Thank God, it's Friday!

MOST CITY-dwellers start their day with a skirmish with the alarm clock, the conflicts of rush (in the kitchen, with kids), the tension with traffic, and a battle against deadlines, before ending up with a lost war against stress (besides sagging shoulders, stomachs and spirits). About the only consolation is that we live to fight another day. And we know how that day is going to be. After five days of such sustained simmering, we finally get to order a ceasefire - of long slumbers and short snoozes, a smile on our lips, a bounce in our step, a time to remember our waylaid dreams. A time to find time. A weekend!

A closer look reveals that those two days of all-the-time-in-the- world often end up as "too much to do in too little time." For Bhavani Sundar, an executive in a leading firm of chartered accountants, a weekend is "simply wonderful". Like most career women, she works both at home and in the office and inspite of a supportive husband, she really needs her two days off - one to keep things moving smoothly at home (house cleaning, repair-jobs, stocking groceries and vegetables) and the other to relax, go out and spend quality time with her two-year old. But for people like Sriram Narayan, a management executive in a petrochemical firm, "Sundays are the only fundays". The much-admired American mandate of shutting down for long weekends is yet to catch up, individual wish being defeated by corporate will.

For those weekenders looking to play as hard as they work, it does not help at all that most Chennai shops down their shutters on Sundays. If the customer wants to be king, the new megastores mushrooming across the Chennai fiefdom are more than willing to treat him like royalty.

As Aniyan Nair, Department Manager at Shopper's Stop, puts it, "We are positioned as a family store and weekends are the only time families get to go out together. Sundays are always the most crowded for us."

So when do the staff get their day off? On weekdays by a predetermined roster. Mr. Nair likes to spend his Thursday offs catching up on some R&R. Since he's new to Chennai, he also likes "to go around discovering the city."

The mood and the weather are frequent facilitators in this fetish for fun. Going off on short holidays and pursuing a chosen hobby has its fair share of followers.

In fact, when Mr. Srinivasan of the Raasi Art Foundation started his Tanjore painting classes, he found a very enthusiastic response to his Sunday programme for, "most of those who come, have a keen interest and they get the time only over the weekend."

Top priority among most people was to just plain sleep (virtually everyone feels they are getting less rest than is good for them), followed by time with the family, eating-out (dinner is the commonest option though Sunday brunches at upmarket restaurants come a not-so-very-close second) and fun outings (the beach and movies topping the list).

Thank God, its Friday? You bet. And Saturday. And Sunday.

* * *

What celebrities do

FOR FORMER cricketer Krish Srikkanth, his weekend means "total relaxation." He is fond of gardening and likes to "spend time in the garden, spend time with the family." Last weekend he slept, lazed around and did both of the above. His wife Vidya says with a smile in her voice, "I am at home and my weekend is just a continuation of my week. During Saturdays, sometimes relatives or friends come over for a get-together, occasionally we have some programme or party to attend, sometimes we go out for dinner with the kids and generally relax and have a great time."

For those of you who find a matinee movie the best way to unwind, spare a thought for Madhavan, the movie star who loves his job but finds himself doing altogether too much of it. As he says, "A weekend? Well, that is what it should be and what it actually is. It should be a relief from the work you do throughout the week. It should be a time to relax, to rejuvenate, to face the week ahead of you. For me, in reality, there is no difference. In the business I am in, there are no weekends. Honestly, and I know this sounds crazy, I haven't had a couple of days off in the last seven months!" His dream weekend? "I fantasise about spending all of it catching up with my sleep!" For his wife Sarita, who used to be an airhostess but now likes to be around with her husband, a weekend would mean, "Spending time with my husband, going bowling - we both love it, watch a VCD/DVD having popcorn or going out for a quiet dinner."

LALITHA SRIDHAR

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Entertainment
Next     : Does packaging matter?