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After a gruelling week in office, the one or two day weekend for most people in the City seems more like blink-and-miss. Metrolife speaks to some hard-working Bangaloreans to find out, what they do on their days off.
Since his childhood, Suraj V P, a senior customer support officer, has been a dedicated cricketer and doesn’t fail to play the sport on weekends. “On most holidays, I will be playing for a company or a club match,” he says. Apart from playing cricket, he organises his work for the coming week. “And the evenings are spent either with the family or partying with friends,” he adds.
Despite a two-day weekend, Suraj feels his holidays get over before he can even realise. “Every time I start work on a Monday, I will be wondering, ‘Oh! I need to work for five more days before Friday’,” he laughs. Being a movie buff, Suraj manages to catch up with every new release as well. “The last movies I saw were New York in Hindi, Masilamani in Tamil and Oye! in Telugu,” he exclaims.
Madhura, a senior software engineer, completely believes in variety being the spice of life and ensures that she does something different every weekend. “I prefer a mixture of everything to balance my life,” she laughs. So while she goes shopping for clothes and jewellery on one of the days she’s off work, she attends art exhibitions during the other. “I keep browsing through newspapers to read up on the events happening in the City,” she adds.
Madhura also loves to explore Karnataka, and keeps travelling across the State. “The last place I went to was Vani Vilasa Sagar, near Davangere last month.” Thanks to her offs, she has learnt the art of yoga and applying mehendi. “And I just love doing crossword puzzles,” she laughs.
As a business development engineer, who is into marketing, Rohit Rajan’s six-day weeks are surely hectic. “Being a member of the Harmonica Club, I go for the meetings on Sunday mornings, and play the instrument,” he says. Rohit is into ‘mad ads’ as well. “When I was in college, I was part of the ‘mad ads’ team. We had performed in many colleges,” he recollects. “After becoming an alumni, we had organised a charity show which was attended by many. We have been doing many shows post that.” Rohit also spends time at Ashraya, a school for the mentally retarded at least once a month.
Madhumita used to be an entrepreneur not very long ago, and would work six and sometimes even seven days a week. Currently, working as a Director, Operations in a software products company, she gets two days off a week. “Since my children are grown up now, I get free time for myself on holidays. However, a lot of household chores pile up through out the week so most Saturdays are spent in finishing those,” she says.
She makes it a point to visit her parents and mother-in-law once a week too. “Sundays are for complete relaxation,” she says. A self-confessed compulsive book buyer, she spends a lot of her time reading as well and has a huge library at home. “I read two or three books at a time mostly,” she laughs. “The only regret I have is that I don’t get enough time to spend with my friends,” she says.