A corporate life

I am a software engineer. We, the software engineers, driven by growing business needs, build efficient code, develop complex software and change the world. Our primary focus is to pursue strategic initiatives, help our company to dominate the market share and become the leading player in the global sector. Thinking out of the box is in our DNA.

Big, big words.

Well, this is how my weekdays turn out to be.

Windows 0.0

The day starts with forty engineers waiting for the shuttle. A 50-seater bus arrives at sharp 10:15 in the morning, with thirteen people already picked up from the previous stop. Now, if you are good at math, you WILL NOT want to end up amongst the last three. To the uninitiated, if you are working in a mass-recruiting company with a decent sex ratio, don’t try to be chivalrous if you don’t want to be a part of the standing committee.

Try as hard as I may, I never, ever get hold of a window seat. There they are. The cool guys with neatly combed hair, and the beautiful ladies with long, black, silky threads of attraction (seriously? Threads of attraction?) camping next to the windows. Did I mention the windows are shut- always - and sealed with M-seal, lest a strand of hair moves out of its defined place?  Whatever happened to “Live in the sunshine, swim the sea, drink the wild air”? It just makes me sick, literally, to sit in a fully-loaded bus with ventilation suppressed to zilch.  I mean, why sit next to the window if you don’t want to open it? 

So, I put on the display-vulnerability-politely makeup. 

“Could you please open the window a little bit? Actually, I’m claustrophobic.”

You should try this once.  It works every time. I might as well say that I’m hippo phobic. I’m pretty sure they think that I’m suffering from a terminal illness and they are fulfilling my last wishes.

Ping!

Life is beautiful. The elevator doors open up and I’m the only soul waiting in the lobby. Gleefully, I enter the elevator and press “6” to have a nice veg-cheese-sandwich at the cafeteria. There is nothing like extra cheese to brighten up your day. Okay, apart from chocolate.

Ping

A lady in red has pressed the button outside. So, a polite smile and a 3-second wait as she enters and presses “3”. The doors begin to close.

Ping

Cool. Two more gentlemen for the fourth floor. Nods of acknowledgement exchanged. The doors begin to close.

Ping

Five more fellow workers. The more, the merrier. One not-so-slim guy to the first floor, and the rest to the fifth. I move to a corner. Sir, that walk to the first floor would have improved our country’s average life expectancy and saved a lot of us some precious time. Never mind. The doors begin to close. 

Ping

A couple more guys enter. Please don’t press 2.Please, I beg you. Ooh, thank god! There is a collective sigh of relief. I’m not the only one eh? The doors begin to close.

Ping

Alas, even god is a sadist. One more female sneaks in and presses “2”. Just awesome! A pit-stop at every turn.

cmus, it is not the destination but the journey that matters.

By now, half of us are frustrated.  The doors begin to close. And this time, for real. The two metal pieces are THERE! Almost touching each other.

Ping

The doors move apart. A dude looks at us, deep in thought. We all glare right back at him.

Come, come, we are having a party inside.

And, he enters. How he manages to squeeze in between us, god only knows. And then… nothing happens. I start chanting in my head, “Close sesame. Close sesame.” 

Only to be interrupted by a sexy automated female voice,”Sorry. This elevator is over-loaded.”

We all look at Dude. Dude thinks aloud, “I think it's me.”

No shit, Sherlock. 

Dude pushes himself outside. The doors begin to close. The metal pieces are in contact. Finally!

Ping

SON-OF-A…
  
No work and no play makes cmus a dull boy

Hope. Every day, I enter my bay(I call it ‘The cage’) with a sense of hope. A hope for the tiniest bit of intellectual stimulation. Not a day goes by when I don’t yearn to do something other than the usual, routine, mind-numbingly boring work. Most of the time, my mind is devoid of thoughts. A machine brought to r(e/u)st. I can sit and stare at the monitor for hours and think nothing. Just like that. I would’ve made Paramahansa Yogananda proud. Attained eternal spiritual peace, didn’t I? If you’re able to think nothing for more than a minute, then I think even you’ve attained spiritual peace.

And, there is no play. Every site, social networking site, porn site, blog site, game site, web site other than Google and a few other news sites, is blocked. So I make do with the alternative for porn site available.

The Times Of India.

Then, there are the peeping Toms. I simply cannot do anything when someone stands behind me or sits next to me and stares stupidly at my monitor. My chatting / surfing comes to an immediate halt and I open a text editor and start typing queries, “SELECT * FROM “ like a moron. Why aren’t these people curious about Baby Bachchan or Shahrukh Khan’s six pack abs and google it at their own work-stations?

And then, a smile to end your day

It has been more than a year and I’m yet to figure out the science behind this - ":)"

Nike, Reebok, Adidas – I wear these logos so that people take notice of me, the attention-seeker that I am. My colleague sports a 10k Fossil watch. Well, mine costs a digit lesser and shows time too, but that’s not the point. He says it gives him confidence and reflects in his body language and all. True.

But, I cannot simply understand the reason for my learned friends to pin up a sweet smiley onto their t-shirts or bags. I mean, I always thought the neat tick mark or the three slanting pillars in increasing order of size were like badges of honor. Why add your "badge of honor"(read disgrace) to the badge of honor?!
Anyway, I keep trying unsuccessfully to come up with a rationalization for this irrational behavior and I’ve given up for now. I could just vent out some of my annoyance here at the glowing smiles on an otherwise elegant bag, but I wouldn’t do as much justice as my calm and patient roomie/colleague Bazi, does. 

So, that’s about it. A day out of a corporate life. Have a nice day. :)
 



4 comments:

  1. One Q: How effing huge is your lift man ? Some 15-20 ppl go at once or wat ? :O

    And where is the smiley ? I can see some other symbol ;)

    ReplyDelete
  2. The label inside the lift says, "20 persons - 1350 kilograms". That should answer your question. A dozen people can go at once comfortably.

    And, edited. Thanks. :)
    Not sure why it's not showing up a smiley.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lol I was reading this online, and this post was the first thing that came to my mind.
    http://thedoghousediaries.com/3354

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. LOL. Never realized that the buttons were part of the scam as well.

      Delete