Saturday, April 3, 2010

Surprise Party


Dholu Ram Gadbad Singh, the rolypoly, yet very strong boy was now big enough to stay alone at home for a day or two on his own if his parents went out of station once in a while. On such occasions he used to invite his friend Golu to stay with him. Of course, his dog Rex and Golu’s dog Rex were always around them. And together they used to manage the show pretty well.

You may ask a question: how come Dholu’s dog’s name is Rex and Golu’s dog’s name is Rex too? You know that Golu and Dholu are great friends. When Dholu got his dog, he named him Rex. Now when Golu saw that his best friend named his dog Rex, being a great friend of Dholu and also because he liked the name Rex too much, he too named his dog Rex.

Now, you may have another question. When both the dogs are together, don’t they get confused when someone calls them? Your question is valid. But then dogs are dogs and they are more intelligent. And that’s how they decide between them as to who should respond when someone calls Rex. Even if they make a mistake and the wrong Rex responds, the caller does not know the difference because both are so identical. Only Dholu and Golu and their parents can make out the difference. And so when they call their dogs, particularly when the two dogs are together, they call Dholu’s Rex as Rex and Golu’s Rex as Rexona.

After satisfying you on this count, let us see what Dholu and Golu are doing together at Dholu’s home when Dholu’s parents have gone out of station for a day on some important work. The parents mentioned to Dholu that they would return home, in any case, by the late evening.

Before going out this morning, all of them had a very nutritious and tasty breakfast of double egg omelet and milk. Golu had joined them the evening of the earlier day and slept in Dholu’s bed room. They told lots of stories to each other in the night and they did not know when sleep came over them.

After a healthy and heavy breakfast, Dholu and Golu waved bye to Dholu’s parents who sat in the car and drove away.

It was school time and both Dholu and Golu got busy with their preparations to go to the school. Soon they were out of home and were walking towards their school. Their school was nearby within walking distance.

As soon as they went out, Rex and Rex (Rexona) got together in the living room of the house and had a conference between them. They wanted to decide something but did not know what. So they wanted the help of their other friends to take a decision.

These days almost every human being has a cell phone which some people also call as mobile phone. The animal kingdom is never backward. When they saw how useful the cell phone was, the wiser of the animals also invented very tiny cell phones for their animal friends. So every animal carries a tiny cell phone these days.

Rex and Rexona got busy calling their friends using their cell phones. They called Blacky bear, Bunny rabbit, Bina butterfly, Ratty rat and Quibee honey bee queen and requested them to join them in their urgent and important conference. All of them agreed to join them soon.

Then Rex and Rexona had some waiting time. During this waiting time, they played some games. Soon their entire friends joined in.

Blacky bear was still in his sleepy mood. He asked Rex and Rexona, “Why did you have to call all of us at such an early morning? I wanted to sleep more and your cell phone ring woke me up right in the middle of my sweet dream. In my dream I was about to pluck the jack fruit from the tree and you disturbed me.”

Rex told Rexona to speak out in the meeting of these friends. Rexona would not speak out. He told Rex, “You speak out. You know that I am not good at making public speeches.”

Ultimately Rex opened his mouth, “Friends, we have to take a decision.” And then he stopped.

Ratty rat got pretty annoyed. He said, “That’s not a complete speech. You must give us the entire background and then alone you can ask us to take a decision.”

Rex gathered some courage and said, “Dholu and Golu are alone at home today. Dholu’s parents have gone outstation and will return by 9 PM tonight. Though Dholu’s mom has cooked some food and stocked it in the refrigerator, I cannot see our dear Dholu and Golu eating the frozen food for the dinner. Why not give them a surprise party? They are such great friends of ours and today we are getting a very good opportunity to show our friendship to them. What is your decision?”

Blacky bear, Bunny rabbit, Bina butterfly, Ratty rat, Quibee honey bee queen and Rexona cheered in one voice, “Hey, hey. Hear, hear. We pass the proposal. Yes, let us throw a surprise party to Dholu and Golu.”

Together they worked out a menu for the dinner party. Every one volunteered to make or bring at least one dish.

Quibee honey bee queen declared that she would get the fresh honey from her honeycomb.

Bunny rabbit said, “I will get some very fresh carrots from the kitchen garden in the backyard of Golu’s home. Golu’s parents have grown the big red colored carrots in their kitchen garden. I will then make carrot pudding (gajar ka halwa).”

Blacky bear always dreamt of jack fruits and so he volunteered to pluck some jack fruits from a nearby garden and then slice them and make a nice fruit platter.

Bina butterfly suggested that while everyone was making or bringing some nice things to eat, she would take the charge of decorating the interior of the house and the dining room with nice flowers. She mentioned that Dholu had a beautiful garden in front of his house and there were so many varieties of flowers and so, she would make many flower arrangements out of them.

Ratty rat had been watching Dholu’s mother’s cooking every day and he used to taste the dishes made by her. By now he was almost like a well trained chef. He had particularly liked a dish called “ratatouille” which is made from eggplant, tomatoes, onions, garlic, peppers and zucchini. He liked ratatouille because it tasted delicious and he had one more reason to like it- in its spelling his own name was also there- “rat”.
He could find all these ingredients eggplant, tomatoes, onions, garlic, peppers and zucchini in the kitchen garden in the backyard of the house, so well maintained by Dholu’s parents.

Rex and Rexona took charge of laying out the dinner table. They also took charge of lighting the dining room with lights of different colors. They arranged for some jazzy music. They told that they would also perform other miscellaneous tasks.

So everybody got ready for the surprise party.

Rex said, “As per their daily routine, Dholu and Golu will play a few games of tennis on the tennis court of the school before they return home. Then they will rush towards the refrigerator to scoop out some frozen dinner for themselves. So just about that time, we will switch on all the colored lights, uncover the flower arrangements and play some jazzy music and let them see the well laid out dining table and so many exotic dishes spread on it. That will definitely surprise them and then we will shout together welcoming them home and appear on the scene. Till then, let us all hide behind the sofa.”

And they did exactly that. As soon as Dholu and Golu reached the refrigerator, Rex and Rexona switched on all the colored lights, uncovered the flower arrangements, played the jazzy music and removed the covers from the food stuff on the dining table. Also simultaneously, everyone came out from their hiding places and shouted, “Welcome home dearest Dholu and Golu. Here is the surprise party in your honor.”

It really was a very pleasant surprise to Dholu and Golu. They just could not believe to start with. But soon they realized that their very good friends loved them so much and they were so considerate that realizing that Dholu’s parents had gone out, they had taken charge of feeding them the great food with so much decoration around.

All of them sang and danced and ate together. They had lots of fun. They gave company to Dholu and Golu till the time Dholu’s parents returned home.

Then they wished good night to each other and went to their respective homes.

Novels and Stories

Novel "Good People" http://good-people-novel.blogspot.com/
Funny (and Not So Funny) Short Stories http://funny-shortstories.blogspot.com/
Stories Children Will Love http://stories-children.blogspot.com/

The novel "Good People", "Funny (and Not So Funny) Short Stories" and "Stories Children Will Love" are available in the form of eBook and printed book from Amazon online. Hurry up, get your copies.

No comments: