Hosting a dinner at home

If you own a four-chair dining table at home, inviting three friends over for dinner isn`t a great idea. We invited three friends and ended up having a buffet – and being used to buffets, after finishing their dinner they placed Rs 300 each on the dining table and left. OK, I am just kidding.

Last weekend we had gone to Bharani`s house for lunch. After working with ibibo for a year, Bharani (along with another ex-ibibo star Sunny) started a neat search engine called Antya. Since, this search engine could turn big and I might need a good job when I am kicked out of ibibo, we invited Bharani and his wife home.

There is no better way to spend one`s time than by investing in Networking & Public Relations. So much so, my wife sends me gifts on Diwali, and New Year to maintain the relations. To start networking log into ibibo now.

Besides Bharani and his wife, we also invited Fayaz, who came home with a bottle of red wine. After seeing the bottle of red wine I told myself: “I got to invite this guy more often.”

As for Bharani and his wife, they brought along loads of fruits and sweets. After close scrutiny Rekha looked at me and nodded her head, which meant: “No, this is not what we gave them last week. They aren`t returning stuff.”

The difficult part of inviting colleagues… is preparing the house for their arrival. After we borrowed good furniture from the neighbor (who had borrowed our fridge when his colleagues came visiting) we started cleaning the washrooms. It was a good thing we did…for we discovered a mirror that was hidden behind all the muck. I also had to clean the toilet bowl – which was a disaster because the moment I had applied Harpic on the inner walls of the toilet bowl I had to pee!

As part of the cleaning process we also had to change the baby`s diaper. For those of you who are curious…well yes, I spotted a Yellow Africa on my baby`s bums when the diapers were removed.

The initial discussion was about office – what else could be common between colleagues. With time we moved on to Television programs, our past, stand-up comedy, search engines, and eventually babies. As soon as the topic veered on babies, Rekha started contributing and we all started listening.

By 8 p.m. only half of the wine bottle was full. After complimenting myself for my positive approach to life (remember, I saw the half empty bottle as half full)…I poured myself another round. Ten minutes later I noticed that the bottle as three-fourths full. Needless to say, I had to compliment myself again and pour myself another round of the red wine.

By nine we started the buffet. Being a health conscious cook, Rekha had ensured that half of her dishes were only half cooked. Being the good Samaritans, everybody said: ‘Great food.” Fayaz went on to add: “Is the less salt in dal, intentional?” Thankfully, Rekha didn`t hear the statement.

After dinner, we sat down and started talking again. I had half a mind to put on the music and ask the guys to dance….but the fact that I only had Jai Santosh Ma bhajans in the iPod made the decision making easy.

At 11 p.m., everybody bade farewell and went their ways. The moment they stepped out, Rekha asked: “So, how do you think we fared?”

“4.5 out of 5, I guess. What do you say?” I have always been lenient towards myself.

“Yeah. Good that we practiced our jokes & responses twice before,” Rekha said with a wink.

“Yeah. And now they will think we are a happy couple,” I said even as I placed the soiled plates in the sink.

“You mean we aren`t?”

Though the silence was deafening, I decided not to respond.

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