Experiencing ‘Farm Life‘

It has been long time since we all got a chance to venture together anywhere from office. However, we still have fresh and fond memories of our last general offsite. We all eager enthusiasts therefore, decided to go for a picnic. This meant communing with nature at a place full of incredible beauty accompanied with good food. In our planning stages, we circulated a sheet of paper to know who all were interested in coming with their pocket expenses. We were surprised to know that the same fire for an outing and adventure was burning in many hearts. Our recce was in the form of browsing through many websites and virtually trying to find out the locations, which were near Mumbai and in our budget. After several days of browsing through several destinations, we finalized on a place in Nerul called ‘Farm Life’.







The appointed day for our picnic was the first Saturday of June. We left office at 12.30 pm to catch the 1.42 pm Karjat train. Only a few people had lunch and rest had to manage with the Vada–Samosa Pav at the station. We purchased second-class tickets for all and as soon the train arrived, we jumped in and took our seats. Mouli took the third seat. We asked him to sit on the window or second seat but he kept on insisting, “I m fine, I m fine”. The journey was two hours long, which I am used to, but for the rest of them, they kept on asking me how much time more to reach. At Thane, Piyush joined us and immediately the atmosphere changed. We followed his initiation and then started cracking jokes to the enjoyment of all. With the chitter-chatter and jokes we finally reached Neral station, where a car cum tempo was awaiting our arrival to take us to Farm Life. We were 16 in number and along with our luggage we were wondering how on earth we all will fit in. Even though we were unsure, the driver was confident about the capacity of his vehicle. A little adjustment here, a little compromise there, finally we all were inside the vehicle and on our way to our priced destination, a 20 minutes drive to Farm Life.

Our first impression of Farm Life was that of shock. A culture shock of sorts in the form of something which did not at all resemble anything that was on the website. We kept asking ourselves whether we are at the right place or the pictures on their site were from somewhere else. Shikha and myself, we were both horrified. There was no scope for anything to be done now and we finally decided to stay.

It was a good decision we thought later. Though the place was not up to our expectations, it was not that bad. The time we spent there was enjoyed by all of us. Our aim of having fun was achieved. Our childhood memories were refreshed when we played Pittu, Chain-chain, etc. Pittu was fun; everyone made their own rules. We set two teams with Shikha the captain of one and I the captain of the other. But the mess was so much that nobody knew in whose team they were. That gave rise to the best game of Pittu everyone must have played ever. We really had fun with bit of harmless banter and cheating. After the two games, we were completely exhausted and just wanted to jump in a swimming pool. We enjoyed and had fun at the same swimming pool, which was not looking that appealing earlier. We sang songs in the pool and were there for almost 3 to 4 hours. The highlight was Archana’s melodious song and the happening rap by Sachin.
Once out of the pool, we satiated our appetite with delicious Chicken and Bakri, cooked on the chulha (wooden stove). The food was amazing with smoke taste. The major part of the night was spent in the pros playing ‘Teen Patti’ and the other enjoying or attempting Dumb Charades. Sachin was the winner in Teen Patti. The only loss was the breaking of a chair at the end of the game. He introduced us to two new words- ‘Rawas’ and ‘Fancy’ which we came to know meant nice. So, whenever we met Sachin, we greeted each other with, “Hi Rawas…how’s everything…ekdum Fancy na….”

Next day we all woke up late and had sumptuous breakfast. We all entertained ourselves with some time pass till lunch time and then left Farm Life. We came back with fond memories of Farm Life and the wonderful time we had together.