An Incredible Quiz Competition

After a completely boring week of very little work at the office (whereby I was practically reading novels, surfing countless sites and doing small work in between), Friday evening set the tone for a terrific weekend. We had a quiz competition at the office. Well the groundwork was laid on Thursday itself when we had an informal discussion (more like a knowledge sharing session) on a wide range of topics. It was enthralling especially after a whole day’s toil at the office. People left the office in earnest and in slight preparation for the demonic questions to be unleashed on Friday evening.

Was I anxious? Was I earnest for the quiz to begin and may be win it? I am quite sure my answer was “NO” for both these questions and for any other related questionnaire including the quiz. The day (the nine hours of torture) passed on with me spending most of the time by reading “The Testament”. The plot has been very nicely woven by John Grisham with some fabulous narrating techniques and an amazing climax (a most unexpected one). I spent the entire day absorbed in the book, oblivious of my surroundings and with no concern whatsoever for team registration for the quiz. In fact, I had planned to leave the office before the quiz began.

Well, the evening finally arrived and I could not find an escape route for myself. So with no aim to progress beyond the first round, we registered ourselves as “Gajab Pagle” and “Ajab Pagle” (the names were supposed to be honest conclusions about ourselves and not euphemisms). Earlier in the day, I had broken my spectacles (aankhon ka diya) which had me pissed on myself (both for my laxity and for the astronomical sum to be spent on it).

So, the first round began with 20 questions to be answered in a sheet of paper. The questions were being displayed on a TV and unfortunately I had a strain my eyes to the fullest to get a fair view of the question. Questions were bizarre, some easy, for quite a few you could do nothing but stare at other people (who appeared to know the answers; not sure correct answer or not), and for the rest you could take a wild guess. Well, we rode on our luck amidst all the fun whereby the “Gajab Pagle” proclaimed to know all the answers. We struck off some answers, and then wrote a different one, but however rewrote it to the original one. Amidst all the fanfare in our group, we finally submitted our answers, with no hope of progressing beyond this round.

As the answers were announced, we were the happiest faces around. We cheered and at times jeered at the other teams too. Finally, I guess we got the maximum correct answers and to the surprise of everybody passed on to the next round in flying colors. Well, among the four team selected for the final round, we were again being mocked at both by ourselves and by others. There was no hope (at all) of answering the super tough questions in this round. After the first round, we were trailing by five points (our team had scored a duck in this round). In the second round, we scored a bonus point and now languished at the last position as other teams had again scored heavily in this round.

The third round started in earnest with each time wanting to make the best of it. However, nothing exceptional happened to our team as we were able to another five points and now were demoted back to the last place. Unfortunately for us, we got all the tough questions and could never lay our hands on the easy questions (they used to exhaust before reaching us). With no hope of a win, we decided to have a little fun around and make fund of everybody. However, seems destiny had some other plans for our team. We scored a full ten point on a guess (oh the lady luck was sure on our side now). As if that was not enough, we capped our stunning scoring run to score another five points on a passed question. Well, the other teams could only shake their heads in disgust to see us leading the competition now. No other team was able to score any points in this round, which augured well for us. So, we were leading by full ten points after the end of this round.

Hey, the “Gajab Pagle” had surprised the audience and the other contestants to win the Quiz Competition. Hurrah, we jumped in air and there were rounds of “High Five”, handshakes and hugs all around me. The underdogs, the outsiders had stormed the event, surprised one and all. Well, the celebrations which started then finally came to end after an ice-cream treat at Corner House.

Cheers to Kush, Vibhav, other team members and not to mention me!!!!!