Thursday Club

Kingfisher has some great people and I by virtue of the nature of my job, get to interact with most of them. However, I could see that most of them did not know each other well enough nor did they have the time or inclination to make the effort to forge closer ties. So I took the initiative to set up the Thursday Club. The idea was to create a platform for people to interact with work colleagues once a month in an informal setting and get to know each other, appreciate each other and in the process break down barriers.

Some of the ground rules:
- Open to anyone from Kingfisher.
- There will be no hierarchy.
- No discussion on work. (difficult but the idea was NO serious discussion on work).

We started off by meeting on the rooftop of the Orchid and then graduating to popular restaurants and finally we have found that it is best to meet at Bunty Marwah's place. It is a time for all of us to let our hair down and release the pentup stress and enjoy ourselves.

It has now been over a year since I started the Thursday Club. It has given me a lot of joy and pleasure and I get a real boost when people send me emails to enquire when is the next one!!

Some of the things I love about it............

• The interaction between the very senior members in Kingfisher and the very junior. There truly is NO hierarchy.
• The support, love and care shown amongst the members.
• The way they refer to me as the President; makes me feel so important.
• The initiation ceremonies for new members (a product of Sanjai and Smitaa's imagination) and the way I "anoint" the new recruits.
• The pictures I take of everyone.

Some of my favourite TCs are:

• The one where Tushita cooked us her famous Burmese Khowsuey.
• The one where they brought in my birthday with the beautiful cake and Smitaa had to drop it!
• The one at Hard Rock Cafe where everyone was totally smashed.
• The one at Escobar where we had the tallest from Seabury and the shortest from Accenture!
• The one where we played drinking games (courtesy Prabh Sharan).
• The one where Smitaa and Sanjai hosted Big Boss.
• The one where we croaked at Karaoke.
• The one where Smitaa did a headstand and Tushita walked like a duck.
• The ones where Sheikh's wife cooked her yummy biryani.
• The one where we had the shiny disco ball and wore retro clothes.

Each of them had its uniqueness and it is difficult to actually pick a favourite one.

At Escobar in Bandra with all the staunch supporters of TC -

Bunty, Smitaa, Sanjai, Chenna, Harsh, Harshit and Arun

Big Boss - Sheikh as Oongli Baba

(Bunty holding the umbrella, Sanjai supervising the proceedings,

Arun making a joke of it all and Capt Puri enjoying the madness)

Big Boss - Ron

(Bunty in the foreground with a goofy smile and mischief in his eyes)

Sanjai, Aarti, Prabh, Capt Puri and myself

Myself, Chenna and Tushita

The beautiful picture on my birthday cake.