect that since we had spent enough time on the problem the previous day, we had it all sorted, right? Dead wrong! We had a completely new set of problems related to ‘who will sleep with whom and where’ on the night of the New Year.
I’ll need to write a whole new post about it.
This story is published in Writers on the Run. If you’re interested in submitting your travel stories please visit our submission guidelines.
Anu Anniah Writes 