Giving Surprises

Surprises are foolish things. The pleasure is not enhanced, and the inconvenience is often considerable.

That’s what Jane Austen said. But I am a person who loves surprises but only the pleasant ones 😀 I like giving and receiving surprises. I love to see the expression of the person whom I surprised, the way his/her face lights up and the way he/she bursts into smiles. 🙂

The surprises I give are not only in the form of gifts and stuff but also in the form of turning up suddenly at home without information. The first time I did that was way back when I was studying B.E. in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh and was living in hostel there. We were five roommates, among which four including me were from Chattisgarh. I and another girl from my hometown and other 2 girls from another city in C.G. So we used to take the same train to hometowns. You know how it is in hostel life…some consecutive festival holidays will come (the advantage of living in India) and we will plan a short trip to home by bunking one day few days here and there 😛

So once there were some holidays (official and ‘unofficial’) and we decided to surprise our parents. The train, Mahandi Express, was a good one. It used to reach my destination in 12 hours. But now it has been discontinued. Anyway so I and my friend reached our destination station at around 4.30 am. Then we took an auto. Looking back I wonder how brave we were and how safe our hometown was. We knew one of us would get down first and the other one would have to go alone in auto at early dawn in a desolated town. I chose to be the second one. I don’t know if my hometown is so safe now!

I reached home around 5 am and the front gate was locked. I climbed over it and was about to ring the bell when I heard someone opening the front door 😀 The rattling of the metal gate had awakened my mother and she had poked my dad to go and investigate if it is a burglar!! He was surprised nonetheless and later annoyed that I took the risk of coming alone. 🙂

Now many years later, I repeated my surprise again. But this time the target was my sister who is visiting home after 4 years and my niece who has come for the first time to Grandpa – Grandma’s home all the way from Denmark. 🙂 Ever since Didi has come, she was saying it would have been so good if my little sister was there. My mother was also feeling the same because one daughter is there and another is not. If I was there, the four of us – Dad, Maa, Didi and I – would be together in our home after 4 years. So my heart started aching for home. Then I saw the holiday list for Jan 2014 – 11th was 2nd Saturday (holiday at work), 12th Sunday, 14th Eid, 15th Sankranti…yipppeeee!!! So taking official and unofficial sick leaves into account, I booked flight tickets and informed only my Dad with strict instructions to keep it a secret, even from Maa. Maa is extremely bad in keeping a secret 🙂

I reached on 10th at around 8.30 pm and the first person to get shocked was my Maa. I gestured her to keep quiet and went inside. Didi was feeding dinner to my niece Parul…I just went and stood with a grin on my face. Didi was shocked as if she had seen a ghost and was about to drop the feeding spoon. The only person who was nonchalant was my niece who had last seen me in person when she was just one year one month old. 😀 😀 After spending few days of fun with Parul and making friends with her, I came back to Bangalore on 15th.

Flight tickets (to and fro) – Rs 11000.

Expressions on family members’ faces and the time spent with Parul – Priceless!!!

So tell me, my dear readers, what sort of surprise have you given to anyone recently?

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