The Dream

Hello World!

I know, I've been lost in space and time! I've been travelling the mountains and deserts, wandering amidst the pines and dunes, searching for the purpose of life. And one day it struck me like a bolt of lightning. And now that I have realized the purpose of life, the universe and everything else, I've returned to my blog to share it with all of you!

Kidding :) Just been busy with other things... Anyway, what made me return to my ages-old blog was a dream I had last night. Not that it's of any consequence to anyone, but I just wanted to pen it down before my ageing grey cells overwrite the memory with something else.

Generally I don't recall my dreams, I can count on my fingertips the number of instances where I dreamt something and still remembered it clear enough to relate after waking up. But this dream was particularly spectacular.

Do you recall a dream where you were aware that it was not the reality? That's what made this dream stand out. And this is the second such instance in recent days.

A few days ago I had a very brief dream where I was running real fast, then I spread my arms like a bird and took off into the air. Then I remember realizing (in my dream) that that was not possible and there was something amiss. I remember thinking "Ha ha no way, this can’t be true", just then I woke up and was not surprised at all.

The dream I had yesterday was a much lengthier version that felt like a great fantasy movie. The start of the dream is hazy in my memory. Here's how it went:

....(i don't remember the start)... I had attained super-human powers of pulling things towards me with the power of my mind, and conversing in advanced language! :) I discovered this when I began writing something using very hi-fi English words "... and the enormity of his disposition amplified the audacity of his proclamation... (or something like that)", and suddenly my pencil slipped from my hand and rolled under the table. I closed my eyes and mentally pulled the pencil from under the table, and it actually rolled out! I was thrilled, but at the same time I became aware that it could not possibly be real. This awareness lasted throughout the dream.

I went about putting my new-found powers to practical use. I pulled the TV remote towards me from across the room. When going out, I extended my arm and pulled my wallet and car keys from their drawers like a magnet. I could draw anything towards me... I drew people (especially beautiful women!) towards me by speaking some awesome words in Hindi (don't remember the words exactly), and drew money, gems and things by just extending my arm like a magnet :) It was fun! I was constantly aware that this was not real, and that's the part I enjoyed most. I even remember speaking in bookish Marathi to my wife Manasi, "Mi yA vismayAchya mULchi vAstaviktA samjhUn gheNyAchA yatna kartoi (I am striving to comprehend the fundamental reality of this illusion)"!

Then I saw the Moon in the sky, extended my hand towards it nonchalantly and willed it to come closer. And it actually worked! The moon grew bigger and bigger as I pulled it closer. Suddenly I realized it had come too close, covering more than a quarter of the sky. The ominous craters were visible in ultra high definition. I realized things were getting out of hand, and tried to push it back, but realized I didn't have any pushing power! I could only pull. The moon continued to fall and a holocaust ensued. It crashed into Earth, all blazing and setting fire to the entire sky. The Earth was plunged into turmoil. Chunks of the Moon flew everywhere and exploded, the sky rained fire and debris. People were running about everywhere shrieking and cursing me in awesome words ".. this is all because of you, you calamitous despicable scoundrel, beep-beep of the highest order!". The beep-beep caused me to smile despite the destruction :)

All this time I was thinking “This is not happening, this is not real, I want to get out of this”. I was not actually aware that it was a Dream as such, just that it was definitely not Reality. I just wanted that virtual setup to end and actual reality to return, and that's when I woke up!

I lay dazed and smiling on my bed, like I had just experienced an awesome 3D 360d UHD VR movie. I was astonished at the unreal choice of words in my dream, and wondered why I don't use such words in actual conversations! :) It gave me a deep feeling of being a 'bystander' in this world where life is a movie and you are the audience. In a movie you witness passing moments and events and know all the time that it isn't real, yet you let yourself get engrossed into the story. You think you are controlling events but when the movie is over you realize that you're only responding to them. Is that what life is?

‘AM’ not in my senses!

All of us sometimes feel like Arthur Dent felt on the day Earth was destroyed by the Vogons to make way for a space highway through the Galaxy, in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. A few days ago it was my turn to feel so, albeit for a very short time, thankfully. I happened to read that a patient plunged in coma from several days had sprung out of it when he smelt his favorite food! I had pooh-poohed it then, but I was about to experience something quite close!

One fine day, uh oh… I mean one not so fine a day, I woke up with a weird feeling. I can’t describe the feeling in words, except by giving a simile. It was exactly the feeling you’d experience if you slept in your house and woke up in the forest. Like you stepped into the elevator of your office, waited till it climbed up to your floor, and suddenly the door opened onto a deserted beach. Ok… not so dramatic, but almost :)

It was a strange morning, and I knew it the moment my sleep broke. It was (supposed to be) a cold December day, but unlike every other day, there was no cold mist, no feeling of freshness that accompanies you once you chase away the sleep hangover. And it just didn’t feel right. While I still lay on the bed, I noticed momentarily that it was all too quiet, and the very next moment I realized I was noticing the absence of the chirping of early morning birds, and the predictable drone of school vans. What was wrong with the environment?

Don’t worry I’m not going to end this article by saying my mom shook me up and I realized I had been dreaming. Nope, this was for real. Very real. I looked at the clock on the table beside my bed. It showed 11.30. I realized with a lazy groan that it had run out of battery a week ago. So what was the damned time? And what was wrong with the Earth?

I intensely felt I had overslept a great deal. But why? The previous day hadn’t been all that exhausting. Expecting it to be quite late in the morning, I got up from my bed, walked over to the window and glanced across the road, half expecting small green men with onion eyes to be walking around. But no, it wasn’t unrealistically unreal. It was just… realistically unreal! I mean, where were the schoolchildren? Where were the joggers? Where were the elderly thieves that stole flowers from our garden every morning on the pretext of performing Pooja? What was wrong with the society?

And what was the matter with the lawn? What? No newspaper? Was the previous day a public holiday? How would I get through the day without a newspaper? Hmmm… and why hadn’t I heard the milkman’s call? That was loud enough to wake the dead. What was wrong with… with everything?

Hmmm, the time should be about 8 or 9, I reckoned. As I walked on towards the sitting room wondering why my mouth felt like some angel had brushed my teeth while I was asleep, the clock in the sitting room suddenly struck 5. Eh? I looked at it with disbelief. Now what was wrong with space and time itself?

I earnestly tried to fit the pieces of the puzzle. Just then I smelt coffee, and my emotions went something like: Coffee. Coffee? Coffee! Of course, coffee!

In a moment, my nose had told me everything that all my other senses could not! Mom never made coffee in the mornings. Coffee was conventionally an evening drink at my place. Like a person who hit upon the ultimate truth of life when struck by a streak of lightning, I suddenly realized why the morning felt weird; because it wasn’t morning at all! I had just woken up from an afternoon nap. I smiled, and stepped into the kitchen for the coffee. Come on, what was wrong with me?! The Universe was alright!

Then on, my respect for the olfactory powers has greatly risen! Nowadays I opine that coffee vending machines should be an integral part of the ICU ward of every hospital.

It's a Pity!

Like I might've said before, I've been a sticky Isaac Asimov bookworm. Most of his sci-fi stories are set into the distant future (as expected, of course). Through his stories, he tries to warn us that technological advancement is moving humanity away from nature. Many of his stories depict the future earth as a place that’s technologically impressive, with fully mechanized comforts, but devoid of natural beauty, with an atmosphere polluted beyond repair, with a teeming test-tube born population living entirely under artificial environs and eating cultured, biologically engineered food. Scary. Improbable. Or so I thought.



A few weeks ago, my niece and nephew from Mumbai came visiting us. They are a bubbly pair of school kids who have spent all their lives behind the closed doors of an apartment in Mumbai. This was the first time they ever came down to our house in Vidyaranyapura, Bangalore. They enjoyed their stay in and out, and they just didn’t want to go back. And for good reason. But throughout their stay, they reminded me of Asimov, and his stories of the fallouts of mindless urbanization.

Their joy burst forth the moment they saw my house. They had expected me to live in an apartment just like the herd of people does in Mumbai. Fortunately Bangalore isn’t so ‘apartmentalized’ yet, although that statement is fast becoming obsolete. Anyway, they just didn’t tire of running in and out of our small bungalow on the outskirts of Bangalore.

Ok, Vidyaranyapura was like paradise for them. They never thought one could grow vegetables in his own house. They just assumed everyone on earth bought vegetables from a shop! They never thought the chirping of birds and cooing of cuckoos could actually wake you up from sleep in the morning. They never thought that a jasmine creeper or a champaka tree could be more fragrant than their perfume-bottle counterparts. They never saw the shine of dew drops on the tips of the tiny velvet fur coat of rose leaves. They never thought the early morning fog could come down so low and thick that you could not see the other side of the road.

It all started one morning when my nephew woke me up, all excited saying, “Kaka, come quick, there is a cuckoo in the garden.” I was overawed that they had distanced themselves from nature so much that hearing a cuckoo was so exciting to them. The same evening there was a slight drizzle, and a beautiful rainbow sprang up on the horizon opposite to the setting sun. The moment my niece noticed it, she and her sibling scampered onto the terrace and gazed at it with mystified eyes. It was so awesome for them to actually witness an event about which they had just read in their text books. It’s not that rainbows don’t happen in Mumbai, but I suspect most people just can’t see them with all those tall buildings around.

The night was even better. In Mumbai, they never got to see the night sky except from the beach, and even then hardly any stars were visible, thanks to all the light pollution. The stars twinkling like pearls on a jet black canvas was a real treat for them. They spent hours on the terrace, feasting their eyes through the binoculars.

This set me thinking. I was overwhelmed with a feeling that Asimov’s prophecies are really coming true. That reminds me of another incident that my friend told me about, a few days ago. He had just returned from New York. While he was enamored by the grandeur of the mega city, he was stumped at the fact that you just cannot get around the city without a car. You need a car to commute from anywhere to anywhere even if the two anywheres were within walking distance. People can’t walk. Instead, they buy treadmills and burn their calories and time in such a silly manner. What the?

Also, while he was there, he had once been to an amusement park, where a typical model village had been recreated. He couldn’t believe that people were actually paying money to see what the rural landscape looked like! It sounds absurd, at least to us Indians! What’s more, even when inside, people were not watching it directly, but through the camcorder’s display screen. He was appalled that people there are quagmired in so many levels of artificiality. They actually pay money to enter an artificial village, spend all their time walking around looking at electro-mechanical animals through a tiny camcorder viewer, then go home and replay it on their television screens and feel happy that they experienced something beyond city life. Aaargghh! Asimov, thou art the God!

Chakra Bar

I've always been an ardent fan of science fiction. From the senseless but adorable Doughlas Adams to the gripping classic Asimov, I've absorbed all the sci-fi I could lay my organic appendages upon.


Hmm... what follows here is not an original article (for a change). I got this story as an email forward several years ago. I put this up here as a tribute to the unknown author of one of the most weird pieces of science fiction I've ever seen. I know it’s a long story, but once you start off you can’t stop reading it. At the end you will feel you should've been dead before you read it. Go ahead... taste the eeeewwww feeling for a change. Don't say I didn't warn you :) And if you are the author or know the author of this story, please do contact me. I have a promise to fulfil!!

Mono-Act: Chakra Bar!

1975 Jan 1

It was about five in the morning. Father (I am not bothering with names) woke up with a start. Many years had passed since he had founded the orphanage. He had named it ‘X-Orphanage’, a rather funny name. But looking back, everything about his life seemed funny now. Hearing some noise outside, Father decided to have a look.

A child lay there in front of the orphanage. It was a girl. Seeing her abandoned like this in the cold morning, Father felt a sense of anger for the merciless being who had thrown her away like this. He took her in his arms. He would raise her like his own child.

17 Years Later

The girl had now grown up. She was now staying at a hostel. She met a man and fell in love with him. Soon she got pregnant. But the man disappeared. She was thrown out of the Hostel. Father came and took her back to the orphanage. She gave birth to a girl, but the baby was mysteriously stolen. Unable to bear all this, the Father committed suicide.

5 years later

Due to some serious health problems, the girl went to see a Doctor. The doctor having examined her, said with a sad expression on his face, “Adrenalo Sytosis, a serious case of hormone imbalance”. An operation was performed in which the doctor had to change the sex of the patient. The girl was now transformed into a man.

The man was very depressed because he had lost his child, his father had committed suicide, his lover had betrayed him, he had to change sex and so on. He eventually took to drinking.

One day he saw that a new bar called ‘Chakra Bar’ had opened in his locality. He went in. He saw a bearded man to whom he related his sad tale. The bearded man took pity on him and told him that he had a Time Machine and that he could use it to change his past. He accepted the gift from the bearded man. He decided to go to the past (to the year 1992) and started the Time Machine.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1992

The man arrived with the Time Machine in the year 1992. There he met a girl and fell in love with her. The girl got pregnant. The man, unwilling to marry her, left the town. He went to another city, earned some money and five years later came back to the city where the girl lived. Wanting to conceal his identity, he grew a beard. He started a bar named 'Chakra Bar'. One day a man came to the bar and narrated a sorrow tale. Out of compassion, he gave the Time Machine to the man. The man started the Time Machine and went back to the past.

Suddenly a man wearing a mask came into the bar. He pointed a gun at the bearded man. He said that he had a Time Machine and forced the bearded man into it along with himself. Taking the bearded man with him, the masked man started the Time Machine.

When they reached the past, the masked man suddenly gave the Time Machine to the bearded man and ran away. The bearded man found himself in front of X-Orphanage. He went inside and found a woman lying there with her new born baby. It was a girl. Since the mother lay unconscious and there wasn’t anyone else nearby to take care of the girl, he took the girl and started the Time Machine to go to the past.

1975 Jan 1

The bearded man arrived with the girl. Thinking that it was the best place for the child, he left her in front of X-Orphanage. He joined a college, studied hard and became a doctor. One day a woman was brought to the hospital. He examined her and found that it was a serious case of 'Adrenalo Sytosis'. He performed an operation in which he had to change her sex. One day, fed up with the complexities of modern life, he started the Time Machine and went back in time.

1968 May 12

He arrived at a time of great famine and suffering. Seeing all this, he decided to become a priest and serve the people. He started an orphanage and named it 'X-Orphanage'.

Years later, he found a girl lying in front of the orphanage. He took her and brought her up like his own child.

Many years later he heard that the girl was pregnant and was thrown out of the hostel. He brought her back to X-Orphanage. She gave birth to a girl and fell unconscious. The father desperately searched for help, but since there was no-one nearby to help him, he decided to bring a person back from the future. He wore a mask, took a gun for protection and started the Time Machine. He materialized in front of 'Chakra Bar'. He went inside, found a bearded man and forced him to travel with him to the past.

Reaching the past, he felt very guilty about forcing the bearded man to come with him. He gave the Time Machine to the bearded man and ran away to see his daughter. When he reached there, he heard the sad news from his daughter that the baby was stolen. Unable to bear the sorrow, he committed suicide.

THE END

What's in a name?

The story begins in the Cognizant Academy training hall at Bangalore, where I, a fresher then (in late 2003), was being trained on Java by Tarun Elankath. Tarun ate, drank and talked Java. He has been one of my idols ever since I met him, although he left Cognizant some time after teaching us. He has his own blog here (click at your own risk): jroller.com/page/lenkite. Anyway… he drilled Java into our brains for 4 days at a stretch, leaving us with a great softwarocomplexophobia towards programming in general and Java in particular. I didn’t understand much Java then, but I did get to know it was incredibly complex behind the scenes. That’s when I wrote a humerous article on how it might be to interview such a hardcore techie.

By great good fortune, after many months of joining CTS I met yet another such radiant personality in one of my projects; Kenny Kuriakose. Kenny was born with a Java compiler CD in his mouth. He could build Enterprise Software before he learnt how to tie his shoelaces and passed the Sun Business and Enterprise Architecture Certification exams before joining kindergarten. One day I just ‘Kenny’-ised my article on Tarun and mailed it to his batchmates. The article has been doing so many rounds in people’s inboxes since then that I thought I should give it a permanent place on the net.

Kenny has a characteristic way of speaking that really endears him to people, making heavy statements while holding up his hand to show the palm, as if he were a Java Guru blessing all his listeners with coding abilities. Maybe people who haven’t met this character won’t enjoy this article, because many statements here are typical of Kenny’s way of speech and make sense only when imagined to be said by him.

Stautory warning: This is a completely unreadable article. Knowledge of Object Oriented Programming is necessary to tolerate the article. No characters in this story are fictious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely intentional.

(The article has been slightly abridged to remove statements that might otherwise have given the lawyers of CTS an opportunity to earn extra money)

‘Literally’ yours,
-Parag

What's in a name?

Kenny, a young and prospective 'Language Developer' gently pushed open the door of the interview room. With a very confident smile, he peered inside and said, “Hello sir, may I come in?”

Subeer Bakshi, an experienced, resourceful human in the human resources dept. of CTS was quite ready to scare the guts out of another candidate. “Hello,” he said, “Please do come in.” Kenny merely said, “Thanks.” and softly entered the room with a thousand ideas running in his mind. Subeer Bakshi indicated a chair, “Please, have a seat.” Kenny responded heartily, “Thank you very much.” and sat down, swinging a giant bag of books over the table.

Wanting to get familiar with the new face, Subeer asked Kenny, “So... what is your name?”

Greatly happy at being asked a question, Kenny held up his forefinger and said, “Aaa… That’s actually a very interesting question. My name belongs to the Domain Namespace ‘Kuriakose’. My name, which is an Abstraction containing three parts, Uniquely identifies me as a Leaf Node in my ancestral Hierarchy. I mean, aaa… the Keyword ‘Kenny’, which is the first part of my name, is the Class Identifier which when Passed by Reference to the second and third parts of my name, uniquely identifies me. ‘Kenny’ is also a Root Directory, in the sense that it does not Inherit any Attributes from any other Namespace. The second part of my name, ‘Joe’, is a Static keyword that Extends my Parent Class. I hope you are able to Compile what I am telling you.

The third part of my name, viz. aaa… ‘Kuriakose’, is the most interesting part. Although it is an Extension of my Namespace, it is a very good example for Multiple, Multilevel Inheritance. You know, among all my Parental Nodes, exactly half were instances of Male Class and the other half were Objects of Female Type! Aaa… That’s actually the best thing about my name! The third part of my name is also a Constructor that Instantiated and Initialized my name as soon as I was born until a formal Declaration was done at the naming ceremony.”

Subeer Bakshi appeared to have been hit by a whirlwind. He collected himself and managed to cut Kenny out; “Okay, okay. Sorry for asking that question. Can I continue with my next question?”

The prospective candidate was not displaced so easily. The forefinger had now been replaced with the entire palm. “Yes of course, but first aaa… let’s understand the simple fundas properly. ‘Kenny Joe Kuriakose’ is an excellent example for Encapsulation. You must be knowing about Encapsulation, right? Access Control mechanisms? Private, Public…blah blah blah blah. The three parts of my name have Access Specifiers as Private, Protected and Public, respectively. I hope you are not getting aaa… bored. Am I going too slow?"

Subeer was stumped at this question. Before he could utter a word, Kenny, the Persistent one continued, "So as I was telling you, ‘Kenny Joe Kuriakose’ is a particular instance of the Template Class Name. And since my name represents me, who am an object, it is Simple, Object Oriented, and Architecture - Neutral. The strange thing about my aaa… name is that although it does not return any Arguments, it still cannot be declared Void! You can call me ‘K. J. Kuriakose’, or ‘K. J. Kenny’, which are different Function Calls that generate the same Result. So aaa… Polymorphism is a built-in feature of my name. That’s why my name is actually quite famous; in fact, ever since I graduated from HKBK college, it has become better known as Hai Kenny Bye Kenny college. Now let me tell you about the Security features of my name.”

Subeer Bakshi was, by this time, actually down on his knees, desperately crying, “Stop! Stop! It is more than evident that you think in Java. I promise you that you shall be selected into the company, but for James Gosling’s sake, stop!” Kenny was startled at his naivety, and said, “But… but you were going to ask me some question, no?”

His face becoming red at the very thought of asking another question, Subeer lamented, “Am I mad? I tell you, you are already selected!”

Kenny shrugged his shoulders, got up from his seat, slung his bag of books over his shoulder and walked towards the door, pleased at the thought of enlightening another ignorant soul. But his explanation was still somehow incomplete. As he opened the door to go out, he could not contain himself. He turned around to his now pale-faced interviewer, and said with a most earnest face, not to mention the forefinger, “Speaking of my name, you may like to visit my personal website: www.mynameiskennyjoekuriakoseandiknowjavarealgood.com. Aaa… It has a beautiful left-nav (Kenny was involved in building the left-nav of our project website and was very passionate about it). It also has a games section where you can play interesting games, such as cursing people by moving the cursor over them. There is also a dating section where you can search partners based on their level of SUN certification.”


(As a matter of fact, Kenny is one of the sweetest people I've ever met, and I'm proud of his friendship.)

My Poor Little Inf(y)amous Company!

Ok, presenting my first non-trivial blog! This is a (supposedly) sarco-humerous article I wrote when I was just about to complete 1 year as a software engineer in Cognizant Technology Solutions. This article was published in the company's monthly magazine.

There is a lot of background behind the story. It is a true incident that I found funny. For the uninitiated, CTS and Infosys are two great software services companies in India. Infy has kindof become an unofficial face of Indian techies. This article portrays the feelings of a person who is working for a company that is (was) not so well known to the local junta (atleast in Bangalore). Even while ordering a Pizza to be delivered to the office, I'd have to repeat the name of the company many times before finally resorting to spelling it out!

Maybe the Infocians would be enraged on reading the article but before they set their lawyers on my tail, let me declare that I have nothing against any company. I was just trying to emphasize how little known CTS was, as compared to the giant Infy. Maybe the situation doesn't exist any more, but the hell... here goes!

My Poor Little Inf(y)amous Company!

I have heard many a people ask that question before. “What are you doing?”

I have heard many a people give that answer before. “I’m working in Infosys”

I have heard many a people express that comment before. “Ooooo…!”

I heard that question again the other day. “What are you doing?”

This time the enquirer was a family friend of ours, who went by the name of Iyer. His only son only worked… guess where… in India’s only company - Infosys.

I have given that answer many a times before. “I’m working for Cognizant.”

I’ve heard many a people wanting to hear that again, just as Mr. Iyer was, “Yenna? Where?”

“Cognizant. Cognizant Technology Solutions. It’s an IT solutions firm.”

I’ve seen many a people blink after that answer. After a brief pause of assimilation (or misassimilation), Iyer said, “What solutions? You mean…. software? Something like Infosys?” Long company names were probably not his cup of coffee. (His only son worked in only Infosys)

I didn’t want to say it, but as many times before, I ended up saying “Yes”. I didn’t want to hear it, but many a times I get to hear the same reply accompanied by the same pitiful look as was being presented to me then. “Don’t worry. Keep trying for Infosys. You’ll make it someday. Send your bio-data form (meaning resume) to my son.” He said.

Everytime that leaves me stupefied, but I don’t even attempt to clear up the muddle. I hope the rest of the Coggies don’t eat me alive for failing to defend the company reputation.

Understandably, Mr. Iyer was one among the breed of ‘fathers of successful software professionals’. He gave the impression that after passing through millions of births in the bodies of all lower organisms, you, the immortal soul, have evolved to accept the body of a Human Being. Now that you have obtained this incredibly rare form of life, that too being born in this land of intrinsically intelligent people, it is an utter waste if you cannot make it into Infosys.

But wait… I left my conversation behind… Most people would stop at that, but being slightly bright among inquirers, Iyer went a step higher. “But… you are a Mechanic, no? Then how are you doing software work?” This generally is too much for me. As a Mechanical Engineer, I get wild enough when people mix up ‘break’ and ‘brake’, but mixing up a Mechanical Engineer with a Mechanic makes me click my toungue in distaste. When asked a question that deserves no answer, I generally answer with a question, “If I do my graduation in Chemical Engineering, would I become a Chemist?” That invariably drives the nail, but Mr. Iyer was of persistent type. “But why does Co… eer… your company… need mechanics to work on the computer?” (His only son studied only computer science and worked only in Infosys)

That was precisely the question I had dared to ask my interviewers (had I known the seriousness of the interview procedure then, I wouldn’t have done it). The answer I got from a startled face was, “Why! We need people who are unbiased!” (they couldn’t explain it beyond this, maybe that’s why they selected me; so that I could experience it first hand). Anyway, I just babbled the same reason to Iyer. “They wanted unbiased people.”

“How do you feel about working? Especially in a software company?” He asked next.

“Well,” I began. “In the beginning of course was the welcome change in life; from college to office, from student to professional.” He smiled as a metaphoric phrase suddenly struck him, “From learning to yearning!”. I couldn’t help agreeing with him as his accent made him pronounce ‘earning’ as ‘yearning’. Sly as I am, I replied, “Well I’m earning a little. But I haven’t stopped learning”. He overtook me with an unbeatable one, “You are still learning to yearn!” We both laughed (I, for a different reason). He continued, “My son yearns handsomely. Of course, he is never there to yenjoy his yearnings yexcept on Sundays.” I laughed wryly, thankful for all the Saturdays my company allowed me to spend at home (I hope that won’t change).

“How do you go to your office?” He asked. I pointed out my bike, emphasizing the fact that I bought it with my own money within two months of joining my company. I hoped he was atleast remotely impressed by that. But no. In all probability he hadn’t even been listening to my reply. “My son has to walk only 100 mtrs in the morning and the company bus picks him up!” I wanted to tell him that I travel 10 kms right into the heart of the city while his only son, after crossing that 100 mtrs mark, took only 100 minutes to get wherever he went. But I held shut. I wouldn’t have even bothered to write this article but for the rest of the conversation.

“They have nine restaurants within the campus.” The guy was hell-bent on proving what? I didn’t know. I found solace in keeping mum although the choicest multicuisine restaurants of Bangalore were a stone’s throw from where I… chuck it.

The vocal masquerade went on for quite a while, at the zenith of which, he finally took it as his duty to deliver me from the dark quagmire I had gotten myself into. “How long has it been since you are working?” he enquired. “Around one year” I said.
“Good. Then your bond must be coming to an end, no? Why don’t you send your bio-data form (meaning only resume) to my son?”

I smiled and said, “My company doesn’t have a bond.”
“What? Then your job is very insecure. As it is people get fired left and right in software companies. No bond means it becomes all the more yeasy for your company to fire you! You should never join such companies. They are very unpredictable! Irresponsible!”

I smiled as I recollected the famous HR statement that was told (even) to me during my interview. “The only bond in CTS is the emotional bond”. I relayed that to him.
“Just you send it across anyway.”
“O.K” said I (only to please him. I haven’t actually done it, HR please note).

That was about a month ago. What prompted me to write this article was that a week ago I met my friend (who happened to be the only son of Mr. Iyer, and who had only worked in Infosys) in the elevator as I was going home from office. He had joined Co… eer… my company. When I asked him the reason, he gave me a bored look and said, “Yaar, I was yearning to leave Infosys!” (and I’ve never known him to have a tarnished accent).

(This article has been published only with due permission from my magnanimous friend)

-Parag

So... what's the menu?

What am I going to post on this blog? Hey, it's too early to say that. Frankly, I don't know. Maybe I'll post something I wrote, or something I read, or both or neither! Maybe something techie, something laymanish... something silly or something geeky... or just a silly joke :) Let's hope it ain't too harsh on your nerves! All fan/hate mails, copyright issues and advertising concerns may be directed to me at pardes@gmail.com :)