DovePlay: My First IndiMeet

Since the day I joined IndiBlogger, I’ve always heard about meets. Usually these meets are organized in metro cities like Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai. Bangalore, being a hub of writers (or so I think), has also seen fair share of the meets. I live in Ahmedabad and so I had never ever thought of attending these meets. It was as good as wishing for the stars because being a working woman, I never thought I could take out the time to travel in train to the city where the meet was being held and spending thousands of bucks on the flight tickets never made sense to me. So imagine my surprise when IndiBlogger and Dove extended an exclusive invite to me for the meet!


And when I say “exclusive,” it was indeed so with the entire trip paid – flight, stay and food. Although I was wary because I firmly believe in the proverb “there’s no such thing as free lunch,” I was intrigued, and so I accepted the invite. Flight tickets were booked and accommodation was arranged. I was all set.

I got the second shock when I landed at the airport and got a message from IndiBlogger that a cab is waiting for me! I was like, am I a VIP or what? I was totally content to reach the hotel by myself but when I took the ride, I couldn’t stop grinning. I was really feeling pampered; and I had no idea that what I felt then was nothing compared to what was in store for me.

When I reached the venue of the meet, I met Vineet from IndiBlogger for the first time. He was the one who had made all the arrangements for me, and I was definitely glad to thank him in person. The first part of the meet was registration, distribution of goodies like sparkling fun hats, funny glares and hair extensions, and clicking of pics. And then the fun started. Literally.

I met fellow blogger friends personally for the first time. Until the meet, I had only seen them on FB but in the meet, I connected with them. I also made new friends. Amazing, isn’t it? We danced and we played games. Games that took me back to my childhood days and kept me grinning like a fool. Games such as hoops, throwing balls and making hairstyles out of our friend’s hair. Too much childishness and still lively.

The second last event of the evening was awesome for me. Can you guess what it was being a Dove event? Yes! It was salon time! You could get your hair styled the way you wanted and I did exactly that. I went for a haircut. I know many of you ladies would be shaking their head at me for trusting my haircut to an unknown hairdresser but come on! It was Dove’s! I was sure they would have hired the best of the best hairdressers and yay, I was right! I got a lovely haircut and that too free of cost. Again that proverb was proved wrong. There’s indeed something called free lunch (Ahem! Okay, free trip. Happy now?) in this world. You just need to be that lucky dog (or bitch in my case….but hey, no pun intended) to get the opportunity to avail it.

But hang on. Goodies don’t stop over here. I received a gift hamper too. Yes, that’s right, a gift hamper! Yay! And you know what was in the hamper? Philips’ hair straightener, Dove’s intense hair repair kit and a cute Dove hair pin. I was ecstatic because I was anyway planning t buy a straightener (Yes, I’m tired of my curls!). When I returned home, I was grinning ear to ear. (I’m so not going to mention the way everyone at the airport was looking at me because of my huge smile) It was a fantabulous experience for me and I don’t think I will ever forget this day in my life.

Then it was time for another change.

I’m bit scared of chemicals and so I tend to stick to Himalaya’s Shikakai shampoo. I have a huge hair fall and dandruff problem, and I’ve tried number of things to solve this problem. Nothing had worked until now and I had made peace with the fact that someday I might just go bald. But there’s always fascination for free things, isn’t it? So I gave into that fascination and tried the shampoo and the conditioner. And you know what? I didn’t shed hair like a cat while shampooing or after that. By the time I’m writing this, I’ve used Dove’s shampoo twice and to be honest, I’m quite impressed with it. I’m on the verge of shifting to Dove permanently from Himalaya.

Please note that this is not freebies talking! It’s an honest opinion! I’m definitely not getting paid for writing the shampoo review but I’m writing it because I’m so damn impressed by it that I’d like my readers to try it. If you don’t like it, shift back to your old shampoo. At the end, you’d be at least happy that you had tried something good for your hair. So try it and let me know whether you agree with me or not.

PS: Indiblogger, I wouldn’t mind you extending me such exclusive invites for all your meets ;)