Parables of a Survivor in Chennai Part 4 : The Final Testament

It would be unwise not to mention the funniest part regarding this particular email.

Originally I wrote it more than a week back. But I decided not to send it that early because people tend to get bored with reading long stories, especially when it has nothing to do with their own lives. So I decided to give them a break.

But just few days back when I got the offer from Cognizant to join in Kolkata, I could not resist to write the 'Twist in the Tale' part. Whatever I have written here under this topic, was actually my first reaction.

But after speaking to a lot of people, I got very confused and was in a great dilemma. In fact, there was a stage when I had met my HR and actually said "I want to resign. Please guide me through the official formalities." !! I also have the resignation letter still saved in my draft folder. But, again in a dilemma, just before clicking on the 'Send' button, I started re-thinking. I called up the Cognizant HR, who (thankfully) said that there is absolutely no guarantee that I would be posted to Kolkata after completion of my training there. So, it appeared pointless to take this risk and start my career afresh in another (in fact smaller) company. But, after a meeting with my delivery manager, I found the work to be very non-challenging, so I again started thinking about resigning! Hahahaha!!!

However, some of the people, including my parents, friends and relatives gave me a lot of strength to stick to the original decision. And now, here I am, back to square one, coincidentally matching exactly with the original decision! (Yesterday, I met the HR again and told him "I decided to stay." He gave me a pat on the back, shook my hand and said, "Welcome back again!". Coincidentally, the HR's name is also Vivek! )

Another twist is that, I am going to Kolkata anyway, in fact I will reach there just after 2 days, and in a leave of 16 days (who says Infosys is not like a government job? :P ) !!! My ticket in Coromondal Express just got confirmed a few minutes back.

Kolkata, here I come ! Behold Durga Puja !

Hahahahaha !!!!


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The Horrible House Hunt : The Final Testament

The three most basic things that a man wants is : food , shelter & sex. Well, in my previous accounts I have covered the fooding part here. I'll be omitting the 'sex' part too as I have had no experience so far !

First of all, from the moment we stepped out of our hostels in Mysore, we knew that time has come for mutual compromises. In a far-away foreign land, where there is hardly any resemblance to our accustomed culture and language, it would be very difficult (if not impossible) to thrive alone. Moreover, the company has not blessed us with a handsome amount of money, which makes most of the things simple ! Hence, the only way to our survival is to live in a group and compromise for each other.

Though we are only 11 familiar people here (language-wise & college-wise), but still there exists a 6+5 further sub-grouping. Anyway, me belonging to the smaller group which was also void from the non-existence of the Tamil-spoken Abhishek Palit, it was initially difficult for us to go out and fix things. But, thanks to him, later he did help us out a lot.

From the first day in here, we noticed our bank balance decreasing almost as much as our receding hairlines ( the fallen hair being accumulated in the bathroom drains and the spent money being accumulated in the vendors' cash boxes). Thus there had to be a way to atleast save one of them. None of us being dermatologists, helplessly we entrusted our hair to the big brands of anti-hairfall shampoos. But being in full control of our money (hardly so, but there's a consolation we get in saying this ! ), we decided to put one or several sharp bumpers in the route of passage of the money to the said vendors.

We had started looking for flats from the first day we put our feet down in this blessed land. Before coming here, we had done some research on the place, however, as most researchers know, theory cannot be implemented unless faced with the practical facts. We had done many calculations before coming here, but all the equations broke down in this black hole of a place.

One of our friends, Arijit, had arranged for a flat for himself in a place called Sylvan County, which is in just the opposite footpath of the Infosys main gate. It is the only residential area in the Mahindra City SEZ. On the first day, we were ready to shell out about 4500 each for our shelter (which was excluding the maintainance and electricity charges). We went to the office and directly asked for contact numbers of the flat owners who are ready to give their flats for rent. They gave us a list of only 15 people, in which a single person had appeared four times. Hence the actual number of 'house-lords' came down to 12. More or less happy with this finite list (we actually had thought that the list would be close to infinite !), we started ringing them up one by one.

(I'm grouping similar cases together, which may not be the actual chronology of the calls) :
The first 4 persons were kind enough to cut the call short while it was still ringing, perhaps as a symbolic gesture that they weren't interested ! The 5th person started shouting (seems like he had had enough calls lately), the 6th owner said he would not rent anything to the bachelors, the 7th & 8th person said their flats were already rented. 9th & 10th persons' mobile numbers were non-existent.

Yes, only ONE person (holding 4 flats) was interested in us ! But as it turned out, our interest dried up as fast as water does in desert sand, when he quoted his price. He demanded 36,000 as the room fare for a 3BHK apartment, and only 3,60,000 as the initial deposit. As per simple arithmetic calculations, each of us had to pay an initial amount of 66,000 to get it. Laughing at each other, we couldn't help but cut the phone in his face as soon as this realization appeared in our minds' calculators. Then I called him again. I told him, the quote he was making, was more than 120% of the salary the company would pay us in a year! And if divided by six, we cumulatively would be able to pay at max the amount that was calculated for each individual ! He was disinterested. Hence our quest for Sylvan County faced an unprecedented immature termination.

We knew nothing about this place. Barren lands everywhere, the only choice that immediately came to our minds was to go to the HR and ask him for extended accomodation in the hostels or threaten him of resigning from the company. When we actually went to him, the young person, who ironically was my namesake, gave a nice smile and said that extension can be readily granted but on deduction of Rs.1000 from each of our salary per day of stay here ! We felt like jumping over his head like Obelix and implant him in the tiled floor of the room he was standing in. Frustrated, demoralised, desparate, we moved out hastily and angrily whamming the poor lift button on our way down. Perhaps the torture was predicted on that button, as it was metallic and gave a sharp jab back to me, faithfully abiding by Newton's Third Law of Motion. Now hurt inside and outside, I felt like blasting like a over-aerated balloon.

Now started the true adventure. Roaming in the sizzling streets and highway, dirt leaving their marks on every inch of our clothing and shoes, we were like half-lunatic gypsies traversing the barrens of the Mahindra City outskirts.

We badly needed a modem (MOdulator-DEModulator) to interpret and encode in the Tamil language. As Palit was busy looking for their own group's house, he was unavailable. Hence we needed a broker. But hardly we knew, that ranging from the vegetable-stall owner on the road to the Infosys sweeper, either is a broker himself or has contacts of dozens of them! Intially ignorant of this fact, we started taking random samples from our surroundings and we were very elated when the hit-rate came very close to 100% ! We deduced that nobody had their paternal homes nearby in this blessed place and most of them travelled a long distance ( from as far as Tambaram ) by train or bus everyday to get here. But they had one thing in common, which we did not. They were accustomed to the weather. The blazing sun, which forced us to hide under a shelter for every metre we walked, the same sun appeared very cool and comfortable to them at this time of the year. Hence, keeping in mind the fast adaptability of the human body, still it was impossible for us to travel long distance to office.

The initial search began with a phone number provided by Ananya, girlfriend of Dhona. The contact person's name was Dominic, who later turned out was igonorant of both English & Hindi, as usual (even names can be deceiving !). We went to SP Kovil bus-stop and after asking (chanting the name 'Dominic') a score of shop-owners and pedestrians, at last somebody pointed out the supposedly right place. On the first knocking of the door, we were welcomed by a continuous bark of a terrier, who was very willing to come to us (and do nothing very pleasing for us guests! ), but God bless the iron gate, his boundary was well-defined within it. Feeling a sense of security, one of our friends Anubrata, took the opportunity to teach the dog a dictionary a acid-words in our mother-tongue ! As well guessed by you, the dog wasn't much pleased, and continued in its efforts of driving us away from the vicinity. However, after some considerable time, a humanly face appeared from behind a door and said something in Tamil. We just repeated on saying "House Rent", and god bless the woman, after repeating only a dozen times she made enough gesture to let us know that the flat was already rented. Thus ended our first effort. In vain, of course!

Anurag, the unfortunate guy from Madhya Pradesh, who was the only one in his friends' group to have adorned Mahindra City (whereas all his friends got in Hyderabad, just 2hours away from his home), somehow got a number of a local broker from a senior friend. He turned up in a 18th Century Bike after 40 minutes of waiting (we had given up almost all hopes and were back counting the time to our melting in the mid-day sun). He told us to go to the Urapakkam bus-stand. When we reached there by a bus, he pointed to some big blue buildings 800 metres away and wheezed off. No umbrella, no cap, nothing to give any respite, without food all day and thriving on Britannia cakes & cold drinks & chips, we picked up ourselves and dragged to our new destination.

Surprisingly, we liked the place at the first sight. The 12-floored buildings (total 4 in number) were such built and almost at any time of the day, the huge open space in between the buildings was under a shade. A cool strong breeze was blowing. If we did not have the pangs of hunger in our stomachs, after the long walks and tiresome journeys, we would have surely fallen asleep there! It took almost an hour for the broker to bring the keys. But, god bless their holy minds, the key to the outer grill of the entrance was missing in the cluttering collection of about 30 keys that he had brought! It took another 30minutes to arrange for a hammer, and for the first time in my life, I witnessed the breaking down of a 8-lever strong lock with the application of crude human labour! The lock revolted with sharp rotations and shrill metallic sounds, but gave in after about 15 more minutes of battle. You should have witnessed this : A small 4 square inch of a lock versus 2 fully grown south-indians battling each other, a grand scene indeed!

The unfurnished flat was spacious, more or less airy, and livable and decently priced at 12,000. We all liked it. The society around was also apparently civilized. But later, it turned out to be too civilized as many constraints were imposed upon us. Cooking non-veg items was stricly prohibited. Some timings were given for checking in and out of the place and no guests were allowed inside. It was okay with us, but the biggest constraint still protruding was the distance from the campus. It would take atleast 20-25minutes by bus to reach the Mahindra City main gate. It was too much for us. Anyway, showing our eagerness to book the flat, we checked out to see our other options.

In the same region, we entered another group of flats. They were fully furnished with cupboards, TV, washing machine, cots etc and quoting a decent price of 3000 per head. The owner was also very leniant on us non-vegetarians for mentioning (let me quote directly) "You can also kill any animal inside my flat, I have no issues with that !" Killing exactly was not in our lists so far (apart from killing our HRs in Mysore & here), but as that was now granted, we thought to give a serious second thought to that, and started thinking of a place to dispose off the bodies! Showing our eagerness to book the flat, we moved on to the last option for the day. The greatest surprise !

It was a bachelor's heaven! An independant bungalow with huge internal decorations, AC in every bedroom, fully furnished rooms with satin bedsheets, cozy couches and a TV connection with one year subscription of Tata-Sky paid in advance ! It appeared to be a King's palace in this region. The price was a decent 22,000 with an advance of 1,00,000. If anyone would have taken my side, I would have booked it immediately. But having options in living cheaper, people from the group opted out. I was very sad initially. But my whole month's salary was less than 22K and there was fooding costs too (if it wasn't I'd have lived there myself alone), so I had to accept that this was not going to be my place. We ended our house-hunt for the day.

Having the three options we chatted late into the night that day. And we arranged for other options the next day also. By this time, the other group had finalized a independant bungalow for themselves at a superb price of 12,000. The place was awesome, with ACs in 3 bedrooms and spacious rooms, well planned halls and kitchens and a nice terrace. The only constraints being too close to the rail-lines and having nothing in the surroundings. Within vast empty fields there was this building, completely surrounded by darkess at night. There was no locality. On the other hand,there was also nobody to ask questions and frown at your lifestyle. You could be completely at peace with yourself. We were jealous!

Next day, finally we got our place to stay. An orange building ( I dont know why the people here have an inclination towards fluroscent colours, especially when it comes to colouring the buildings! Right from the first day when we stepped in Chennai, we all noticed fluroscent green and fluroscent orange coloured buildings. Hardly did we guess then that we ourselves would have to stay in something like that! ). Anyway, this unfurnished independant house was overall decent, very near to the Mahindra City main gate (5 minutes walk) and had 2bedrooms, 3bathrooms, 1 puja-room, 1 hall, a car-parking space and a big terrace. We had to pay a rent of 9000 per month and an initial deposit of 40,000. There was 3/4 buildings nearby, mostly barren and a nice view of the hills nearby. We were more or less happy with the location and price. We would enjoy unlimited freedom in our actions (without causing any damage to the house property, of course) and also zero social disturbance.

Epilogue :

As this account was too much extended, you must have by now developed a sore eye (assuming you read every word I've written) like I have developed sore fingers. But it gives me an immense relief on penning (read: typing) down the whole story vividly as this deserved to be told in case we failed to survive in Chennai.

Sometimes, you may think that Life is doing very injustice to you, putting you through the toughest tests and making you suffer and demanding great sacrifices for every little achievement. But, what we fail to see that if you take all this in the right positive attitude, it makes you stronger. As one of my idols, Einstein puts it : "If I were to lead a layman to the path of success that I know, I would rather lead him through the sufferings and pains that I have been through instead of the short-cuts that I have learnt with experience now. Because it will make him appreciate the achievement at the end of the day." Sometimes maybe the destination is not so important as the way to reach it is.

Twist in the Tale :

In the Campus selections, I got placed in two IT companies. First was Cognizant, and the second Infosys. As Cognizant office was in our hometown Kolkata, most of us waited anxiously for its joining date. But deceiving all of us, it finally intimated the joining date (by the time we already had 3 months experience in Infosys) almost 15 months late of our passing out from college. So, thinking it would not honour our offers, we had joined Infosys. Moreover, Cognizant had posted us in Chennai. Being in Chennai already and passing the Infosys training successfully, there was no point switching companies.

But, just 2 days back I had a pleasant shock ! Cognizant sent a mail notifying that my joining date has been pre-poned to 29th September and I'll be posted to Kolkata !

After going through all the hardships here, and having no guarantee of being assigned to a project immediately, it was obviously very tempting for me to re-think. The comfort of my own home, being surrounded by the people I love, and the food that brings peace to my stomach and the last but not the least, saving almost 90% of the salary ... all these were too strong temptations to avoid.

I could resign here and also refuse to pay the bond-money, resulting being black-listed in this company, which means I will be never re-considered for re-hiring here (which doesnt matter anyway to me, as I have plans of higher studies ).

But, after giving a lot of thought, I've decided to stay in Infosys.

It is very shameful for me to leave the battle unfought. I want to see a winner when I face myself in the mind's mirror at the end of the day. I refuse to accept defeat ... I will fight the toughest conditions here and I want to explore the limits of my endurance. I will leave this place with honour, dignity and with a bigger offer somewhere else. I want to re-embrace Kolkata as a winner. Not now, not like this. I am a fighter. I want to prove myself. A fighter does not compromise with honour and step back. There is plenty of time to live a comfortable life.

We have to stay here in Chennai Mahindra City for atleast an year (if we choose to switch companies) or two (if we want an inter-DC transfer). I have accepted my fate and as I've always believed in the fighting-spirit of a true martial-artist, I take pride in saying :

"Come ye waves of trials and challenges ... for I am ready."
(Grandmaster Oyama)

Love,
Vivek

P.S. : Please give me a feedback on my trial to portray the story to you. I would really appreciate your response.

Regards
Vivek Panda