Tracy Hills Onam 2022

  Prakashettan announced clubhouse keys receipt at 10 AM. Gafoor, Vipin and myself brought the chairs and tables over to the clubhouse. Girish was setting up the sound system. We put the chairs into a stage and gallery arrangement and left home to bring our families over.

.......

An hour later,  when we dropped in with family, clubhouse was pretty much filled with the tracy hills keralite families in traditional attire,  ladies in kerala sarees, men in munde and shirt/juba, kids in traditional style clothes. The pookkalam was setup, sadya items had been arranged on the side tables,  sound system setup was complete and playing,  audience had occupied the gallery. The place just got live!


Prakashettan took the wireless mike and announced the program start,  each family got on the stage and introduced themselves. We had Thiruvathira kali performed around the traditional kerala style "vilakku". Audience enjoyed the dance and clapped loud to express appreciation. 


Gallery and stage gave way to dining seating with two tables on either side and one table in the middle. Initial plan was to seat on both sides of the tables and complete the sadya in two rounds. However, as serving would be a challenge with seating on both sides,  instead had three rounds with one side seating. Sadya itself was heart filling - special thanks to all the families for the amazing curries and also to Mahesh for a very thoroughly planned "task allotment" and coordination. 



Space reset into gallery and stage. Vijesh's daughters set the stage on fire with a dance performance. Anjali sang "Kannan thumbi" expertly, accompanied by her son on piano. Next up,  Girish sang and performed "Ilavannoor madathile" like a seasoned stage singer against karaoke music. I sang "Innale mayangumbol..", Ajit's daughters sang a keerthan followed by Ajit's amazing flute performance taking the art quotient of the day a notch further up. Leena chechi sang a chirpy "chinni chinni vilangane..".

Once the art programs were done, it was time for games! Musical chair for the kids, balloon stamping for kids, lemon and spoon race for the ladies,  water filling for the gents. 


 

The time was now 4:30 PM, time to vacate and clean up the place to return the keys by 5 PM.  I dropped  my chairs and children home and came back for the "vadamvali" that was supposed to happen outside on the ground.  While folks were still around, dispersal had started. We chatted near the pool for a bit and bade goodbyes. 

It was wonderful catching up with every one. It was great to watch how everyone worked closely together through the events of the day to make the program a grand success! Kudos to all the planning and preparations, and also to the last minute handling that kicked in the last two days.  Looking forward to many more such fun filled get-togethers! 

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