I woke up with a start at round 5.30 a.m this morning, thanks to what sounded like people running helter skelter, which seemed to come from the room upstairs. I'm usually a very paranoid person when I'm living in a hotel, given my past experiences with the supernatural kind while living out of a suitcase. On most occasions I end up sleeping with the lights on all night, the story of my encounters with the paranormal is something I shall write about once I'm safely ensconced in the loving warmth of my room back in Mumbai, here I would like to record why my life has become happening all of a sudden.
So as I mentioned the sounds woke me up and I shot out of bed like a scalded cat. After what seemed like an eternity my pulse rate returned to normal and given that I had a snowflakes chance in hell of getting back to sleep, I began pottering about the room. Mind you my room this time is very pokey and honestly I now understand why this room has no window, if in a moment of absentmindedness a guest were to stretch after waking up in morning, he would most definitely fall out the window if there happened to be one. It is a blessing that my colleague who is over six feet tall was given a slightly bigger room else, he would be sleeping with his feet in the next room and his head hanging out the window on the other side.The staff are very co-operative and accommodating and more than make up for these small inconveniences. A long while passed and nothing seemed to happen, so I dressed up and left for office.
An hour passed by and then as they say in the penny thrillers, 'It happenned', a girl with whom we are on hi-hello terms walks up to me and say 'You are put up at XYZ hotel right, I just passed that way while coming to office, there is a huge crowd outside the hotel and the police are also there, is there a problem ??". My mind worked like a computer (obviously not as fast as Chacha Choudhary but I get by) and put an unnecessary two plus two together. Was the running around in the morning related to the journalists and police hovering around the premises just now ???
I alerted my colleague, and the next five minutes saw him flying over to the hotel to check out what the problem was. Turns out there was a fire on the first floor thanks to a short circuit and the entire hotel was engulfed in smoke!!! Our rooms are on the ground floor so eventually he was allowed to go in and collect his passport, but he had a few heart in mouth moments while he waited to gain access to his beloved passport and was only placated once he had the familiar blue book in his hand !!!
They offered us alternate accommodation at another hotel, but one look at the rooms at was enough to convince us that we would rather brave another fire even if this time it was on the ground floor, than spend the night at that hotel. Thankfully the Gods in heaven took pity on us and by the time it was evening the ground floor and lobby area was functional and declared safe to be inhabited and we moved back in, all in all I've had a very very exciting day, so much so that its 12 am and I just can't seem be able to get to sleep... thankfully the wifi in my room seems to be working today and I could keep busy just typing this out... that's all for now... cheers and wish you a very good morning !!!
