Another train journey!
Another train journey! Wooo hoooo…
Well I guess the cribbing days are gone. Not that the journey was top class or anything, but this time Lakshmi and me had company – sjpaul (Officially Johnny) . To write more about sjpaul I would have to give you a brief draft about the character. sjpaul is a colleague who is loved by most of the female colleagues. This is mostly because of his charms; his childish charms. He is not tall as the average male but has a sense of humor and spirit that is way beyond anything the average male would have. In all a great person to hang out with. That being said, he is also a person who takes the entire world’s garbage. Absolute immunity to any kind insult/harassment vented out to him. I am sure he must feel the pang but well, not everybody likes to react in public. Wish he could also teach us how to get immunity to some creatures.
On Friday, 6 July, we start out to the station, four of us – Ujj, Sail, sjpaul , and me. Lakshmi had to take the opportunity to board a running a train, so she decided to make it only at the last minute and hence did not join us. Ujj’s train was the first scheduled to leave, and a visible panicky Ujj was who we saw when we picked her up. Dear sjpaul did his best to cheer her up. We even thought of the sequence from Sivaji where Shriya decides to stop the train. sjpaul actually suggested we call Shriya up to stop the train for Ujj. It was also for obvious reasons, not that he was entirely selfish. Finally we reach, and Ujj and sjpaul run to get her on her train. Finally seated and relieved of her tension, we continue with our usual business – ranting about the usual stuff and the usual people. As it neared Ujj’s train’s departure time, and there was no sign of the event, we thought it would be great for Sail to board her train. We went along with her to the platform; our train was coming there as soon as hers departed. We got into the a/c compartment which she had opted. The three of us relaxed a bit and then as we got the feeling we were becoming a public nuisance we got out. Lakshmi had joined us in the mean while and was sitting with Sail in the compartment and as usual got out from a moving train. sjpaul and Lakshmi discussing about the various methods of boarding and getting off a moving train followed the event! - The kind of conversation that I do not want to take part in. Then after some commenting on the people around us, we stayed put till our train came. Finally, we got into the train and settled down. sjpaul was like the “Kid” who had to get the window seat and we decided all the three would get the window seat by the compromising. Photos will be put up if I get them. We then started talking about stuff. With sjpaul there can only be one kind of conversation, rather only one topic that most people would shun in public. But then a revelation would be when he gets into the serious mode, he means serious. I think he will get there after reading the blog. So after discussing about our respective love lives and having found out that I, unlike my companions, let romance pass me by, we decided to get some food. Unfortunately we had this one person who I would prefer to name “blessed one” (BO) who had to interrupt and make friends with sjpaul . And he further discussed how we were loud and all that we spoke off was heard and would have definitely made a few plays and replays in his mind. There was no good intention in the conversation. Although any other motive was not explicitly evident. But yes, it was disturbing, and sjpaul ’s ears bleed. Poor sjpaul ! BO was supposedly working for the MNC and was a big guy having to report to the Big boss’s right hand! : P he apparently gave us a lot of gyan on how he intends to get the competitor’s product’s quality better than ours. Lets not underestimate here; there is always room for improvement. I have no clue or no interest in knowing what he advised sjpaul about, but apparently a hassled sjpaul had to be rescued. And Lakshmi came to his rescue by asking him to join her and play a game of cards. Poor sjpaul . Wonder why people, even if it was true, have to impose their positions on others. And why on people you don’t know. Lakshmi and I soo felt bad for sjpaul who had to put up with him for very long. When sjpaul and Lakshmi got out to get food, he came around and introduced himself and all that and went on to say what he did. But how is it that when you are who you claim to be you don’t know most of the little things that are associated with your work. Well I guess when you get to higher positions you have to forget the little things that laid foundations to get you where you are. I just could not wait for them to get back. After telling, rather after dominating Lakshmi and switching off the lights so everyone could sleep and not disturb us anymore, we spent some more time and I dozed off, while Lakshmi took up the task of putting the baby (sjpaul ) to sleep. Reaching Chennai, we handed over sjpaul to his guardians who were waiting for him and spent some time socializing, where Lakshmi asked me to write about the trip.
He does it again!(FYI search for “Johnny jokes” community on orkut)
He could do with some “grooming” 
:P Thrrrrr…..
It really does not make sense to me. Actually it does. I just need to crib about something in life and I conveniently find a reason to. Especially when I have to put-up with weird people in confined spaces. The act of “acting” professional is hard to encounter these days. Of course, with a majority of freshers and not-so-fresh freshers you cannot expect much. Guess daddy spoilt me bad in my learning years. Having the ad/marketing/media industry and the way it functions, and the publishinag sector for whatever time I was there, this job seems to hold my interest for a lot weird reasons. When we had interns in my dad’s office or his friends offices, it was soo much fun. While interning they would simply come in their torn jeans or whatever they could, lay their hands, unless they were the PGP people. Then all of a sudden, if they are absorbed, the entire, makeover happens. Punctuality, professionalism creeps in. Guess it the increase in the paycheck. Nevertheless, all hell breaks loose at almost all parties. Here on the other hand, it really is opposite. I really like the culture at this office but it often is a topic to ponder about. Supposedly, as far as I have read in the magazines and all surveys that include my employer, the culture is a key contributor to the success of the business. A culture is essentially made of its people; no two humans are of the same kind. Maintaining a volatile environment is difficult in this case. The key may lie in taking in people of the same frequency in a particular team or a department itself. However, that it is not 100% foolproof. I have not seen the global scene in all the departments. Though in this office, nay! Anyways, now we have a so-called open environment. I say so-called, as it has to differ from the other cultures. If you have to make a comparison between this office and the head office, well firstly, shame on you for the thought itself, but am sure you will need an endless excel sheet to make note of the differences. The very fact that we are not in close proximity to the top management would make us miss the opportunity of taking pride in the biggest solar panel J and a lot more of these thoughtful steps taken to improve the campus.
Yet this campus in itself is quite a thing in the peninsula. Free food, transport etc. come on aren’t you already feeling a li’l pang. However, yeah I guess that’s exactly where our pay packages differ. They give me enough food at work, but I guess if I had a family back home to feed, it would not be enough. That’s the catch. Simple! However, people like me shamelessly confess that this is just for the “brand” on my resume after a period! However, what hurts me the most is to see the exploitation happening. We can go on cribbing about the exploitation of human resources and the earth’s non-renewable sources of energy; but no one ever cares to see how much you exploit the company. I do it too… I write all this trash on my laptop, copy it over and publish it online. No one cares as long as it is not “confidential” information that is being published. The fact that almost everyone uses the company’s resources not for their own good, but for “material pleasures” is quite disturbing. It could create a bigger impact in the long run, if the tendency spreads that is. Like when you are assigned cab timing, it makes sense that u report to it at the given time, and not treat the cab and its driver as someone employed by your family to chauffeur you around – just go and don’t keep the cabbie waiting. His time is precious too. I have no clue why I am soo keen on bringing up stories from the cab every time. Anyways, after the comment by “Anonymous” I went into introspection. Anon had actually brought out some good points – the one with the confined spaces thing, well, I really can’t jump out of a moving cab can I? Nevertheless, I should appreciate the points brought were quite a new perspective to blogging, however whenever I want to crib I think blogging is better than actually going around showing my attitude and throwing tantrums. Although I am contemplating, creating a tag called cribbing so you can skip it if you actually see it tagged as such. 
