Virtual Ramblings

“You” are a Male
“You” are a Kannadiga
“You” are a South Indian
“You” are an Indian
“You” are an Asian
“You” are a Hindu
“You” are Brown
“You” are a IT Professional

When am I going to be “me” , Just “me”?
When am “I” going to be blamed for “my” mistakes ?
when am “I” going to get credit for “my” success?

Its so simple to make instant noodles isn’t it?, I mean all you need to do is turn the packet over, and look for directions as to how to make yourself a wonderful cup of the yummy noodles. I wish many a times that our days were like this, we wake up and open the newspaper and bang, you have all the directions to make your day an awesome one. Two large hour-full spoons of self time, Two and a half cups of  soulful movie with a mate,  A stirring lunch with the family, some boiling playtime with the guys, a cool and soothing dinner at a fancy place, and a couple of miles of moon walk along the beach for the garnishing. Wish it was this simple to make a day awesome, all we need to do is turn over and look for directions

As a kid I remember getting directions from my parents, jumping on the sofa was a big no no, skipping dinner was forbidden, laughing too loudly while having food was almost a un forgivable sin. Sometimes I wish our emotions could take orders like these, I wish I could order myself in the middle of  a busy day, now is the time Laugh loudly, Wish I could forbid thinking anything about work once I reach home, wish I could control my urge to just go up the highs of a vacation when I am supposed to be reviewing an artifact at my workplace. It would be so simple isn’t it, if we could give directions to our mind.

Have you ever checked your deodorant spray? It does have directions for usage, we are supposed to open the cap, keep the nozzle at around 6 inches away from the body, and press the release button for about a second. It also comes with a caution of being highly inflammable, and directs the user to discontinue if a rash develops. Shouldn’t we have such directions to vent our bottled frustrations?, I mean keep your bottled frustration at a safe distance from your family, keep the cap tightly closed, when no ones’ around and you can’t hold it any more, give a  vent for few seconds, one should be cautious of as this can be highly destructible, and should be immediately discontinued in case of any signs rage.

I was once bored and alone in Arizona, and I wanted to go and try meeting someone at a local bar, knowing my socializing abilities, I wanted a backup, I wanted a bar that played music, just in case [in high probabilities] I chicken out speaking to strangers at a bar. So I choose some bar close by on the internet, and take the driving directions from the google maps. I take my car out, and follow the directions the reach the destination, only to find out the bar has long gone, and has been replaced by a dingy and dangerous looking central American place and is named La Bamba. Why does it happen in life, I mean why do we take pains in knowing the exact directions, reach the destination to find out that we were just a bit late, what we wanted has long perished, and whats remaining has nothing to offer.

The topic today over at skittles was “directions”.. and needless to say my mind ran in all four of them

Remember the question I asked some time back?

“People who do not affect us, people who really do not care much about us, people who were close to us once upon a time, people who have grown up and apart, why do they still matter to us so much?, why can’t we forget that people who have drifted apart?“

I think I am back to the same thought again today, I think I found the answer, “Time”, how effectively it makes us forget people, and reduced their need, their importance.

This put a even bigger question on my mind, are people really important?, people who did not stand the test of time, do they still matter to us?, is “mattering” just a function of time?, or time just hides the importance and people will be back to haunt us soon.

1. People who do not affect us, people who really do not care much about us, people who were close to us once upon a time, people who have grown up and apart, why do they still matter to us so much?, why can’t we forget that people who have drifted apart?

2. People whom you have never met, people with whom you have connected, people whom you don’t know in person, why do they still matter to us?, why do we have a feeling of a strong belonging associated with them.

Scene: A table of for four at my workplace cafeteria.

People Involved:
Yours truly: sitting at the end of the table [usual preference]
A good friend: My coworker, good friend and a lunch buddy.
Guy1 [Lets call him Tom]: A reasonable young guy, looks like just out of college, may be an year of work experience max.
Guy2 [Lets call him Dick]: A guy in his mid twenties, neither too young, nor to old confused age I guess.
Guy3 [Lets call him Harry]: A late twenties guy, looks like a north Indian, and speaks like one.

And the fun began.
Me and my friend hurriedly walked into the café, I had been the culprit delaying lunch by about half an hour, you know the usual work pressures. So we walk up to surprisingly empty table in our busy café, and comfortably seat ourselves in the remote end. Somehow I have developed liking for the corner seats and tend to choose the ones in the far most table. As usual we opened our lunch boxes [yep we are fortunate ones who get lunch from home], and began with usual discussion about the project, and whos doing what badly, the usual suspicions as to whats gonna happen to our company, and throwing in the subject of movies once in a while.
Tom and Dick, seeing the empty place walk up to the table and make them comfortable, conversing with each other in hindi, and then a third guy Harry walks in and squeezes himself in between the other two.

Tom [to Dick]: Look Harry looks so concerned, he has began the hunt you know, now he is all tensed..

Tom [to Harry]: hey don’t worry too much about this, Dick can help you with this, btw you should decide on your specs first …

[Read it as, got to decide the specifications, the term used in the cubeland to indicate the requirements for any product/software]

Dick: Yeah you should first find out what you want, just “homely” is not good enough to find what you want.
Dick: I think you should go for a north Indian girl, South Indians are very forward.

*me thinks, Dick must have watched Chak De on Sony last week, talking about forwards..*

Dick Continues… South Indian girls are really well educated, earning well, and also mostly employed in a high paying corporate job. They are self sufficient and know they can live independently.

*me thinks Ah!, Ideal for me, but why “South Indians” and I look up to my friend who can’t stop smiling*

Dick Continues…Now a days you know girls directly ask, do you know basic cooking in the first meeting itself, so its better to employee a cook than marry one.

*me thinks ok at least he thinks wives are not mere cooks*

Harry: Surprised and a little worried by now, oh really? So we should know how to cook?

Dick: yep all IT couples in Bangalore, share the cooking job, if the guy reaches home early he will cut the vegetables by the time wife reaches home, and wife fine tunes them before cooking them

*me thinks, another tech word, fine tuning..job terms in conversations like this make them hilarious.. wow this guy is funny.. but good he wants to help his wife.*

Dick: That’s why you should marry a north Indian girl.. They are excellent managers you know, they take care of both work and home easily, you need not worry a bit.

*me thinks, so here comes the true color*
Tom [who was listening silently so far ], yeah that is the reason why I said, “You should decide on the specs”.

Dick [citing an example], you know my friend was telling this case, one girl who was exactly of the type we want, put up her profile on a matrimony site, and within a week there was a line, so such girls are totally out of reach

Tom: May be you should put up your profile too, some or the other will match your config spec

[Read config spec as the set of rules we define in the clear case to chose a particular version of the file in the vob]

*me thinks this was the limit, config spec hahha I need a break*

My friend was done, so we walked off before I could hear any more c**p

Topic of yesterday’s post lunch walk, was recession. Looks like all we can think of at work these days is how recession is going to affect us and India in general.

Bangalore is known as the IT capital of India, when we were in school there was nothing like IT industry, but this IT industry kind of started only in early 90’s and picked up by mid 90’s and was at peak in late 90’s. People in my parent’s generation, were very keen on getting into a government job, a 9 to 5 permanent source of income, then came the intermediate generation of 80’s where people really had no clue what to do, with no government jobs to take and not much happening in private sector. That followed with IT, drawing people from far parts of India to Bangalore. One thing this did was, the land values sky rocketed, the service industry which was never heard before, like office cleaners, consultants, HR firms providing profiles for jobs, caterers for ever increasing population, the hotel industry ranging from the road side vendors to 5/7 star restaurants, every one started making money. Banking sector also saw a boom, from a conservative India, where people thought saving is the ultimate aim, it drifted away and people began to live on credit, taking huge home loans, vehicle and personal loans, hence banking sector too made a lot of money, employing more people with a high pay packet.

Then came in the BPO, the call center brought in even more moolah, with the youth being pulled into the tech support arena. It became a good source of income to non engineers with a good degree, providing decent to very good pay packets. More money for the youth, meant more money being spent for recreation, movies, restaurants, pubs, coffee places, you name it people started spending more money. Flow of money revolutionized the market, the textile industry, lifestyle stores, even the retail grocery market started making huge profits, and started employing even more people, making the money flow even better.

The economy now seems to be more based on the cash flow, I mean no one seems to be saving too much, people seem to be investing more and more, and spending more and more. So the Indian economy is more or less changing fast into the US economy model. But what would really happen if the incoming money stops, what if IT does really slow down, and many people get back to conservative money saving mode? How badly will the economy be affected. Can the economy still survive with the money that has already flown in?. Can it continue to flow around keeping all of us in a good state?

I was of the opinion that no, we are going to see huge troubles if the IT generated income stops. I feel the chain will get broken and hence all other sectors might get affected. The business might slow down, and hence other businesses might get affected too, the real estate values might come down, and since many people already have huge loans, the banking sector is also going to see losses, service industry is going to get affected, and almost every one is going to see a dip.

My friend felt no, its not going to affect that much, according to him, the IT industry is still a very small part of Indian economy, and we have enough businesses to keep up the economy. Cities like Bangalore and Noida might get affected, because of the high technology population, but then rest of India is going to survive.

I do not think so, look at travel industry, I mean domestic airlines might see a dip, even the middle men in many areas might have to find a different job.

All this leaves me with just one question, what next, whats going to be the next big industry which is going to take the place of the IT world. Ideas anyone?

Its been one of those days where one wake up feeling kind of low, and all he can think about are the points of lows in recent times, then he switches on TV hoping to listen to some good music, and all he gets to hear are sad songs, and making him want to listen to more sad songs. A day where one seem to wait for that ’single’ spark which shall light up the day…

I think in this world, there are two kinds of people,

One who set themselves up for challenges, work hard, conquer them, and then try to move onto better challenges.

One who set themselves up for challenges, work hard, conquer them, enjoy the results, and continue to look for challenges in what they do.

I am talking purely about professional career here.

I and my friend S might have spoken about this topic like thousand times. She more or less belonged to the former category and me the later one.

I had a tough time when I left my first company; I am really of the old school of thought where one works for a company for a lifetime, if allowed. I had to quit because I was very dissatisfied with my job. I have been with this job ever since.

People, young professionals like us, [well we are not young anymoreJ], but people who just move out of college are generally very enthusiastic about work they do. With years of hard work put into studies, they want to show their talent in things they do. When they join a company, and within few months come to terms with reality, they realize that not every aspect of the job is challenging, and not all work that happens around the technology company is the kind of research they dreamt off.

I have been there, I have lived the days where I felt any stupid person can do what I do, I have seen people around me feel the same about the standard of work that happens in technology companies here in Bangalore. Slowly we begin to learn the “job”, even though we had the basic knowledge of how to do, we were so raw. I can really see the difference in professional me, when compared to me from days of college. The work still excites me is still the same, but the work items that excite me have changed so much.

Coming back to the topic, of moving on or sticking to a company, I guess both are right, it’s just what you choose.

Somewhere when we work in a company for many years, we get into a comfort zone, we tend to do the things in a way which is fit only for that company, we get used to it, and after that many years it might get tougher to get used to the other company outside. Mental ability too, I mean you keep on working on a particular product or a project, your knowledge gets very streamlined, so chances of survival when that product dooms might be very difficult.

I kind of agree with S, when she thinks in the above manner. She always told me that many settle in their comfort zone, and never try to come out of it.

I am not defending myself here, but still my ideologies are different, when you work so hard to build your legacy in a company, learn the tricks of trade over there, when you still enjoy to do what you are doing, should you really quit because you are used to it?, or you need to get out of the comfort zone?. I know the answer is not simple.

The Rupee appreciation in front of the dollar has hit the Indian job market badly, but still there is demand for talent, if you market yourself properly, and if I get to jump out of my current job, and join another company, I am sure I can look forward to a raise of at least 30-40% raise in my annual compensation. Isn’t that a good enough reason I should change?, also company I am currently working for is not doing that great in the market, so there is always clouds of uncertainty about the future, but then every technology company is not doing well right now, the doubt will be there in any other company.

Again it all boils down to the individual, one who likes to move on, would chose to move onto various other challenges outside, look for a constant challenges outside in different companies, go test new waters, learn and move onto newer companies.

I wouldn’t say that’s bad at all. It does sound very exciting. But there are people who like to stick on, learn more, dig deep, enjoy the success, search for challenges, and build a legacy within.

Debates never end, well that’s what I like about friends and friends with different view point, and they provide so much to think about.

Some of my old readers might remember a two part post which I did some time back, “It happened “ and “couple of good news” . It was one of those posts where some of the people were disappointed at my behavior, and some excited as to what might follow. The part 3 of that story never happened and till today I never saw that girl/woman again.

Why did I think about that incident?, you might wonder. I see a lot of campaign going on TV these days, saying stop leching. I have read numerable blogs which talk about the subject eve teasing, incidents related to molestation which seem to be finding headlines in Indian media almost every other day. People at mall’s being groped and comments of sexual nature being passed at, passers by. I totally agree that these forms of crime against women should not be tolerated; more importantly should be dealt with bigger punishments. Women today are being subjected to this kind of nonsense, and high levels of humiliation, is this making smaller crimes like looking/staring acceptable?. Firstly is looking/staring really a crime.

I have to admit, I am a little confused when it comes to the difference between looking and staring. I did what I knew best searching for it over the internet

star•ing: To look directly and fixedly, often with a wide-eyed gaze. See synonyms at gaze.

look•ing: employ one’s sight, especially in a given direction or on a given object: looking out the window; looked at the floor.

So from this, it appears as if “looking” is just having a glance where as, starting is to have a prolonged and wide eyed look. So how often men/women are guilty with this?. I mean we all look at things around us, and people of opposite sex happen to be around us, so we do spot them. So may be looking is not that much of a crime. Moving onto the staring part, after one has had a look, if he/she continues to look with deeper interests, in a fashion making the person of interest conscious, that would constitute a “stare”. Now is that bad?. I feel yes in most cases.

There have been numerous times, when I am really angry and have given wide long stares at the other person, Instead of yelling out abuses or even breaking into a verbal fight. So I do know consciously when I want to stare, how to do it. If one has really bad intentions, he/she might end up indulging in “staring” for bad reasons. However when the intentions are not consciously bad, when one is genuinely looking when it turns into a stare is a difficult line to draw. How many times have we caught ourselves staring at something or someone without even realizing? So when that happens, does that constitute a crime?. Going by the approach that, a murder committed unconsciously still constitutes a crime, this as well might end up in such a bracket. All it calls for is more self control.

So coming back to the twin incidents, was I guilty?. May be yes for looking, and definitely no for staring, not at this case atleast, mainly because if I know me, you can relate, when I say that, most of my staring happens in the “mind”, where I tend to think about things which matter to me the most in a person. Infact one of the most common problems I face in public places is when, I kind of get lost in my thoughts, my eyes drifts unknowingly to a distant object, mainly towards sky, or a distant gate in view, or the most commonly window by the side, at this moment if someone is sitting in the line of sight, I have ended up being conscious of the fact that someone might mistake that I am staring at them.

I don’t claim to be a hermit, I do look around, and very rarely continue to look at people from opposite sex, but it needs a very good mood. I mean normally I am never in good mood. When I walk around the city, and chose to walk with my head down or up towards the sky, I have imagined many a times, that girls around me might think what kind of a fool I am to do that, or whats wrong with him.

I recently came across a project called “Blank noise”. . I had seen this couple of months ago, and was wondering how men can contribute to such projects, today got to read some sections in the site, mainly to understand what really bothers women, and how bad is the situation. Looking at the statistics there, the situation seems to be really bad. So we do need more of us to contribute. So made me wonder how I can contribute. What we can all do is first consciously avoid doing simplest of things, even things like starting or avoidable ‘looking’. One might be really good, but if his/her friend tries to indulge in such things, or even try to glorify it as achievement, be quick to point out how stupid they are to think that as achievement. Atleast try and discourage people around you who try to whistle or pass comments. We can do atleast this much cant we?