Incredible India - We did Christmas and tried to party

Away in a manager

One has to give all kudos to Koenig Solutions for hastily arranging a Christmas party this afternoon considering a good number of us will be in India over the Christmas and New Year holidays.

In a Hindu majority country and possibly Hindu majority city along with the staff of Koenig Solutions, one can appreciate the involvement of everyone to help ease the nostalgia that is accentuated by being away at such a time from family, relations, friends and home.

The roof terrace was carpeted green, with white and pinkish-red curtains as cordons round the entire terrace, no, it was not nightclub ambience.

Good King Wenceslas

The party somewhat started before I got there with my new trainer, the compere who I think is probably one of the senior officials was introducing the main members of his team who were the technical managers and team leaders of the clusters of trainers for the courses the Koenig Solutions runs.

If anything, it was a wonderful showcase of the Indian talent that makes Koenig Solutions a high choice for the many who run the gauntlet of inscrutable visa application processes and endure with little commentary the conditions that yearn for some voices.

As I was opportuned to read on my Twitter time line yesterday; a good man does no good remaining silent when he should be talking – not that I will arrogate to myself any status than to make observations and offer suggestions.

O come all ye faithful

One cannot say the trainers were examples of public speaking nor were their comments representative of the expertise or underlying genius of their ability. If not shy, reticent and somewhat too stiff to join in the fun of the compere who seemed to have a rather good sense of fun and humour that made for some entertainment.

The disk jockey was a confused spell of discs with the music starting and stopping abruptly that it made for irritation that could draw the ire of plugging the plug and asking everyone to do nursery rhymes instead.

Drinks were served and the Santa Claus whose costume could do with a few well directed claws cut the cake with a knife I thought was a camp knife picked up as an afterthought.

God rest ye, merry gentlemen

Then we were invited to play games, at which point, farce was beckoning the farcical – the trainees were in an inner circle walking in a clockwise direction and the trainers on the outer circle walking in an anti-clockwise direction and as the music spluttered to a stop, the trainee and trainer were to give the first impressions of each other – I held my head in my hands.

O, for some inspiration; maybe some wisdom, surely, it could get no worse as a second and third round of walking left the partners misaligned. Maybe I should not forget the observation of another colleague for all he could see were 8 men holding hands – it was a game if you were there but a picture might just convey a different impression.

Once in royal David’s city

Then the floor was opened for dancing, everything from hip-hop through Bollywood music was thrown in with the expected segue of a DJ at hand.

Soon we were spared any more torture, the party ended not really having been a party in a general sense but at least it offered a time for us to let down our hair – What am I talking about? I have none.

So, there was our Christmas party and I would generously not rate it apart from say it gets full marks for good intentions and some cake.

Thank you, Koenig Solutions for bringing Bethlehem to New Delhi.