Another quick (mostly FIAT lovers) meet in Kochi

[hydrashok]

Folks, we had a quick meet in Kochi today. Mostly FIATs. And a Tarmac Race-winning Alto. Carfreak's Palio 1.6, MaxBHP's Siena and my Palio 1.2. And Zak's wolf-in-sheep's clothing Alto (not the much awaited 1.1 but the 800cc one).

Before I start, this program was sponsored by Carfreak. 3 cheers to him. (And may his search for proper alloys be fruitful soon).

Max was collecting his Siena from TVS after service. Carfreak drove him there. I met up with them at TVS (Elamakkara) by 7.00PM. We were discussing the travails of an earlier alloy purchase and soon Zak showed up. By then the watchman was getting jittery, seeing so much action there after hours. He came over and (half) 'politely' threw us out. We immediately decided to call a crisis meeting at Coco Tree to discuss and protest the incident over coffee and pastries in true Mallu ishtyle. I was especially pissed as the incident happened just as I was about to show off my ICE

We left for Coco Tree (coffee shop at the Avenue Regent hotel) immediately. After a missed turn-off (to Zak's house) and an awkward U turn, I picked up Zak at his house. Taha (aha @ TBHP) took over the crazy-mad Alto.

We reached the Hotel (we'd chosen the bloody place because they normally have enough parking) only to find they had nearly no parking left. But they offered to valet park the cars. Since I'd rather prefer to park my car in Hell and walk back to the hotel (rather than have my car and ICE groped by a valet parker), Zak and I decided to park the car bang in front of the hotel entrance. Having accomplished this in no way easy task (ok, to be serious they didn't really mind) we walked in to Coco Tree and occupied the far RHS corner table. We then ordered some really calorie-ridden (I still cringe at the thought and the taste of them in my mouth) pastry combos to protest the watchman's conduct. Carfreak and I will probably have to diet for a year to shed ourselves of the sin we indulged in (I mean the pastry things, and nothing else heh, heh). The others also shared in the sinful act and the protest. Carfreak paid the full bill 3 cheers to him, and thank you, Carfreak, for a great treat.

After thrashing various car brands and talking about other things, and calling up various TBHPians we had KPhilip join us. He ordered a particularly scary looking sizzler treat that everybody on the table just had to photograph. Soon we had Irfanmon (Zak's cousin) join us.

We broke by 10 as it was a weekday. And Zak had a long drive to Kozhikode ahead of him (which he had put off to make the meet).

Pics below. Sorry, no car pics as it was night and between the seven of us, we had only one true-blue camera (that didn't have any juice left).


Left to right: MAXBHP, Speedzak, myself, Carfreak, kphilip, aha. Snap taken by Irfanmon.



Left to right: Carfreak, kphilip



Zak!



kphilip's sizzler thing



aha & Maxbhp snapping kphilip's sizzler-thing



Irfanmon


OK, now can anybody guess what Zak is thinking? (Sorry Zak, couldn't resist )

[speedzak]

Hey guys! Nice meet it was. We had attendance of people from Delhi & Bangalore (On the phone of course).

The meet actually started before lunch. Mr Carfreak announced his much anticipated arrival on his infamous FIAT Palio 1.6 by 1pm. He wasn't late!
MaxBHP was in town to pick his FIAT siena from the service centre.
They both met up @ Canopy, ABAD. (Max loves this place it seems). I joined them by 1:45pm. After some regular ha ba blah blah, we decided to have lunch somewhere. Myself & Carfreak was hungry and could've gulped down the can of Valve synthetic oil max bought for his car. The time was 3pm and lunch was over by then in almost every restaurant. So, had to call up the Kitchen staff at WyteFort to cook something for us.
MaxBHP and CF duo went to FIAT service centre to feed the Siena with some fresh Synthetic engine Oil. Hey, won't FIAT guys do that for you?
I reached at Wytefort and soon the FIAT duo reached. We had some mouth watering seafood dishes and lot of juices etc... We sat their chatting till 5. Then moved towards the pool and spent another 1hr drinking tea & coffee by the pool. Then, it was time for FIAT Service guys to close shop and warned us to show up at once or forget the car!!
I had to leave to Calicut with my sis & co. So, took leave and went home. (I hate FIAT service centres and especially the one they were headed to. So anyway I wouldn't have joined them).
On the way home, I got a call from Hydra announcing his landing back to town on his FIAT Palio. Told him about my Calicut trip and the FIAT duo in town. He called them and decided to extend the meet a bit more and rest... Read the above post by Hydra.

When I reached home, my sis felt I was very tired from the work and told me to rest a while and offered to drop the Calicut plan. I was like; Wow!! But kept a very tired face intact. And changed into some easy clothing and slipped out again. Met up with the FIAT guys (duo turned trio by now) at FIAT service centre. Hey, my car is a bit hated there by the watchman and other staff for some nice reasons. So, now you know why they (half) politely kicked us out!

[hydrashok]

Originally Posted by speedzak

When I reached home, my sis felt I was very tired from the work and told me to rest a while and offered to drop the Calicut plan.

Yeah, sure! What a tough tiring day! Lounging by the pool does sap you of your strength, doesn't it?

[speedzak]

Yes guys! I am late once again with this report.

We all met up once again. This time, it was a bit different because we had a guest from Chennai visiting us. Sideways was in Kerala for some business reasons and it was our great pleasure to meet him.
He arrived from Chennai on friday and was at Kottayam. Saturday morning, I decided to drive down to Kottayam to meet with our very own Raid De Himalaya winner. As usual, my better half wouldn't allow me to go alone this time too. She was eager to know how a WagonR behaves on a highway (yes, a very stupid excuse it was).

I could only leave Ernakulam by 11.30am. And I got further delayed when I had to stop at one of our ongoing project site. I am very sorry to keep you waiting at the lobby, Sideways! The road was fantastic with less traffic, not very rough surface and lot of exciting curves. I deeply regretted in taking that stupid tallboy because it wasn't allowing me to use the road the way it was supposed to be. I reached Kottayam by around 1pm. Dropped my home minister & kids at a friend's place and carried on to pick up Mr. Sideways. Shared some Hi, hello etc.. and soon we started driving back.
We had to have lunch by my friend's place and wow!! It was indeed a good decision. My stomach is still happy with that very delicious dishes we had there. We ate like cows (ok, maybe only me), and sat around chatting for sometime.
By now, it was 4pm and the team-Bhpians @ Cochin had already gathered up to get a peek of Mr. Sideways. And there started the phonecalls. "Hey Zak! Where're you? We're here waiting at the venue as told." Oh my god! We're still at Kottayam!!
We hurried and somehow pulled the home minister and got into the car by 4.30pm and started driving back. Drive back was great! It included various subjects From Raid de himalaya to speedrun. Thank you Sideways. I simply enjoyed it and floored myself to the max. Back home, the team-Bhpians got together and moved into a mall near the waterfront and sat down for a coffee (Nice decision guys!). I reached home, dropped my family and continued to the waterfront.
We reached by 6.00pm! 2hours late than the promised time. Nikkibike, Hydrasho(c)k, Carfreak, a_micky, biju etc were there waiting with furious faces. But after seeing the Raid de Himalaya champion, they were a bit relieved.
Hi, hellos, introductions! AHA! arrives too. We sit chatting around for sometime.
The clock was ticking slowly and it started clicking a bit louder as it was time for Mr. sideways' train to Chennai. We soon decided left to the Railway station. We drove in a convoy of 4cars. We reached the station on time. Said Hi, tata and Sideways was soon on his chuk chuk journey to Chennai.

We stood around chatting at the station for some time when we got a call from KPHILIP. He wanted to meet us and we decided to go back to the mall. We reached, spend some time chatting, checked out the ICE & engine power of a_micky's JBLfied Verna and finally we called it a day by 8pm.

Thank you Sideways for coming. We hope to see you again soon. (Well, I'll get to see you tomorrow in Bangalore).

And guys! Thanks once more for making this meet a success. And also for having the precious patience for waiting.

Pics?? I think Carfreak and Hydra will do the honours.

[nikkibike]

That was an awsome meet!! Never even dreamt of meeting "Sachin Tendulkar of Car Rallys" Mr. Faran Vohra (Sideways) in real form!! Thanks for making it happen!! Great effort

[biju]

Hello guys

After attending my first meet with you..i getting so much worried about all meets that I have missed.

Really cool friends and I really enjoyed the company especaially SpeedZak, Nikkkiebike, Hydarashok..etc.

thanks for everyone and especially to our Chief Guest from Chennai.

Regards,

Biju

[hydrashok]

It was a really great meet. And we all had a great time talking with Sideways. Engine-vengine & ICE stuff.

We should thank Sideways for coming over at Kochi to meet us all (when he could have very well left directly from Kottayam), and Zak for the initiative in setting up the meet.

Pics are coming up later today.

[jango]

Yeah waiting for the pic..seems like ekm too is picking up....great going !!

[CrAzY dRiVeR]

Originally Posted by hydrashok

It was a really great meet. And we all had a great time talking with Sideways. Engine-vengine & ICE stuff.

We should thank Sideways for coming over at Kochi to meet us all (when he could have very well left directly from Kottayam), and Zak for the initiative in setting up the meet.

Pics are coming up later today.

Guys,

Nice write up and pics.... And... What was Zak actually thinking???

ME coming to cochin this week, to check out a modded P180 (for a friend to buy 2nd hand)

Problem is... Driving in ernakulam city is sort of a night mare for me... Am not familiar with the town, and it always seem to go in circles... And many one-ways to confuse...

Please help... Can anyone PM me your number so i can call for help (also, may be for a meet) if i find out am doing circles around ekm city...

[speedzak]

Ok! So, There's another chief guest coming!!
PM me, I'll send you my number.

And where's Mr. Carfreak lost? We need the pics.

[biju]

Hey Carfreak,

Please upload the photo that you have taken in front of the Bay Pride Mall.

So that I can have a view of my photo in my first meet.

Please upload it bhai..

Regards,

Biju

[carfreak]

hey guys,like always i am late for t-bhp meets,reviews etc etc.i didnt even see hydrashok's meet report of the previously conducted ekm meet.and i sponsored it??!!!when???

anyway coming to the present meet,it was great meeting farhan vohra-though the meet was a very very brief one!!i have send the snap to hydrashok who will be uploading it soon.the quality of the snap is too bad,so guys please spare me the abuses,kicks,bangs, etc.will be buying a new camera soon after which i will give my present one to you folks to stamp,burn and destroy!!(if i dont get frustrated and destroy it myself before)

[hydrashok]

Originally Posted by carfreak

and i sponsored it??!!!when???

When? When you paid for our grub as you left.

Folks! Here's the snap:



From left to right:
1. a_micky
2. Speedzak
3. Nikkibike
4. Hydrashok
5. Sideways
6. Biju
7. Hydra's Hatch

Carfreak took the snap, so he's not in the pic. Zak had taken a snap with Carfreak and the rest of us, but the cam chose to run out of juice right then :(

[Sideways]

A big thank you to all the BHPians who took time out for the meet. It was a short meet, but I really enjoyed myself. Was very impressed with the sound quality in Hydra's Palio. Very neatly installed too. Thank you all for seeing me off at the station.

A special thank you to Speedzak for driving all the way to Kottayam and picking me up. Really enjoyed the lunch and the drive to Ernakulam.

Hoping to see you guys in Chennai sometime. Thanx again.

[icemanz]

Hey Guys....
It was indeed a gr8 meet we had. My first meet with Tbhpians in Cochin and it was worth the wait Zak put us into.
Zak sends me a msg as early as 1.30 am on 24th about the meet. He was furious on me as I had skipped the cochin speed run in Jan. So I skipped the drive to calicut n made it to meet Zak n Himalayan speedster.

It was nice meeting n chatting with Farhan, since he had to catch the train back to Chennai we had a quick talk here n der. Looking forward to meet him again some time soon...may b for the Track day @ Chennai...

Since the meet was at a short notice, we could not get all the TBHPians in cochin to arrive, lets plan a better meet next time may b a dinner.

Guys pls note the change in ID .. I shall be so called "ICEMANZ" from here on...