My nephew Uday Bhaskar is a Dental Surgeon and is presently working in Al Dammam, Saudi Arabia. He has completed a year’s service there and he is now here on a two and a half months vacation. Since about two months we were aware of his long vacation but were not sure of the date of his arrival. Then since about three weeks he began to inform us that he would be arriving on 13th July. When I spoke to him on 8th July night, he told me of his flight schedules and confirmed that he would be reaching Hyderabad at 10:30 AM on 13th July. We did not believe him initially because ever since he left home in August 1996 for studying B.D.S. at Pune, M.D.S. at AIIMS, New Delhi, and then a job at Lucknow, he has always surprised us by reaching home earlier than indicated. There was also a surprise element in his mode of travel. He used to state that he is traveling by train and suddenly arrive by flight and always when we were least expecting him.
We were more or less convinced this time by his sincere talk but my son Srikanth did not believe him. But eventually Uday Bhaskar convinced my son too; about the date of his arrival. Then suddenly he appeared at home on 10th July afternoon, three days prior to the date virtually promised to us. We were once again surprised and especially happy as it was the day of my father’s ceremony and he could partake in it. There were also some close relatives in the house for the ceremony who were also happy to see him.
Somehow playing these pranks has become a habit with him and we continue to believe him. When he went to Saudi Arabia for the first time on 14th July’08 (that is exactly a year ago) we were thinking that he would be able to come home only after a year and at the most after 6 or 8 months. But he and Hina his wife maintained total secrecy and suddenly arrived at Hyderabad within two months in mid-September ’08. They were here for a fortnight as Ramzan holidays were declared at the College where he is working.
He has a partner in Hyderabad in playing these pranks on us and it is my other nephew Sridhar, my sister’s son. Uday is my brother’s son. Sridhar maintains total secrecy over Uday’s travel plans; he takes care of him if he is arriving by late trains or flights and brings him home at the most appropriate time to surprise us.
On 12th July I made the following comment in facebook on Uday’s pranks: A surprise homecoming as usual! His umpteen homecoming pranks, starting from the times of Pune, Delhi, Lucknow and now Saudi Arabia continue to astonish us!
To this Hina replied: hehe..chacha i tell him that soon all of u will be surprised only when he reaches on the said day!!!...not very far away!
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