I and SA have been planning a vacation for an eternity. We haven’t taken any break since we’ve been married. And that makes taking this vacation right now even more crucial. Right now has come into existence since April this year.

We have a week to take off. After all the hard work at office, I believe my boss would accommodate a week long break request.  SA remains committed to a week of Neelam’s convenience.

April. We started with listing down places that we could go to and places we completely wanted to avoid. SA had only one thing on his list ‘same as Neelam’s’. Still has.

I settled on Seychelles Islands for an idyllic beach side holiday. As an afterthought, I added Greece to the list for an exploratory kind of holiday. Since we were going to spend much over the average honeymoon trip budget, I couldn’t make up my mind whether I should spend all that lazing around the all alike  exotic beaches or claim my share of historical rendezvous in Greece. No run of the mill destinations for me. Both of us spent whatever free time we could pouring over the internet to plan our perfect holiday.

Weeks ran into months, we sent emails to resorts asking for accommodation quotations, fretting over the visa requirements and squabbling all along for things not falling into place.

Strike 1. Mid May. SA decided he wanted to attend a summer school abroad in an attempt to add frills to his CV. He keeps investing in such stuff. Good or bad, I do not know, I never dissuade him. Since the summer schools open for enrollment were in Peking, Singapore, Germany and even Russia, we abandoned ongoing plan and thought of visiting these places instead – combing the summer school with the holiday. But we got down and busy with work and parked the summer schools for a while. On the last day of enrollment, SA’s brother put a wise thought in SA’s head – ‘you need to do something better than summer schools to differentiate your profile.’ And that settled the summer school dust. Meanwhile we still kept squabbling.

Strike 2. June. Monsoons. It was June already, the tropical countries had run their yearly course of being touristy and it was time for them to cool off. And just like that we had no place left to go. Except Bali. And except that fact that I had to make a teeny allowance to accommodate Indonesia in my list of holiday destinations. But it was an easy decision. There simply wasn’t anywhere else to go given our budget and time constraints. We did fleetingly toy with Dubai (with its harsh summer) and Singapore (all touristy and no soul), but for some indiscernible reasons left it at that.  So, we raided the internet again for packages and quotations for a Bali holiday. And with the passage of June, the Bali plan came to a screeching halt – monsoon’s onset in Bali.

July. I’m breaking under pressure at work. But that was true of May and June too. So, I’m still breaking under work pressure. I applied and my boss approved my leave for a week, the coming week. I & SA still have no destination to go to. During my week’s leave I plan to take off to Mumbai to visit my family. And during that week SA is on an official trip to Mizoram.

Can I join SA there? Is Mizoram an exciting enough place – especially after I’ve toured Seychelles, Greece, Dubai and Bali over the internet during my quest? Is it going to be a week spent with family when I’ve really been looking forward to spend some time with SA minus our work? I’ll be watching as this week ends and the new one unfolds to know if we finally took off or gave up.