IF...

Yesterday when I was coming back home walking from the cyber cafe after office, I looked at a kid with her parents and I thought if I would have been at home with my parents, my life would have been fun and without any tension. This word “IF” stuck in my mind. And then I questioned myself with so many IFs. Jolted down few of them... (Please add IF in front of all of them yourself)
1. I would have been at home with ma-papa.
2. I had free unlimited supply of world’s best chocolate.
3. My height had been 5 feet 8 inches and a better face.
4. I had office only 2 days a week that too with the privilege of working from home.
5. My account always had Rs. 5,00,000 balance (more than that is always welcome and this would have fulfilled most of my “normal” wishes).
6. My laptop would catch unprotected wireless network of my unaware neighbor and the movies would download within half an hour.
7. I had free membership of the best video and book libraries.
8. I was a privileged customer of King-fisher airlines and could travel without any fare being charged all round the world.
9. I could own a nice flat in Dubai and live there with my dear family.
10. I can roam about freely with my friends without any worry of getting married (I mean if the society would not care for all the girls and boys to get married).
11. I would have done my engineering from IIT and MBA from IIM and would have been working in Google (that does not mean that I didn’t love my institutes, they were great and I learnt and gained a lot from them).
12. I could taste the best of food and (non-alcoholic) drinks from all over the world.
13. I had more patience.
14. I could sing in decent voice (thankfully, I can dance now).
15. I knew how to play guitar or flute or for that matter any musical instrument.
By this time, I had already started smiling to myself and then I entered my PG and point # 1 was instantly out and all the others also came trashing. There is another word which normally accompanies IF, that is BUT. Or you can say in Hindi, If is Agar, you prefix it with "M"; that is But in Hindi.
“But” seemed to me like a gate-keeper to hold me from going into my fantasy world. Aaaaah...!!! What will God lose if those 15 wishes of mine (at-least those 15 initially, more are yet in my mind) gets fulfilled?

Gtalk & FWDs..Official Life Lines

Yesterday when I reached home and started reading my novel on the laptop, I wondered whether I saw an orange light blink in the lower right corner of my laptop. But no. Immediately I realized that its the hangover of using Gtalk in office. The day I get just 3-4 forwarded mails, I am deeply hurt. "My friends forgot me...!!!!!!!". These two are our lifelines in the otherwise boring office.

Day in the office starts with signing in for the attendance and then open all the mail IDs I have. Company ID, gmail, rediffmail, and yahoo. Then sign in to gtalk. Day starts on a cheerful note if there are mails and forwards to be read. It looks gloomy if no mails are there. Due to unusual office hours, I reach too early to find anyone online. But after breakfast, all those hi's and hellos welcome me on my seat.

If get any forward, the normal ritual is to read it. If you like it, forward it to your usual group of people or else delete it. But if it is too good to wait to forward it, tell the contents to your friends who are online or bother the one sitting next to you.

If by chance the server is down, and the Internet connection is out, we never bother to call the technical team because I am not getting my boss's mail or for that matter other official mails, but because my GTALK is not working and I can't concentrate on my work. Some companies are very generous to allow gtalk to run on the systems (I am thankful to them), but few are not. Although more than finding out new ways to improve our productivity and company's revenue and business, employees of those unfortunate companies are busy to find out proxies to access gtalk, other personal mail ids, blogs, orkut (the most popular one to be searched), and other social networking sites. Afterall, our parents always preach us that we should be socially active. What say ???

Thank you my dear company that you had atleast not banned these two important Life-lines of your employees. I hope my management is not reading this. How can they allow an employee to be happy?? Long live the inventors of Internet and chat engines.

Animation...

Hi... Another weekend passed by. This time, I was indeed busy on Friday and Saturday. But Sunday... "My Dear Sleep". And yes, I once again watched Madagascar-2(Escape to Africa). Its an animated movie and I am always ready anytime to watch any animation movie. Few of the good ones that even you can watch are: Madagascar-1 & 2, Wall:E, Surf's up, The Polar Express, Stuart Little- 1 & 2, Kung-fu Panda, Ratatouille, Ice Age-1 & 2, Shrek-1 & 2, Cars. They are so logical. No loose ends of the story. And yes, they actually have a story and teach you a lot in fun way. No vulgarity, and no songs, and can be seen with the family. These are the traits missing in most of the Hollywood and Bollywood movies, or for that matter in any non-animated movie (I don't know what do we call those movies which are not animated).

If we notice, in most of the animation movies, animals or otherwise non-living things are the main protagonists and its not only about making you laugh by looking cute or making strange sounds, they show various emotions. Wall:E is a story about a robot, who falls in love with another robot and how he follows her, takes care of her, even gets hurt (I mean, his wires and motherboard are mishandled), but ultimately rescues her and the mankind.

Madagascar is about four friends, a zebra, lion, giraffe, and a hippo. They are inseparable, and whatever comes their way, they are there for each other. Eventually, giraffe and hippo get married. I wonder, how their kids would be. In Stuart little, a rat has been adopted as a second child by a human couple and provide him with all amenities as their human kid (small versions of bed, brush, chairs, car...). The story of Ramayana and Hanuman is also made in animation form. Its not slow and covers almost all major events and is fun to watch.

Came to know just few days back, while surfing the internet, that the first animated feature film was made way back in the year 1917- The Apostle and since then each year there had been atleast 8-10 animated feature films released in various parts of the world. And I thought, its the recent development.

So, anyone please suggest which one to watch next.....

The Shock...

Yesterday evening I got the “small” shock of my life (I mean, not that big a shock to ruin my life, but enough to ruin my night). I came back home after office and hurriedly settled myself with my chocolate biscuits to finish off my novel- The Associate, by John Grisham. I bought this novel from Odyssey just like that, while scanning through so many fiction novels in the shop. Since when I bought it, I could find it mentioned in magazines, newspapers, Internet and so many copies displayed in various book-stores. I was feeling very happy to have made the right choice to chose this book, for this is much talked about novel these days.
This is the story of a very young and bright law student, Kyle McAvoy of Yale School of Law. Had nice noble plans to start off his career with the offer from the biggest law firm up his sleeve. But he bumped into FBI agents, who claimed to have known his dark past, of an alleged rape which took place in Kyle’s apartment, by his fraternity brothers, in front of him, though he was too much on booze to realize it, five years back. They knew every bit of his life. Though he was not the one who committed the crime, but he was present on the scene. These “FBI” guys had a deal for him. This deal is talked through one Bennie (or whatever his real name was). You follow our directions or face the trial. All this blackmailing on the basis of a video of that night, which these guys showed to Kyle. He agrees to face the trial. He reads out the first page. Turns to the next. To his shock, all the other pages are blank. There is no trial. These men are not FBI guys. They are thugs, working for “someone”, who has unlimited money, power and manpower. This was the biggest twist I had ever witnessed. Well written, and so engrossing. He is left with no other option but to follow them.
His each breath is being heard, each step is being followed, and each move is being recorded. In his own apartment, he has 3 cameras, mics at various places, the blackmailer’s men can come and go out of his apartment any time, without his knowledge. He is forced to join the biggest law firm, get on to the biggest trial between two companies and pass on the secret information out of his own firm.
He reports to Bennie many times. His life in the law firm is sucking. He finds himself a girlfriend. Then some twists. He decides to get out of this. Involves his father; who is also a well known principled lawyer, his friend, Joe; who is one of the two main culprits, decides to hire a lawyer for himself, confides everything to the real FBI. His father solves the matter with the victim (the girl) so easily (I didn’t expect that, for Kyle was afraid throughout of how this girl will react once she comes to know of the video).
Everything seems to be going good. I was about to find out who was this Bennie. Who was he working for? Where did he mysteriously run away? After telling the truth in his firm, will Kyle be able to pursue normal life or he will be banned for life? Who killed his friend, Baxter, the main culprit? What happened to Joe?
Last 3 pages, excitement to its maximum. My room-mate asked me the story. I hurriedly told her in the briefest possible way (I am sure, she did not understand anything) and went back to reveal the secret.
BUT. The novel came to an abrupt end and I did not get any of the much awaited answers. How is this possible? Did I pick up the pirated copy, with so many pages missing from the original story? Is John about to introduce the second part of this novel like most other movies, I mean, a sequel? Never came to know what happened to that much talked about case, who was Bennie, and who was he working for. This disturbed me for long time. Still can’t forget this.
Wish someone give me the missing answers. The novel is well written till some 25 chapters, at times gets repetitive for the Bennie and Kyle meetings, introduced small but nice twists. Towards the end, the story fastened up the pace. But the end disappointed me. Would have been better with the answers. Anyone interested? I can lend you the “original” copy.

My most memorable holiday...

I know the title seems like the title for a school essay to describe your most memorable holiday. And I admit, it is exactly like that.
Yesterday, my friend called me to discuss and plan his family vacation down to South India, since I had already been to those places, where he is planning to visit. After talking to him, I went back to the memory lanes of that vacation of mine, by far the most memorable and loving.
We (I-ma-papa) planned for a 20 day trip in December, 2003 to Andaman’s and South India. You can get down to Port Blair (capital of Andaman’s & Nicobar) only from either Kolkatta or Chennai. So, we chose the former. Stayed over in Kolkatta for a day, visited few places and then set off for Port Blair flight (which was 8 hours late). The moment I stepped out of the plane, I had to pull off my jacket (it was a cold winter morning in Kolkatta) even before I stepped down the stairs. It was so humid. But 15 minutes after stepping on the island, I could feel better. Landed up in a decent hotel and in the evening were off to the “Kala Pani” jail. It was a horrifying trip there to see such small cells, in which almost 8-9 inmates were stuffed without letting them come out for as long as 4 days, not even to answer the nature’s call, the dungeon where they were hanged and where their bodies would fall, the oil grinding machine on which they were tied, with heavy weights around their necks, to crush the oil out of the seeds/coconut instead of bulls, the place where they were tied up and thrashed. Later, watched an amazing light and sound show. Was almost in tears throughout the show. Just walk down the jail to the vast water sports complex. The moment we stepped into the complex through vast gates, was welcomed by such cool and fresh air which had enough speed to blow off the empty chairs. Next day went in local sight-seeing. Went to watch the Chatham Saw Mill, Asia’s biggest saw mill. God, such a huge saw cutting such huge tree trunks!!! Then to the zoo, the coral museum and then the tribal museum. You click anywhere and will get the perfect scenic frame. In the evening, our driver, Ganesh, took us to Chidiya Tapu. A small beach, with such clean and still water, surrounded by full grown trees on 3 sides and the mountain on the 4th side. During that time, so many birds would gather on the trees (may be their home) and chirp continuously. Calm water with trees around and birds singing to mark the sunset. Perfect. Yet another day, we started very early in the morning to visit a far off island. Nothing great about the island but on the way to it, we could confront a tribe- Jharawas. Deadly and dangerous. Following the same life-style as we have read in our history books. Naked, self made weapons, hunt and eat wild animals (just for these tribes, hunting is legally allowed), dark and would attack you anytime. Our driver procured the special permission (which is mandatory for this trip) from the commissioner’s office and armed himself with lots of bananas. I asked him curiously the reason for so many bananas, he said casually, if attacked, I will offer them bananas and try to distract them so that we can escape. What???? Do we have chances of being attacked and killed by tribal family in the most ancient style of murder? Yes. That’s why all the tourist cars pass the area with police protection. One armed policeman in the first car of the convoy and the other in the last one. All the drivers are trained and have different types of horns in case someone have been left behind or have been caught by the tribal or got some problem with the car. We travelled by zig-zag road, throughout which policemen would stand guard after every few kms. Then loaded our cars on ferry boats (which can even load buses) and crossed the sea and back on road. But saw just one jharawa man, who was traced back into the forest by one of the policeman, as he was ready to puncture our tyre with his bow-arrow. Stayed overnight in a small village and the smallest hotel. Again started back to Port Blair and this time our car was stopped with a complete family. More than excited, I was scared. They looked so horrible. Since a policeman was in our car, so obviously, I was “legally” not allowed to click them but my driver tried to give me enough time but with a word of caution of not using the flash or else we will get in trouble. But I got so engaged to watch them that I could not handle my camera and I missed the shot. I know that was stupid of me. On our way back, stopped by to walk deep into a forest to visit the Mud volcano. It was still burning hot with bubbles and we were standing on top of it. Wow. Next day, we first went to a Botanical garden and then to one of the islands famous for viewing underwater life- corals. We are not allowed to litter any garbage there. We pay security amount for each plastic bottle we take and get it back when we show them; any one missing, you are fined. I swam in the Bay of Bengal (the divers took me, of course, I am not a swimmer) and saw so many beautiful fishes and corals. Such clean water, I doubted if I am in India.
Well, I can go on and on. Still the second part of my journey, South India, is left. But enough heavy dose for all of you.

The Half blood prince...

So, what’s new? Nothing. Weekend was pretty uneventful. It’s raining heavily here. Majority of my time went in two activities- sleeping (oh, my dear sleep!!) and reading two novels at a time (wow, see the appetite).
On Sunday night, I was very tired and it was getting late but I fought my sleep (how can I do that??) because I was almost at the climax of one of my novels- Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.
Yes, I am a fan of Harry Potter (HP) series- the books and the movies and the game as well. I am far away from the teen-age (yet, I did not reveal my age) but still gets excited like a 5 year old fan of Harry Potter, if at all any topic is touched related to HP. Still remember the only good thing that the CAT exam did to me. I was very upset after the exam (95% of the candidates are always upset appearing for this exam). So, my mum-dad decided to take me to watch the Harry Potter- and the Prisoner of Azkaban in the movie hall (1st and last time that I watched HP movie in hall else always have to settle down with the VCD on my laptop)... who cares about CAT after that...!!!
Hats off to JK Rowling for carving out a completely new world of wizardry and magic – Hogwarts.
For those who are completely unaware of this world, let me give a sneak preview. It is a story about a boy- Harry Potter who lives with his uncle-aunt and their son and they treat him nothing better than a servant. The boy is special because his mum-dad were wizards and they died while saving him from the Dark Lord (Voldemort), considered as the most evil wizard of the world, when he was just 1 year old. Voldemort wanted to kill HP but could not (because he was special). One fine day, the principal (Professor Dumbledore) of this Magic school- Hogwarts decides to enroll HP, and that was the day when he came to know that he too is a wizard. He then sets on his journey in the school, where he is already famous because he fought Voldemort and defeated him at the age of one. A world which stands amongst the “normal” people, yet they cannot see it, it has its own rules and regulations, houses, students, teachers, enemies, friends, subjects, classes, secrets, offices, ministry, strange people, magical animals, sport (Quidditch)... Here anything is possible. You can fly, you can make things fly, you can travel to any street through the fireplace (with the help of magical powder and some abracadabra), you fly on broomsticks and you have self speaking letters. Here Harry meet his friends for life- Hermione Granger (my favorite, because, she is the brightest of all) and Ron Weasley (always terrorized but cute). In all the parts, Harry has to fight the Dark lord (who still wants to kill HP) and somehow comes out unscathed, beating his greatest enemy. Harry and his group reveal some new secret every time.
It is not only the magical words and charms that bind me; it’s the journey that we had witnessed. All the actors started working in the movie as kids and they have also grown with the story, and so had many of us.
Harry Potter is not only about magic but also various emotions. Friendships, hatred, animosity, respect, love for friends and parents, trap, misunderstanding, sorrow and so on. It is about believing in self and what he/she desires.
JK Rowling has succeeded in binding her billions of fans and adding new ones with each new edition. Same applause goes to the directors of the Harry Potter movies for translating the book into motion with such detailing. I actually started watching the movie first and then read the books. By then I had already associated faces with the characters, thanks to the movies. So could easily visualize the scene written. Even though, I already knew what is going to happen in the next chapter but still the fun and suspense was same as encountering the story for the first time.
The writer appealed to her fans not to discuss and reveal the end of the story to anyone after they had read it, for not ruining the fun of other readers. Every time the new part is released, it creates a sort of history of fastest selling novel. The last (6th) part made a record of 15 million copies sold within the first 24 hours of release. The previous record holder is again HP- and the Half Blood prince with 9 million copies sold within first 24 hours.
Waiting to finish off the last novel of the series and still eagerly waiting to watch last two parts of the movie.

Cost Cutting......

Again, they switched off the AC. Another most innovative way of cost cutting. When I joined the company, the corporate world went upside down(not because of me, c'mon). There were news of economic slowdown and companies on firing spree. When we were making plans as to when to switch to another company, exactly then the "experience holders" advised to stick to your seat till the situation becomes better and the economy gains strength again.

But then, most of the companies took it as an excuse and started "cost cutting", to save resources and money. Slowly and slowly the coffee cup became smaller and thinner. We would get one mail daily from our Technology team with the list of all the workstations and which of them were on during the non-working hours and we were reminded to shut down the systems properly before leaving the desk. One fine day, the coffee machine was shifted to the eight floor- our dining area (our office is on the 4th floor). This actually discouraged most of the people, as very few wanted to take the strain to climb upto the 8th floor for such a tiny cup of tea/coffee. Another brilliant and out-of-the-box idea of cost-cutting. Employees of last four grades were now not allowed to "fly" between Chennai and Bangalore, rather they should travel by bus/train (well, this is acceptable) but what about those people, who keep on flying for every small distance (that too not settling for the anything less than Jet and Kingfisher flights). Quantity and quality of food was being compromised.

To add to the fun, I once travelled to one of the states (not the United States.. an Indian state) and stayed in the company guest house for few hours. Next day, other guests staying there told me that they could not find the remote of the ACs there and then the care-taker informed that he has been ordered to do keep away the remotes so that no one could switch on the ACs. God....!!!

For each stationery item you want, you are asked for the group head's approval (now who is going to ask for the group head's approval for a small little file or eraser, so forget it).

The examples can go on and on and on. No one can gather the courage to tell the "management" that these are useless measures and cost can be controlled with numerous other thoughtful ways. Because everyone is scared to be shown the door. So, again, just stick to where you are.

I agree that the companies have their own reasons to fire huge mass at one go. But are they in such bad shape all of a sudden that they cannot sustain the employees for atleast one month. They had lost the project, so call all the people on the project in the most suspicious way, make them sit in a closed room and inform that their services are no longer required by the company and no need to come to the office from next day. For God's sake, he/she has loans to pay, families to take care, and bills to be paid.

What amuses me the most is that we call ourselves IT companies but make no effort to go paperless. Once I went to my intranet for settlement of my travel claims. Completed the process and thought that it was over. But no. I have to "courier" the original boarding passes and other bills to Mumbai office and submit their "photocopies" and the printout of the tickets (which I anyways got from the travel desk through e-mail, which I could have forwarded, but no, I have to submit the print out) with the local CFO team. I could have saved these courier charges for sending 3 pages to Mumbai and could have instead forwarded the scanned copy of each one of them to the concerned stake-holders. The "management" again can show the concern by taking a cut in their heavy salaries. Sorry to say but their monthly salaries run upto lakhs, even when their travel and phone bills are taken care by the company itself.

I can survive in the office without AC and travel in train but please don't make me feel that I am the burden on the company and reason for higher costs, when I am the one working day in and day out sitting on same seat. Rather make a collective effort to "save the cost" and not "cut the cost"....

TUM HO TOH, GATA HAI DIL...

Yesterday when I was going back to my home in the office cab after a hectic day at office, I was recollecting all the mails received, chatting that I did on gtalk during office time and the calls received in the past few days from my sweet, cherished and most important friends; I incidentally tuned in to 94.3 FM.
Right at that moment it was playing the Rock On song- Sinband-the sailor. Without hurting anyone’s sentiments, I confess that except one song of the movie (ye tumhari meri baatein...), I never liked its songs. And every time this particular song would come on TV or FM, I would flip the channel. But here there was no other option, since this is only channel which plays Hindi songs. So, there comes one slow, out of pace stanza of this song-
“Tum ho toh, gata hai dil,
Tum nahi, toh geet kahaaaa...
Tum ho toh, hai sab hasil,
Tum nahi, toh kya hai yahaaaa...
Tum, ho toh hai, sapno ke jaisa haseen, ek samaaaaaa......”
BANG........ What a situational song!! For the first time, I could understand the lyrics and the depth of these lines. Throughout the rest of my journey, I kept on recollecting all the wonderful moments that I had with my friends and how every time, it was difficult to part with them to move on to the next level of my life.
During school time, never had any friend, they were all just my class-mates. I got the first taste of friendship when I came into the college to do BCA. There I met my first bunch of treasured jewels. We were just 5 girls in our batch and never felt the need for the 6th one (a boy or a girl). Used to call ourselves- The Band of Girls (I know, I sound so silly and stupid, but it was fun). Would come to college even if almost all the classes had been canceled, just to meet each other and have our tiffin in the college canteen (distance from my home to college was 10 kms). Played pranks (originated mostly by me and the victim, the most innocent one of the lot).
PS: Here I declare that in my blog, I would refrain from using name of any person. I hope the person I refer to, always understands it.
After finishing with the graduation, all of them had already started their P.G. courses while I prepared for entrance exams. When it was time to move out, I was so sad to leave them and was skeptical of the new friends that I would make.
There I met two of my room-mates for the first year, who virtually adopted me as their kid. Would take care of me, not let me do any work in our very small kitchen, teach me, would give the first bite to me before taking any of their meals. In short, they spoilt me. We had fun and also cried together. Then we had a small rough patch but, thankfully, everything became normal.
By that time, I had also found 3 more special people in my life (papa-chinchu-sikgurum, these are the code names). We became inseparable. Any problem to anyone, the other could feel the pain and had a solution. Used to feel secure with them. Knew that when I have them by my side, nothing can go wrong. Can’t forget those endless hours munching on my mom’s mathri with pickle and tea, thinking and planning about future, correcting each-other, playing online games for hours and hours (even though had final exam the next day, with practically no preparation), chinchu making me cram the summarized chapters in the early winter morning, on the day of exam while I, lie cozily in the blanket and making occasional sounds to make her feel that I am listening to her, preparing for placement GD/PIs, conspiracies in our PG etc etc. (I can write an entire book on our masti time).
When I had to move on to join the corporate life, could feel the void space in my life without them. It was difficult for all of us to carry on without each other. But we moved on, in search of new friends. I mentioned that in school time, I never had any friend. But thanks to the internet (orkut & gtalk) I have found one of my school mates as other jewel in my treasure. Again, need not mention his name, he is surely reading this blog.
Found few more in Chennai, who know my ups and downs in Chennai and stood by me in my difficult times there and I know will always stand. They were there to make me happy, cheer me up after a tiring day, share my problems and making me feel that everything will be ok.
So, thanks to Sinband-the sailor, to make me go back to the wonderful memories of my extended family. I wish all of you scale new heights and achieve what you desire. Thanks to all my dear friends (I know there is no space of thank you and sorry amongst us) for always being with me, in good and bad times... Love you all. This is straight from the heart. Cheers!!!

My dear sleep...

It was 6 a.m. when my mobile alarm rang and was irritating me when I decided to stop it (not even put it on snooze, so that it should not disturb me again after 5 minutes). Exactly at that time, my room-mate and my colleague called me up and ordered me to get up and get going else we will get late. I declared, “I am not going early today. I will come later” and went back to sleep leaving her shocked, since if I would have told her this last night itself, she would have also slept a little longer.

Now, you might be thinking where were we going. Do we work in call center and have early morning shift or are we still in school. No, we are not in school and neither do we work in call center. We work in “normal” IT company with the most abnormal office timings- 7:45 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. (to avoid the traffic during “usual” office hours, and sadly, almost all the companies in this IT park thought the same and made this as their official timing, so in turn, no respite from the traffic jams even so early in the morning) and the above mentioned scene is our daily routine, when mind says to get up (else would have to go by city bus) and the body refuses to leave the bed. Our cab comes to pick us up at 6:50 a.m. and both of us take turn on alternate days as to who will get up at 5:45 and who at 6:15 (both enjoy our turns when one can sleep for 30 more minutes than the other). Still most of the time, our cab driver welcomes us with disapproving looks- “madam, again late”. And as soon as we are in cab and settled ourselves in our places, we decide to go to sleep but thanks to the “super smooth” roads of Bangalore, we are forced to keep our eyes open and go through the torture. Last 15 minutes of our way allow us to take quick nap but before we could make ourselves comfortable, we are standing in front of our office. Everyday we have to drag our feet to the first floor, rubbing our eyes, cursing the management for such awful timings, and signing in to mark the attendance. Once on my desk, I normally make another attempt to sleep on my desk, since we are the first ones to reach the office and there is no one to bother.
On top of that, our company has obliged us with Internet access to normally blocked sites (not all, though) from 9 p.m. to 9 a.m., so we have only 45 more minutes (7:45 to 8:30) to surf through these privileged sites before rushing to take breakfast. So, another attempt failed to take quick, silent and unbothered nap. In another 15 minutes, next batch of sleepy colleagues appear and then we force ourselves to wish Good morning to all (even though mind tries hard to speak out Good night, and please let me sleep for some more time).
Was so happy when left my school since now I don’t have to get up so early. Went on to do BCA, initially was very happy for classes started at 9 a.m. But then came the evil of “extra-classes”, which ought to be taken in early morning only (but why?). Was again happy when passed out of BCA. But then, joined MBA coaching center and got the batch of 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. Was again very happy when joined MBA. Never knew that there was no time to sleep while doing this prestigious course. But was sure that since I am not a techie and neither am I working in a BPO, so my office will be from at-least 9 a.m. And there I landed up in this wonderful office. When will I get my dear sleep???

Chennai- The Place to be???

As I said in my previous post that I landed up in Chennai, the southern Metro city of India. Although my dreams of foreign posting were already in trash, but still Chennai did give me a flavor of how one would feel in a foreign city since here everything was so different and strange.
My first barrier was the language which was nowhere even remotely related to Hindi, English, Punjabi, Marwari or Gujarati, the languages I had always listened to since childhood. Initially, we were the easy victims for the autorikshaw drivers. We would enquire for a place, that time the fellow would understand our Hindi, tell us the rate which would be four times the actual, and finally when we would argue while handing over the fare (on realizing that we have just now been looted), he would simply start talking in Tamil and make us feel that he does not know which language we are talking in. After staying there for 1 month, even I understood that whatever the fellow asks for just argue for half the rate else laugh on them (even if they abuse me, who cares, for I don’t understand Tamil).
Next, one day I was desperate to have North Indian food and ordered for Mushroom masala and tandoori roti in a famous chain of eating joints, Hot Chips. I indeed got masala, which meant only green and red chillies and mushroom has to be searched for. Then and there itself I promised myself never to order my favorite dish in Chennai.
Did I miss to tell you about the overloaded buses which are 45 degrees titled towards one side for people are dangling out of the gate and the windows. Malls, which are one of the normal features of any metro city, Chennai had only two of them- City Center and Spencer’s. With its hot climate where I was feeling so uncomfortable even in my cotton shirts, ladies would wear dark heavy silk sarees and gold ornaments during day time!!
Now, if any native of Chennai is reading this, (s) he might have already started cursing me. But hey, picture abhi baki hai mere dost. This is where I could find the best Idly ever (after my mom’s) at Murugan Idly Shop (I actually got addicted to it), where I could manage very well eating them with sambhar and 4 chutneys with my hand neatly on a banana leaf. Found one of the most mouth watering gol gappas at Gangotri (chat shop run by bihari bhaiyyas). Relaxed for hours and hours at Besant Nagar beach (better than Marina beach, in terms of crowd and cleanliness). Saw most beautiful gold jewellery (shops as big as 3-4 floors just for gold ornaments), and the best silk sarees (I bought my mom one from the famous Nallis with my first salary, and she looked amazing in it). Got to live in a bungalow size flat, with all the amenities, with the most amazing landlords and 3 sweet room-mates, with our endless movie story telling sessions, school poems and chapters, gossips on Zoom TV, watching Roadies on MTV and comedy scenes in our kitchen while preparing dinner. Later on, it became fun to travel in over-crowded buses, since I started getting deluxe buses on my route from office to home. Tried my hand at learning Tamil and Malayalam (for my two flat-mates were Keralites), but failed badly with the tongue-twister languages.
But yes, when I had to bid farewell to this Southern metro, I had tears in my eyes, which I made sure not to reveal to anyone, because I was leaving behind my landlords, who were no less than my parents there, my cousin- my backbone in Chennai, my flat-mates- all of us would wait for everyone to come back from office to start our gossip session. Must admit, not a bad place to be in...Cheers!!

Rajasthan Royals Vs. Chennai Super Kings..

When I joined my company after been selected through the campus placement, I had an induction program at Mumbai. There we were supposed to get our final locations. Eagerly waiting throughout the program schedule, with various rumors about the prospective projects and foreign locations/trips, our HR team finally announced the locations and the projects on the last day of the program, in which around 150 bright MBAs were placed. I was among those 10 brightest people who were just given the project (rural project, which meant our passports had to be buried deep under in our suitcases and the dream of foreign locations had to be thrown away in a trash) and to get the locations, we had to wait for another 2 days for some Mr. Paddy (Padmanabhan Iyer) who was to allocate us our locations.
After much waiting the day and the moment arrived. Mr. Paddy (SGM of our company) announced, “Nikita, with your specialization in Operations, I think you would be fit for Business Operations profile and you would be based out of Chennai”. CHENNAI !!!!!!! Of course, I admit that while giving placement interview for the company I said to the interview panel that I have absolutely no issues to base myself anywhere (in or out of India), but Chennai !!!!!! Did the panel actually told the HR team about my mobility?
I could not concentrate thereafter on what the gentleman was speaking and talking about. Hundreds of questions were racing in my mind. How far is Chennai from Jaipur/Hyderabad (where my brother stays)? How often will I be able to visit home? Have heard about its very bad climate, is that true? How will I manage there with the language? Do I have any relative there? Why can I not be based out of, say, Delhi or Mumbai.. Phew...
I could not help myself but I sent an sms to papa stating that my worst fear has come true. I am going to Chennai. I waited for his reply. But nothing. As soon as I came out of that meeting room, I called him up and then realized that I had forgotten that next day was my cousin's wedding and my parents were busy there. Well, now it can't be changed. I took a flight to Jaipur (to attend the wedding), meet one prospective girl for my elder brother (who is now my bhabhi) and crib about the company and their unfair criteria of placing the people in projects and giving locations. Finally on 15th of May, 2008 I landed up at Chennai, where very fortunately, I found one of my cousin, Nandita Di. She came to pick me up at the airport and dropped me at the company Guest house. If she would not have been there, believe me, I might have gone mad in this alien city, which is nothing less than a foreign city for me, because of the language, food, people, living style, and climate.
For my roller-coaster stay at Chennai, keep watching this space...Cheers !!!!!!

DREAMZZZ.....

Let me start with why I chose DREAMZZZ as my blog's title. Because that is the world I live in. Had been living away from my home since 2006 and my room-mates have often commented that I can sit in a corner for hours and hours without anyone noticing me. Don’t I get bored? NO. Because that time I was not just sitting idle, I was in my dreamland. I love to dream, but please don’t make an impression that I am insane and unrealistic. It’s just that I always want to do so many things in this one single small life, which “realistically” is not possible to do. Once, as a kid, I wanted to become a Doctor (although I admit I cannot remember the names of medicines and diseases sparing few common ones like Crocin, Emflam, fever, typhoid, diabetes etc), later wanted to get into armed forces (where people with specs are not entertained, and I unfortunately came in this bracket too early in life), then started watching some Hollywood flicks and reading English fiction novels and was fascinated with the actors playing FBI/CIA agents, so thought of becoming one, and lastly, since I am an Indian, every girl or a boy always carry two dreams- to become an actor/actress or to become a cricketer. So, to become a famous actress was another career option. But hey, I am talking about becoming all these in this life only (since, I don’t believe in re-birth). So, only two options –
1) Actually become an actress and play all these roles in movies, or
2) Just lie down and DREAM....
With a salaried family background, where getting good education, getting married and/or getting into service is the pre-decided path, second option seems most viable.
So, in my very treasured world, I have till date become a very successful doctor, had a very short stint in Air force, had become a CBI agent (could not afford to become an FBI agent even in my dreams) and also a sought after actress (this was the funniest)...
That is my world where only my most cherished friends and family members are welcome. With this, let me also tell you that once I come out of my dream role, I know where I am and what the real world is like. Cheers...

My First One

Finally I decided that I would also bug people with my blogs. I always used to wonder what are these blogs. Got to first understand with my brother's blog page. Living alone and far away from home where you have limited options to share your daily thoughts and observations, I hope this might help me "talk". So, here I go.....