Every batch of MTs (management trainees or as we liked to call ourselves..emptys! Well, we did get paid the least in the organisation save for the support staff!) after their month long training had a lavish party thrown in their honor! Usually at some 5 Star or the other or at some very fancy Club. This was the ONE event that all of us looked forward to all the time. It was the one thing that kept us sane all through the torturous field training, the classroom sessions and we really wanted to let our hair down and PARTYYYYY!!!
Now,there was this one trainee who had joined our Delhi office and had come down to Bombay for the training. Let's just call her K. Now K just loovvveeeddddd Ricky Martin and all music that was Latino.. or one could also say all Latino that was, or for that matter, was not music. Someday I'll post about what she did to the poor Latino Trainee the Delhi office had!!!! ;) So, there was K who, like the rest of us, was all excited about the party. Now the MT party was also attended by everyone in the organisation, including the CEO! So, while all of us were really looking forward to it, we were also feeling a little inhibited about dancing wildly and drinking too much. Afterall, no one would want to puke on their VP or call names to their Super Boss in an inebriated state, right?
So, the party was on in full swing at the Bombay Gymkhama and spirits (not the supernatural ones!) were flowing and the music rocked and all of us were dancing pretty wildly... Then suddenly there is a change in music and one after another Latino numbers were being played. The few of us who were from the same B School immediately figured that K had had a word with the DJ. And we knew what was to come and so we slyly slithered away and hid behind a large pillar for protection. Why protection? Read on...
Latino music does something to K. It unleashed the demon in her. Or at any rate takes her to another place far removed from her current geographic location! I think the Latino beats transpond K to the land of the Salsa and of no inhibitions!!! As soon as the first Latino number came on.. and I think that was Un, Dos, Tres..K jumped on to the dance floor and started doing a version of Salsa that would make most people want to hide for cover, lest she pull them onto the floor or shake them till their teeth clattered! In fact, there was this one party on campus where a poor, unsuspecting junior was shaken and yanked around so much that he dislocated his shoulder!!! So, the bunch of us who had seen K in action knew what to expect and hence, were hiding behind the pillar.
Once Un, Dos, Tres ended, Livin' La Vida Loca came on. Dictated by the savage beast that was now controlling her, K made a grab for one of the VPs- a guy called JJ. Now, K is around 5'7'' tall and broad while JJ is 6'2" and could often be mistaken for a large stick insect on good days and on bad days he couldn't be seen at all! So, K continued her violent rendition of the Salsa and started twirling JJ all around the room. JJ was pulled, pushed, twirled, shaken..just like clothes are in a drier! Poor JJ looked like he was being run over by a large tank. Sums, Bobo and I looked on in shock. I just crossed my fingers and hoped that by the time this song was through JJ would still be in a position to stand! Sums (my buddy and batchmate from B School) was almost delirious and looked like he would pass out any minute. All through the song, all Sums did was mutter, "My Boss, My boss... she will kill my boss!" I didn't know whether to console Sums or to collapse on the floor laughing!
Finally the song ended and K released JJ, who flew across the room and crashed into a tray of drinks some four feet away! Sums and a couple of others ran to help him! By then the music had stopped and so K's trance was broken and she realised who it was that she was twirling all this while. She clapped her hands to her mouth and ran out of the room.....and was not seen for the rest of the evening... JJ, I am glad to announce, started walking after two days and at every Annual Meeting kept a SAFE distance from K! :))
