"Multiplex"- Infosys, Mysore Diaries - #BlogChatterA2Z

 On Saturday, I was still fast asleep when Arjun called me.

“Hey Priya, wake up and get ready immediately. Enthiran is playing in the Multiplex theater today, let’s watch it”, he said in an urgent tone. 

“Enthiran? What movie is it?”, I asked him.

“Really!! You don’t know about Enthiran - The Robot! It’s Rajnikanth and Aishwarya Rai’s much-awaited movie, directed by the legendary Shankar. The music is by A.R. Rahman.”, he said.

“Oh! Are you talking about Robot!! When’s the show?”, I asked, suddenly excited.

“The afternoon show is at 2 PM, let’s try for the tickets. There’s going to be a very long queue. If we don’t get tickets, let’s try the evening show. “, he said.

“It’s only 10 AM. “, I said.

“It’s Rajnikanth movie”, he said in a slightly annoyed tone, “People are already leaving for the tickets. And as you already know, each person will only get 1 ticket. “

“Are we watching the Tamil version? But how can we understand?”, I asked. Arjun did not reply, I knew he was irritated by my questions.

“I’ll meet you in 30 minutes. Call Myra, I’ll call Anusha”, I said and hung up.

I called up Anusha, informed her the same, and asked her to inform Swati and any of her other friends. 

I turned the kettle on to heat water and got ready at jet speed. I then added milk powder to the hot water in a bowl and loaded it with chocos.  I took the bowl with me and knocked on Myra’s door to check what she was doing. She was having corn flakes and had a comb in her hand. She gave a thumbs up and went back to my room to finish my breakfast. Myra and I had very similar habits and usually took the same time to get ready. Having this coordination with someone was a boon. 

After my hurried breakfast, I knocked on Anusha’s door. I knew she would be ready and as I’d expected, she came out of her room with a wallet in her hands. Swati was also ready. We locked our rooms and hurried downstairs. 

Arjun, Chetan, and Suraj were waiting for us. We said a quick “hi” and started jogging.  Many people were doing the same and we knew where they were all headed. 

                                                                                    *

We finally reached the dome-shaped large theater, which was also called Multiplex. The theater was located in the heart of the campus and was one of the most popular places on campus. The glass dome had ridges on it and the building was surrounded by a clear path full of greenery. It also had a small fountain flowing down the steps. It was an architectural wonder and my favorite place on the campus. 

There was a long queue of about 100 trainees. We looked at the queue in disbelief, it was only 10:40 AM and the movie was in Tamil. I was sure that not everybody understood Tamil in the campus. But the craze for Rajnikanth’s movies had no language barrier. 

“No chance of getting tickets”, Chetan said. 

We ignored him and started walking towards the end of the queue and joined it. The queue was moving very slowly. In about 15 minutes, the queue turned into a circular shape, surrounding the Multiplex building. 

We sat on the clean grounds with our backs against the building. 

A month ago, we were stunned to see the prominent dome-shaped building and stand in its vicinity. Today, we were leaning against it and it felt extremely special.

At about 11:30 AM, we were about 6 feet away from the ticket counter when someone shouted “House Full”. 

All people in the queue started shouting. Management personnel came out of the ticket office and shouted, “Go back”. We were highly disappointed and started complaining. 

One by one, people started going back when I got an idea. I went to the officer and said, “Sir, it’s my friend’s birthday today. He wants to watch the movie today. “

“You came late”, he said in a disinterested voice.

“Sir please let me know when the ticket counter would open for the evening show. Please give us an estimate. We did not have breakfast yet.”, I said pointing to my friends. They all looked at me in suspicion but that look helped. They looked disappointed, hungry, and lost.

The officer said grudgingly, “Come at 1:30”, 

Looking at me, many others started approaching the officer and he waved them off and left. 

“The counter for 6 PM’s show opens at 1:30 PM. Don’t tell anyone.”, I said in an excited tone. The others were elated.

“Maybe he’s lying”, Chetan said. I ignored him.

“We still have 1.5 hours. Let’s have lunch and come back soon”, Myra said. 

“1.5 hour is a long time”, Chetan drawled. 

“Why don’t you go to Loyal World? You can easily pass the 1.5 hours there”, I said to which Myra laughed. 

Arjun, Anusha, and Swati looked at us questioningly but we refused to tell them. I did not feel like sharing our little joke.

 We had a quick lunch at the Magna food court in GEC2. During lunch, we decided to inform our college friends about the ticket counter. We sent an email to our college group.

At about 1:20 PM, we reached the Multiplex. I was tensed about the ticket counter, what if the officer does not open it? In about 5 minutes, 10 of our college mates joined us. Only our group was at the Multiplex. I reached the counter tentatively and knocked on it.

“5 minutes”, the officer replied. I sighed with relief. 

In about 5 minutes, the officer opened the counter and we got the best seats and an entire row for ourselves. 

Elated with our tickets in hand, we all regrouped again at 5:30 in the evening. There was a queue to get into the theater and everyone was talking excitedly. 

“The movie is a hit”, someone said.

At last, it was our turn to enter the theater. The inside of the theater was very noisy and it seemed very crowded, despite the huge hall, high ceiling, and about 300-400 seats. We reached our seats after a very long time and sat in our row. 

The movie started with huge applause and when Rajnikanth came on screen, people went mad and screamed until their voices went sore. The movie was in Tamil, which I did not understand. There were no subtitles either, but we understood the context and did not mind the language barrier. We were enjoying the festive atmosphere which was very infectious. When the Robot-Rajnikanth danced to the “Arima Arima” song (title song), the crowd roared, whistled, and clapped so hard that I couldn’t hear anything for the next 2 minutes. 

The multiplex management expected decorum from the trainees but there no laws where Rajnikanth was involved.

2.5 hours later, we all walked out of the theater feeling jubilant. 

Watching such a highly engaging, super-hit movie in one of the country’s best theaters is indeed one of our best experiences to date…

-- To be continued

This post is a part of the Blogchatter A2Z Challenge.