I.T.(is on the)ROCKS!!

The IT sector is booming. People are getting recruited at fantastic salaries left, right and center (and being put on bench also at the aforementioned places). All the top companies are proudly quoting the headcount they expect to have in three years from now just like the Indian Association of Meat-sellers(I don’t know what it is called exactly, but this seems pretty logical, doesn’t it? A wonder if they haven’t named it thus) must be proudly boasting about the headcount of goats and sheep. Thankfully, cannibalism isn’t part of our culture, else ‘being axed from the job’ might have taken a whole new meaning altogether.

The rise of IT is indeed impressive. Kudos to all the computer engineers who made it possible! Screeeeeeechhhhh…..Wait a second! Did I just say computer engineers? I am sorry, I meant mechanical, civil, chemical, metallurgical, electrical engineers. Now there can be three reactions to this piece of news which I’ll list below:

1. An IT professional : (No reaction. Waiting for the next sentence)
2. Lehmann..I mean, layman : Hmmm….
3. An American Client : What the %$%#!! They make the software??!!

Thankfully for all of us non-comps IT people, I don’t suppose any American client is going to read my blog (except maybe if I get sick of my project and want it cancelled).

I think we, the ones who thought s/w was, at worst, all about writing a C Program on how to generate the Fibonacci series, are the ones who have benefited the most from this boom. I mean, can you imagine an automobile manufacturing company taking an English(Hons) graduate in their R&D team which is going to come out with a brand new clone of its close competitor? But IT is simply great. IT(t) didn’t ask me a single question on computers and gave me two job offers from the top 3 IT companies in India! And unlike in the previous scenario, where the English(Hons) graduate, even if he somehow managed to get into the R&D team, will only be used to correct the innumerable mistakes in official e-mails, here a mechanical engineer can be easily put into coding in C/C++/Java after a training spanning just one month. And what a training it is! Even the guys who used to staple chits to the inside of their pants in college and were the first to reach the exam hall, not because of any excitement but purely to ‘make notes’ on the wonderfully cluttered drawing boards, get a shock.. For here, co-operation is virtually officially sanctioned. Sample a scene in the classroom during a test :

Ayan : Hey Sonia(for want of a better name)! Log in to the test site, start the test and we can all help u with the answers. Then we can simply copy all the answers.

Sonia: Shh…Ma’am is still in the class.

Ayan: Exactly. Even our class genius Mohan will know only 5 answers. From where do you think we were going to get the rest?

Ma’am: First of all, don’t call me Ma’am. My name is Sree Devi(I am not kidding – there were quite a few madhuris and sreedevis for our batch). And please don’t make so much noise. Your training lead can come anytime. Do it quietly. And Sonia, the answer is D, not B.

Ayan: Sreedevi, I’ll go out and have coffee. Will be back in 15 minutes.

Ma’am alias Sreedevi: Bring lemon tea for me, ok?

And so were the so-called tests cleared, and I became a trained Datawarehousing professional, ready to unleash upon my future team and client the full force of the havoc known as complete and utter ignorance.

However, things didn’t turn out so bad at the end of 6 months in the project – simply because we(me and two others of my ilk) weren’t made to work on anything for the first month and for the next 5, well, lets say that being born required more skill than what we did.

From time to time, the devil in my head (it’s a hot chick wearing a green noodle-strapped blouse and saree [a-la mandira bedi…btw, studying for MBA teaches you some new things…like which bracket to put inside a round bracket] and pouty lips just like Jolie) tries to get me to apply for a mechanical company, but thankfully, sense prevails (meaning – I get cold feet) and I refuse, realizing one thing. If there is one place which demands nothing from my brain, except that it control my fingers, and instead, lets it rot away writing blogs which only I am going to read (and maybe the occasional Client), then that place is IT.

Amen.

Ayanony'mouse'

The workplace in a software company is a place where cleanliness pervades. All the surfaces are shining, no garbage lies around and the white lighting gives one a feeling, when one first enters the bay, of being in heaven ( the one with all the fairies,saints and clouds - all draped in white and totally aimless; not the beaches,girls,wine and riches one). The feeling soon fades away when the person realises that instead of everyone being contented and just lazing around, all of them are hunched forward in their seats, staring at the monitors and hammering away at the keyboard as if some wild orgy is going on and they are controlling the proceedings with their fingers! But when that person, whose name is one, realises that all they are looking at are just rows and rows of lines text, thats when he gets thoroughly nonplussed. But leave Mr. One for now.

So, when in this haven of all that is immaculate and spotless, one finds a mouse doing highly advanced aerobics, viz. leaping from the ground straight onto the top of the drawers, one doesn’t feel like clapping and hooting so much as themselves doing aerobics of no mean sort by leaping a clean 3 inches from the chair at the spectacle. This, I shamefully admit, was the case with me. Though I have killed two mice in my lifetime – both receiving a direct hit from one of my slippers as they were climbing the curtains, and thus, were silhouetted against the daylight, I let out a squeak just as a mouse of my dimensions might have emitted. But thankfully, I wasn’t made to feel ashamed of my reflexive behaviour by my team members. I think they were just glad that it was I who got to witness the egregious event, and not they.

The worst angle to this whole issue is of course, when a specimen of the species mus musculus6 chooses to expel his/her last breath in the vicinity of one’s workstation. Why they should chose to do so, I don’t know. If I had to guess, I would think a celebrity assassin’s mindset at work here ‘If I couldn’t become famous in life, I will become notorious in death.’ The point being, the brown creature’s last breath makes it difficult to take even one breath for sensitive noses like mine. So what do I do then? Call up facilities and services of course. The guy arrives promptly, armed not with whatever people are armed with to remove mice, but a room freshener can. And then, he proceeds to spray the noxious fumes all over the place, making the mild stench of the decomposing diminutive mammal almost welcome. On the brighter side, the development of this foul atmosphere gives me a perfect excuse to slip away for a refreshing cup of hot chocolate in the break-out area.

I wonder why it is called a break-out area. The two things which come to mind the moment one hears the phrase ‘break-out’ are a jail break and an outbreak of some disease. The presence of the furry little animals makes one wonder whether it is not just the first meaning which is intended.

But to be fair to mice, they don’t trouble us a lot. They are in general shy creatures, shunning any publicity and generally keep to themselves. Though I do hope someday they take a liking to the vast network of plastic vines crisscrossing the entire complex. I would gladly change the name of my blog from ayanonymous to ayanonymouse on that day.

P.S. Please see the first comment on my blog for shashank’s sake.

Flying loo

The flight to Bangalore took off at the scheduled time on the 30th day of May, 2006. I was traveling with Jindal to join _____(can't reveal the name of the company, coz tho' plea bargaining has begun in India, I am still not a big fan of soothing body acupressure by the lathis of the gallant upholders of the law) , the company I had fooled into taking me on board. But more about that later.

A few minutes into the flight, nature started calling me incessantly, but thankfully, she didn’t turn up at my doorstep. From my previous experience on a plane, I was thinking that we would be allowed to unfasten our seat belts some 10 minutes into the flight. But 10 minutes came and went. Then 15 and then 20 and then 21, then 22….you get the picture. I was counting the minutes. . A stage appeared when I realized that nature was gonna get really angry and decide to mess up the neat and clean, non-natural interiors of the plane. At that moment, I decided to drown my dignity in a bowl of my foulest smelling juices and asked the air-hostess whether I could get rid of those plastic shackles and head straight for the 4 square feet of paradise which was beckoning me like a newly wed bride beckons her newly wed husband. The husband cant wait to be with his wife but has to free himself from friends who know only too well the reason for his desperation and so , are even more enthusiastic in their display of camaraderie with their fallen comrade. Sadly, my dignity didn’t die a martyr’s death. The air-hostess told me what I already knew – that till the light on top and in front of my seat didn’t turn off, I had to remain seated. Tho’ no one looked at me, I was pretty sure what the others around my seat were thinking – ‘Another gawaar in his first flight’. However, the gawaar had the last laugh, not because he didn’t get the joke, but because the moment the light went out, he bolted like the fabled horse who had bolted before the stable door could be bolted, straight for the promised land. And it did keep its promise. A flood of relief came over me when I released the flood within me. And then I spent some time admiring my profile in the mirror while all the gawaar-accusers stood outside in the aisle, advertising their bloated bladders to all who cared to notice. After I had got enough of an ego-massage, I emerged, at peace with all the world, save for a smirk for all the people in the aisle who would have given their credit cards to have exchanged places with me. Thus sated, I relaxed but my bowels didnt and I continued on my sojourn...

Well, hello! First off, I think there are better things you can do than read my blog. But I guess you know that already. So inspite of the fact that you know that you should be doing something worthwhile,you still persist in reading this? Great! Just the sort of absolutely vella person I was looking forward to. For, trust me, I have serious doubts whether anything in any of my blogs will change your life in any way. You know the famous smoking fact - every cigarette you smoke reduces your life by 5 minutes. But one never knows for sure, does one? I mean, you dont get a sms notification the moment you smoke a ciggy showing your outstanding life, do you? I digress. My point being that smoking a cigarette might reduce your life by 5 minutes, but reading this blog will for sure reduce it by much more than that. Oh, and btw, it has already reduced it by a couple of minutes....just thought I should warn you before you trudge bravely on. Now I intended my first blog to be a sort of introduction to my future blogs but to even attempt to do that would be a lie coz I dont have the foggiest idea what they are going to be on. They can be on anything - right from the effect of reptilian erotica on chameleons to a complete dissertation on the open zip.

Alrighty then! Without any further ado, I leave you at the mercy of my blogs...