Ode to Team Opulence

"All the world's a stage and........." - William Shakespeare

The wonderful thing about life is that it compels man to be content with just a bit part in this global theatre. The more you try and do it all yourself, the more lonely and cornered you become.

Opulence 2007 was probably one such story. The story of a failed division of labour where everything which encompassed the crux of the fest- celebrities, marketing, design, event management and even putting up of publicity paraphernalia was handled by a very limited group of quality-oriented workaholics.

"Quality in everything" had been our motto right from day one. It might have just proved to be our undoing, for by the end, there was nobody managing the fest; all were working for it.

The team that worked for us was an interesting one. A mix of some of the nicest guys and girls you could ever come across (I just cannot beleive how a group could have so many like-minded individuals). Be it boozing out two days before the fest or attending classes on the morning of the fest or even behaving like a set of the most irresponsible brats, I beleive there was never a word spoken to them in anger. There were pleas, requests, orders and so on.... but never anything derogatory. All negative sentiments would be would be wonderfully suppressed and the only avenue for giving vent to all the pent up emotion would invariably be within the confines of our room. In hindsight, that was wonderfully orchestrated.

How frustrating can it get than being forced to go to the booking office when Prahlad Kakar was sending the house in raptures or to go to see off celebrities when somebody else for whom you had worked your ass off was holding centrestage. It is a pity when you work hard all year to put something in place and you don't get to see even a tiny part of it sans the valedictory! I am not the only one awaiting the Opulence videos to see how it all went. Justice can sometimes be cruel in its ways of implementation!

Digressing as I am, it is probably because I am just a bit overcome with emotion. The strange thing about our team is that we somehow were never able to muster up enough and tell the co-ordinators, "the fest is all yours", and leave it all to them.

I still recall how we used to go and put up posters for we thought that the team under us might be too tired. Mistaken priorities!

As careless, irresponsible and 'mischievous' as they have been all along, I still envy some of the IInd yearites for the talent and potential that exists there. 'Tactitude' and 'Brand Aid' were two events whose conceptualization was first-class and as an impassive novice, feel, challenged the thought process no ends. The amount of quality, passion and desire that the Ankits, Parikshits, Vigneshs, Rahuls, Gauravs and Chagganis of this world possess is tremendous. But the issue all along was whether they were able to buy into our vision and commitment?

I am also grateful to all my event team members. Vineet & Anshul surprised me pleasantly with the push that they had to get more participation for Manthan; Nimit & Deepak in Cognoscenti were no less enterprising; so were the Vibhores, Amits & Anshumans in Ventura. Saurabh, Kshitij and Prativesh were the go to guys whenever a need arose.

Adiosyncrasy has been the soul of Opulence in all its three editions for we have never failed in getting the best ad-makers. I could never quite gauge the Bhoopendras, Paliwals, Sonis and Sonals but one incident that happened during the course of Opulence would suffice for them.

Prahlad Kakar kept gazing at the wall mags and admired its beauty. That from the greatest. Kudos to you!

It is a bit strange that only the convenor gets an opportunity to become emotional during the valedictory. Opulence 2007 has been all the more richer for all these wonderful people and all I can say is .....Thanks a ton!!

P.S. The number of exclamation marks are suggestive.